What is Home Staging?
Home Staging is the art of decorating a home to sell quickly and for top dollar. In general terms, we use interior design principles and real-estate know-how to maximize features and minimize drawbacks.
From the simple to the complex, a staging project can involve:
· Consulting
· Staging
· Redecorating (or Redesign)
· Renovating
Consulting generally means we meet with the homeowner to view the property and make recommendations on changes that the seller will carry out themselves. Consulting generally involves a 2-hour to 3-hour visit (depending on the size and condition of the property) and is followed by a written report which often include sketches and pictures.
Redecorating (also known as Redesign) involves rearranging the seller’s existing furniture. Redecorating generally involves a 3-hour to 4-hour visit by a staging team of 2 to 3 individuals.
Renovating often involves updating plumbing and lighting fixtures, flooring changes, and almost always painting. Generally, most renovation work concentrates on kitchens and bathrooms where we know the rate of return is highest.
Staging a vacant home or display suite involves us bringing in and arranging all the furniture and accessories. Staging can also include fixtures such as window treatments.
What are the Steps Involved in Home Staging?
Whatever the project, Homesale by Design does its homework first. Before we view the property, we research listings in the neighbourhood to analyze features of comparable properties and gauge characteristics of buyers in the area.
When we tour a property, we make note of its overall style characteristics, interesting features, potential drawbacks, and repairs that may be required.
Then Homesale by Design prepares your listing so that it represents the “aspirational lifestyle” of your target market.
If repairs are required, we select, schedule and supervise all the tradesmen needed. If renovations will help the sale, we design and manage all aspects of those renovations, ensuring the project completes on time and on budget.
How does Home Staging help me as a realtor?
Homesale by Design frees your time so you can focus on your core competencies as a realtor: finding buyers, negotiating offers and closing deals.
You know what it's like to be stuck with a stale listing. The seller calls you every day to ask: “Why it isn’t selling?” “When will you run another ad?” “Have you scheduled another open house?”
Studies show that, generally speaking, staging helps a property sell for at least 5% more in half the usual time. And staging is inexpensive in comparison to the impact it has on the price of a property.
By recommending Homesale by Design, you can help your sellers achieve what may be the best return on investment of their lives. Statistics demonstrate that staging can generate returns of 100% to 200%. By letting your clients know about the potential benefits of home staging, you offer them a higher level of customer service. This is a whole new level of customer care. Homesale by Design offers an investment opportunity that must be considered and should not be missed.
With a quicker sale, you save hundreds in advertising dollars. And you save yourself countless hours at lackluster open houses, rewriting ad copy, and revising listings to reflect yet another price reduction.
Homesale by Design will prepare a property that you will be proud to show to agents and buyers, and that will reflect well on your professional reputation. Truly, nothing beats the feeling of opening the door of a beautifully-staged home and hearing the buyer say … “Wow”.
Won’t I insult my client by recommending Home Staging?
Homesale by Design addresses many issues that you may not feel comfortable discussing with your clients. We tackle the sensitive topics like clutter, dated fixtures, old furniture, and odor problems in a compassionate and sensitive way.
Let us deliver the “bad news”, because to us it’s not bad news, it’s simply an obstacle to the sellers moving on with their lives.
We appreciate that all sellers are in a time of transition, and given the value of their homes and the personal issues that make be driving the need to sell, that transition can be hugely stressful. Our job is to help sellers make the transition from their old home with more ease, more relaxing sleep and more money in their pockets.
If I recommend Homesale by Design, do I have to pay for it?
At Homesale by Design, we never recommend that a realtor pay for staging. As staging offers the seller such a great potential return on investment, we always recommend that the seller make the investment themselves.
Nevertheless, agents with high-end listings will sometimes pay for the cost of an initial 3-hour consultation followed by written recommendations (usually about $500). Then the seller usually takes over and pays for the actual work required to carry out those recommendations.
You aren't expected to pay those fees so why would home staging be any different?
Many clients are asking agents to recommend a stager so it's a good idea to have one or two good ones in your Rolodex.
You're in the service business and you have only so many hours in a day! Every hour you spend inside one of your listings discussing how to improve it for sale, is another hour you aren't spending marketing the property or getting another listing!
Many agents suggest obvious repairs, cleaning and decluttering; but do you really want to spend hours deciding the optimal placement of every piece of furniture or accessory?
Do you understand colour theory? Do you know what this season’s fashion colours are? Do you know what colours are favoured by various ethnic groups?
If you have an empty home, do you know how to get it fully furnished? Is this how you should be spending your time?
What if, your client has terrible taste?
Do you want to tell them their furniture has to be replaced? Do you want to tell them to put away all their treasured family photos, heirlooms and collection of 60 house plants?
This makes your job easier and lets you focus on what you're good at— getting and selling your listings!
The real estate market is hot in my area. Why should I bother with Home Staging?
While it's true that in a seller's market it sometimes feels like all you have to do is stick a sign on the front lawn and the house will sell. But you know that not all properties sell fast even in a hot market. There are always the listings that languish on the market while everything else sells.
You know how bad you look to your clients in that situation and how embarrassing it is to have your sign on the lawn in front of a non-selling house in a hot market week after week.
Even the houses that show relatively well and will sell regardless of what you do, you know that if you can get 10 couples in a bidding war the price will go WAY up! Home staging makes it that much easier for that to happen.
Read more about why home staging works.
Can Home Staging help me turn listings in a slow real estate market?
CNN Money did a story on 5 strategies homeowners can use to get top dollar in a slow real estate market. Home Staging was the top strategy.
Basically, the slower the market the harder you have to work to turn your listings. Anything you can do to get a competitive edge over similar houses for sale in the area will make your job easier and make you look good to current and prospective clients and your fellow agents.
Don't you owe it to yourself to do what you can to blow away the competition? Wouldn't it be great to get a bidding war going because your listing looks so much better than everything else in the price range?
How much does Home Staging cost?
It can range from a few hundred dollars for an initial consultation to over $10,000 to decorate a large home. The cost of staging depends on:
· the size and condition of the home
· how much of the work your client is willing to do themselves once they have considered the home stager's advice
· the proposed listing price of the home
For example, it costs more to furnish a million-dollar home than a $500,000 home, because of the square footage and the quality of furnishings required to attract buyers in a high-end neighbourhood.
If the home is already furnished, a home staging consultation generally ranges from between $250 to $500 depending on how much work needs to be done.
Whether you are paying for the consultation or simply recommending home staging to your client, it's important to remember that home staging advice is an investment in a potentially significant financial return. Don't base the choice of stager purely on price, consider who will do the best job.
What if I have a vacant home to sell?
Selling an empty home isn't a good idea. Buyers have great difficulty envisioning how their furniture should be arranged and they have no sense of how big the rooms are with no point of reference. In fact, rooms generally look larger after staging.
Vacant homes tend to look depressing and they also draw attention to every possible construction flaw since there's nothing else to look at.
It's hard for buyers to make an emotional connection with an empty house. That's why builders use model homes.
Why should I bother staging my home?
The simple answer is that staging will help you sell your home more quickly and for more money. But there are many benefits to staging your home. See the information at right to learn some of the statistical facts about why staging makes sense and works!
How does staging make more money for the seller?
Price is ultimately determined by you and your realtor based on market conditions and other factors. However, there is also the perceived value factor which, for a buyer who loves your home, can be totally subjective. Home staging goes a long way toward helping increase a home’s perceived value.
Research shows that staged homes sell for more money than homes that have not been staged. Consider this scenario: Your home is listed for sale at $500,000 and it has been sitting on the market for a while. In an effort to sell it you reduce the price by 5% or $25,000. If you spent just 1% of the listing price ($5,000) on staging to make your home more appealing, you wouldn’t need to reduce the price and you would be $20,000 ahead of a reduce listing price. Simply put, every time you reduce the listing price you lose money.
How much does it cost?
A variety of factors determine what staging your home will cost including the amount of work that may need to be done, who does the work, and whether or not you need to change or add things to your home to make it appealing to buyers.
What is the best use of my staging budget?
The best use of your staging budget is to hire a professional stager. At Homesale by Design, we have the expertise to make the most of your staging budget. We offer ingenious cost-effective solutions to problems that can really hinder a sale.
Why should I hire a stager to do something I could do myself?
Our expertise is grounded in proven interior design principles, careful market research, and a deep understanding of buyer psychology. It’s hard for a seller to view their home as a commodity. We help seller’s make the transition from homeowners to homesellers. We offer a compassionate, objective and informed point of view about what preparations need to be made. Most homeowners either do too much, too little, or the wrong things in preparing their homes as they cannot see their home through a buyer’s eyes.
Does home staging mislead buyers or create false perceptions?
Our job as home stagers is to maximize a property’s features and minimize its drawbacks. We know how to focus a buyer’s attention on your home’s best features, so that a buyer can make the emotional bond crucial to making a buying decision. That is what ultimately makes a buyer fall in love with your home. While we may draw attention away from the home’s less attractive features, we don’t disguise problems or safety issues. In fact, we often save the seller weeks of delay by pointing out repairs, code violations and safety issues so they can be addressed now instead of after an offer is made.
Does staging make more sense in an up or down real estate market?
Home staging is a valuable strategy in any market condition. While sellers don’t like the idea of putting money into home staging in a cold or buyers’ market, the fact is that during a stagnant market, the buyer has far more options to choose from, so your property must standout from everything else buyers will see. Research shows that home staging makes a difference in how long your property sits on the market, and at what price.
The same idea applies in a hot or sellers’ market. While in this situation demand exceeds supply, buyers know they don’t have the time to ponder a decision and generally become more aggressive about their desire to have a home they love. Studies show that in a hot market, a staged home is more likely to generate multiple offers and offers above the asking price. If the seller is purchasing a new home themselves, they will want to close on their new property quickly and any delay in selling their old home could be devastating to closing the deal on their new home. A beautifully-staged home stands out from other listings and that gives the seller a clear competitive advantage, commanding a higher price and a quicker close.
Remember that for every month a home sits on the market costs the seller money in carry costs, and costs the realtor money in continued advertising costs and marketing hours. The longer a home sits on the market, the more likely it will face price reductions. Both of these situations mean losses to your bottom line.
“My home looks beautiful the way it is and it will sell.”
Sure, your home will eventually sell, but how long will it be before it does? Two months, four months, a year? As each month passes, you will consider lowering your asking price. Stop throwing your money away!
By hiring a professional to stage your home, you can relax knowing that you did the most you could to receive the maximum return on your investment. Most people can not see their home objectively – it is what they have lived in, know and love. We will give you an expert, unbiased opinion of why your home is not selling and we will look at your home through the “buyer’s eyes”. We will focus on problem areas, enhance all the positives, and create a beautiful package that will attract the most buyers!
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