Staging

We closed on the new house May 28 and are getting ready to renovate, but before I talk about that, I’d like to talk about the importance of staging.

When our realtor first came to see our existing house, she mentioned that she often used a professional stager before bringing in the photographer.  By the time she was done looking over the house, she thought I might try staging the house myself.  I wasn’t opposed to using a professional, but thought it might be a fun challenge to give it a try.  She gave me some tips and set me loose.

First, we had to move A LOT of furniture and stuff over to the basement of the new house.  I tried to adhere to the cardinal rules of no pets (easy, since we have none), no kids (harder, because we have four) and no religion (which required the removal of a single Buddha statue).  My guiding vision was what I like to call "hotel room bland."

Then, I tried to create space in every storage area so prospective buyers could envision there was enough space for their stuff.  I emptied the top shelves of the closets, and the top two shelves of each kitchen cabinet.  The bookshelves had to be thinned out considerably; here are before and after shots:

 In the first photo, I had already started arranging the books by color.  After pulling out all of the "excess" (i.e., not color-coordinated) books, I removed some of the shelves as well, then moved some of the accents around to try and achieve a pleasing composition.  Ikea offered a few inexpensive pops of color in the form of the lime green lampshade and the hot pink lantern.

We followed the standard staging guidelines about clear surfaces, shined faucets, cords out of sight, and smoothed bed linens, and turned on all the lights in advance of the photographer's arrival.  The photos turned out great and we listed our house last Friday morning.  By the next afternoon, we had an offer.  Our house has a lot of nice features, but I truly believe the staging made all the difference.  It got all the stuff out of the way so buyers could focus on all those nice features and envision themselves in the space.

I know not everyone has available space to stash excess belongings, but anyone can clear the stuff off their bathroom and kitchen counters and make sure their beds are crisply made.  I'm always amazed at how many listing photos have a butt print on the bed where someone was obviously sitting.

Good staging isn't all it takes to sell a house, of course, but I believe in our case it captured people's attention and made them want to come and see for themselves.