New View Home Staging Blog

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Great Impact from Inexpensive Changes

There's always a fine line to be walked when making changes to prepare a home for sale.  As stagers we need to recommend the changes that will have the biggest impact to keep (or get) the house at the top of its price range without eating into the potential returns. 

 

There are always factors that cannot be changed, primarily location and price range.  Beyond those, buyers are going to be most strongly influenced by fresh paint, flooring, and storage.  It's all about the immediate visuals and forming the best first impression.

 

Painting is one of the easiest and least expensive ways to transform a space from overly personalized to neutral, or seriously outdated to current, and this applies to both interior AND exterior.  Colour has such an emotional power, it can be warming or cooling, strong or subtle, and it's always best to let a colour specialist or home stager make the recommendations.

 

Flooring ~ type, style and condition ~ can say a great deal about the rest of the house.   If it's poorly maintained and really dated, then it could be indication of other problems or areas of neglect that might be hiding.  That being said, this is not a recommendation to put down new flooring to hide other problems!  So, hopefully the flooring is in good shape, and only requires professional cleaning, but if it comes to the point of replacing it, carpet is always the most cost effective choice over laminate, vinyl, tile or hardwood.   Again, it's that fine line... hardwood is a huge selling feature and if you pull up carpet and find hardwood then you've hit the mother load.  But don't pull up old carpet with the intention of laying hardwood because remember, this house is being sold and the return will likely not be there.

 

Storage is the third, really visible feature that sells as house, and it starts right at the front door.  Clean out hall closets, under sinks and garage spaces.  Cleaned and well organized storage space allows the buyer to mentally move their own things in, so you really need to show it off.  And cleaning out the closets costs nothing!

 

We always say that buying a home is all about the first impressions, and first impressions are almost always based on emotional responses, so address the most immediate and influential features of the home and you're well on your way to receiving an offer.

 

These are all items covered in our extensive pre-listing evaluations.  For more information about New View Home Staging, visit www.newviewhomestaging.ca. 

6 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • July 26 2010 09:38AM

Savvy Sellers Do The Work...

As long as people have been buying and selling, there has been the persistent question of "should I go to the bother of doing the work or can't I just offer the buyer a credit to do it themselves?"

As staging becomes more prevelant, and we see the results and outcome on both sides of that argument, we can say with certainty that in almost every scenario, YES Sellers, you should do the work yourself!

That comes with only a few qualifications ... in a $300,000 home you probably should not gut and replace the entire kitchen at a cost of $30,000, but there are facelift projects and updates that will take you a long way.  And you won't undertake to finish an unfinished basement, although you might complete a basement project which is already half way along.

Sellers need to find the best way to maximize the return on their investment and protect the equity in their home, and in most cases that is by rolling up their sleeves (or hiring someone that will), and putting in some effort on the front end so that their realtor isn't having to negotiate a value for that work on the back end.  The cost of a few cans of paint to do three bedrooms and the front foyer is far less than it would be once a parent has to listen to the wails of their 8 year old son refusing to move into the shocking pink bedroom.  Convincing themselves that the house is perfect for them is much more difficult once a buyer has experienced a negative emotional response, and the seller will end up paying dearly to make the problem go away. 

Perhaps the carpet hasn't been replaced since 1985, its worn, threadbare and stained.  Have you met the buyer yet that says, "just give us the money for an inexpensive beige carpet, we're fine with that"... ?  Probably not, but if it was done for them most buyers wouldn't complain and in fact would appreciate the house even more because it now feels fresh and new.

It's hard to go wrong by doing the work before listing.  Sellers shouldn't have to offer a credit to offset a buyer's emotional reaction to their house, and so be reducing the likelihood of a negative response at the front end, they will have protected their own equity and financial investment at the back end. 

At New View Home Staging, this is what we recommend to our staging clients.

2 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • February 22 2010 04:00PM

CSP ELITE Affiliate Designation for Realtors - Class Update

On February 2, an enthusiastic group of six joined me in the main board room at the Centre in the Square to earn the CSP Elite Affiliate Designation for Realtors.   

We spent a full day of learning about PROTECTING YOUR CLIENT'S EQUITY WITH HOME STAGING, as well as how to leverage home staging as a marketing tool to increase listings, provide better customer service to ensure more referrals, and improve understanding and confidence when communicating the benefits of home staging.  

The course was a hit, and I'm looking forward to another group of realtors coming in on March 23.  You can read more about the CSP ELITE designation for Realtors, or email or call me anytime and I'll be happy to answer your questions.  

If you haven't read the February issue of REM, this program has received a huge endorsement from one of Canada's top brokers who has taken the program himself and now requires that all team members are CSP Elite Realtors.  

If you have a group of 5 or more within your office I would be very pleased to schedule a class on-site, and will offer a $25 voucher on each seat.

Chris Bird

CCSP & CSP Elite Instructor

New View Home Staging

519-505-0892

christine@newviewhomestaging.ca

1 comment • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • February 11 2010 07:34AM

Home Stagers . . . Decorator Wannabes??

Great post on Active Rain... because yes, sometimes I really would prefer to "decorate" but that isn't necessarily going to SELL the house!

Via Deena Cottingham, Home Stager & Photographer (GreenApple Staging & Images, Calgary Staging & Photography):

Okay, let's be honest . . . Is home staging just an "easy" portal to an interior decorating career? Afterall, it's all about re-decorating a house in a more contemporary style . . . right?

No, not at all. Home staging is more accurately thought of as a subset of the real estate industry. While the tools of the trade may look similar to those of a decorator, Stagers have a far different goal in mind.

Paint canA Professional Home Stager's priority is to bring greater market appeal to a property. Often this does involve advising clients to upgrade various decor elements that are otherwise out-dated. As a stager, yes I would recommend that you lose the tiny floral wallpaper in the half-bath, or the brass lighting fixtures in the kitchen. I'd probably pick on your Barcalounger, too.

But the reason I would suggest this is not because those things are no longer in fashion. I would make these recommendations because buyers respond better to properties that have been well-maintained. And believe it or not, having an updated decor helps communicate that essential message. If you've taken the time to replace a light fixture or two in the last 20 years, chances are good that you might have tightened a few toilet bolts a long the way, as well.

When staging a home, recommended furniture placement may also be very different from how you might live in a particular room. A good home stager will take into account how easy it is for at least 3 people to navigate through the property when viewing it. Usually this means that I will ask the home owner to remove all those little, extraneous pieces of furniture that come in handy when entertaining or watching the game. Yes, awkward furniture placements make for awkward showings! If the buyer doesn't actually enter all the rooms, they won't be buying your house.

And about that furniture, a Stager wouldn't simply choose a sofa based on color and comfort. We would choose a sofa that fit the room, first and foremost, and then the price point and style of the home. Luxury homes need luxury furnishings to underscore the value packed into the price tag. Small spaces require furnishings that are light in color, don't take up a lot of visual space, and are functionally cheerful.

As a Stager, I really don't care about how comfy that sofa is for TV viewing! It's all about allowing the home's architectural features to be the focal point (is that a window behind the big screen TV?). Furniture in a Stager's mind is simply a means to reinforcing a lifestyle message for the buyer, and showcasing the space that it resides in.

For selling a home, accessorizing is all about de-personalizing--not choosing the things that you love. The treasures you have collected on your last trip to Asia, or over a lifetime with sentimental value, are the first things to go from a home. When buyers get the feeling that they are invading someone else's space, they are out of there like a turkey before Thanksgiving. Probably not what you want when trying to sell your home.

Artwork, knick-knacks and even reading material need to be "safe and neutral" in their content. While a decorator would showcase these items, a Stager will tactfully suggest that you put Uncle Henry's self-portrait in storage, for the time being.

Bottom line? Decorators should listen. Stagers need to advise. Pretty and trendy may be your goal for decorating your home, but the Stager is ruthlessly objective in achieving "neutral". It is possible to make your home beautiful, and unsellable all at the same time! Choose the right professional for the job!

 

Deena Cottingham

GreenApple Staging & Images
Serving Calgary and Okotoks, Alberta

2 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • December 07 2009 10:38AM

Staging Your Entry Way and Front Yard Using Feng Shui - Let's Get the Chi Moving!

I'm only just starting to learn about Feng Shui, but this is a cool post re-blogged from Active Rain about the importance of curb appeal from a Feng Shui perspective.

Via Kate Case ~ Kate's Home Staging ~ RESA ~ ASHSR ~ NJ NAR Affiliate (Kates Home Staging and Redesign):

External curb appeal and your entry way are the two items that create a buyer's all important first impression of your home.  A potential home buyer will make up their mind about your home in under one minute.

What first impression would your home leave a buyer?

feng shui home staging tips for sellers

The goal of using Feng Shui to stage your home is to balance all five elements (wood, fire, earth, metal, water) in and around your property. (We are only going to look at external curb appeal and your entry way in this post.)

For a Feng Shui Cheat Sheet on the Five Elements, please take a look here: http://activerain.com/blogsview/1314589/using-feng-shui-to-correctly-prepare-your-home-for-sale

The external curb appeal of your property is very important when selling your home. The way your home looks from the street is representative of your home's chi or energy.  Abundant green landscapes, that are well manicured, are chi reservours.  To keep positive chi flowing on your property, please remove any dead trees or plantings from your front yard. Please keep your front yard free from debris and well maintained. The importance of a first impression can not be underestimated.

Please keep your driveway well lit and free from debris also; please fix any broken or cracked driveways immediately. If your driveway descends sharply towards the street, please install bright lights on both sides of the driveway.

Feng Shui considers the front door and entry to be the most important places in your home.  The front door (or Mouth of Chi), determines the amount and quality of chi or energy that will flow through your home. A grand, open entry way will support the flow of chi.

By clearing out items that are behind your front door (such as bikes, old magazines, shoes, toys), chi will be better able to enter you home.  The goal here is to let chi flow unobstructed right into your home. 

Your home's front door should be upright and well-hinged; it should be very easy to open and close.  If your front door creaks when it is opened, it is disturbing the harmony of your home and needs to be fixed.

The front door of your home needs to be the correct size and in correct proportion to the size of your home.  A door that is too large can cause financial problems, whereas a door that is to small can lead to family disagreements. Minor flaws at your front door can affect you negatively.  The reverse is also true, by making minor improvements at your front door entry you can significantly impact your life in a positive way.

external lighting for home selling tips

Good chi can be further attracted into your home by proper lighting attached to the outside wall of your home. 

Your front door should open into a bright space that has room for chi to breathe. 

feng shui home staging tips for home sellers

To maximize the movement of chi and to prevent stagnant chi, please open your windows and let the fresh air filter in.

By paying close attention to the placement of Feng Shui objects on and around your property, the amount of positive chi will be increased which will result in more potential home buyer activity.

-Kate

Kate's Home Staging and Redesign serves the Rockland County and Orange County area of New York, Bergen County and Passaic County of New Jersey. Kate is an affiliate member of the Passaic County of Realtors. Kate's Home Staging and Redesign is now offering Full Digital Services to sell your home quickly. In other words, we will bring in the accessories, we will stage your home, we will re-take all the digital pictures, and then we will load these pictures into a virtual show to help sell your home. The virtual show is being offered to all our clients FREE of CHARGE to help SELL your home. We also sell a full line of semi-custom window coverings.

 

4 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • November 27 2009 08:44AM

Five Reasons to Stage Occupied Homes

This is a re-blog from from Active Rain... the before and after shots really show the positive changes made by staging an occupied home.

Via Laurie Calhoun Seminole County FL Home Stager (Gloria Home Staging, Inc.):

Picture an occupied home -- comfortably furnished, nicely decorated. How would having it staged help it sell? Is it worth the expense? Here are five reasons for sellers of occupied homes to consider a professional home staging consultation:

#1 –Getting a home ready to sell can be overwhelming to sellers, and they may not know how to begin or what to do. Home stagers can tell sellers where to start, and then guide them through the process, from paint color selection to furniture placement.

#2 – Occupied homes are lived in. The sellers have gotten comfortable with the things they have and how they are placed. Their homes are set for the way they live. The next owners will have an entirely different set of things and their own routine. To market their home, the sellers must consider how the house would work for someone else, and be willing to make changes to the way they live while they sell the home. It’s all about the buyers now, and stagers can help sellers make that mind shift and the necessary changes.

The owner of this office was willing to pack up about 20 boxes of books and largely clear the room out. He was rewarded with a sale in 30 days.

Office before staging  Office after staging

#3 – Sellers need help to see the home as a buyer would. Stagers provide “outsiders’ eyes” to see the home differently. Not only can we view the home’s features impartially, we can spot “red flags” – signals of potential problems – that the seller either knows are no longer a problem (like water stains resulting from leaks now repaired), or is unaware of.

For example, the china hutch in this kitchen was a clear indication to us that the home did not provide enough storage for the sellers’ things. The buyers were likely to assume that there would not be enough room for their things, either, so we advised the sellers to put it into storage.

Kitchen before staging  Staged kitchen

#4 – Decorated does not equal staged. Although they are often beautiful and warmly welcoming places, decorated homes are not meant to be sold. They are meant to be lived in. They are often highly personal, and the décor can distract from or cover up some of the home’s features. Décor can also go out of style. The point of home staging is to show off the home (not the furnishings or the owners’ taste) and make it appeal to a wide segment of its target market. The more highly decorated a home is, the harder it is for buyers to picture themselves making it their own.

Being unbiased outsiders, stagers can point out decorative elements that are too particularly individual, such as paint colors, wallpaper, or collections. The owners of this home had many lovely things, including a curio cabinet containing a large collection of angels. We advised them to pack the angels up, and the result was this welcoming reading nook, instead of a museum likely to distract buyers.

 

Curio corner  Staged readiing nook

#5 – Home stagers specialize in presenting homes to their best advantage. That’s our full-time job, and something we love to do. We are students of home merchandising: We know what colors work well for marketing homes. We know low-cost solutions for outdated furniture and décor. We know whether furniture needs to be removed or added, and how to arrange that furniture so that it shows off the home. We know how to help home sellers, who are experts in other areas, not this one.

In this example, the seller resisted removing the draperies and much of the furniture from this master bedroom. He thought it would look bare, and that the room would not look as large because it would not be showing how much furniture it could hold. We insisted that the room would look bigger, brighter and more up-to-date, and he chose to trust us. You decide whether or not it worked!

Master bedroom before staging  Staged master bedroom

If you are selling your Orlando area home, give us a call at Gloria Home Staging. We will be glad to help make your home feel like home to buyers.

Gloria Home Staging

www.GloriaHomeStaging.com

                             407-695-0023

         Setting your home apart

Serving the Orlando, Florida area

0 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • November 25 2009 07:42AM

Home Staging by a Professional

This is a reblog, originally written by an Ottawa Keller-Williams Realtor.  Thanks Irene, for saying it so well.

Via Irene Bilinski (Keller Williams Ottawa Realty):

Home Staging is an art - not something that everyone can do well.  Let me explain.  Last night I did a listing presentation and the sellers were wondering why their home did not sell when previously listed. There were several factors involved:  (1) overpriced (2) no staging appeal and (3) errors on the feature sheet.  Staging a home makes it more appealing to the buyers looking for a home in a certain area within a certain budget.  Instead of hiring a professional home stager, the previous agent asked the sellers to declutter and they did, but to the point of where the house was basically bare of any character, charm - the WOW factor was missing.

It's very important that the sellers are provided with the right tools to help them to sell their home.  That includes:  home staging by a professional; virtual tour/photos by a professional and marketing of the home by a professional.  Great team-work makes the sale easier.

My job is to assist the sellers in selling their home and to use all the tools available to me to do so.  If things are done right i.e. pricing, condition and location there is no reason why a home won't sell.  Always use the services of a professional.

1 comment • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • November 17 2009 08:56AM

CSP ELITE AGENT Class Dates in Southwestern Ontario


The December class of the CSP ELITE AGENT Designation is scheduled for Tuesday, December 8th, for realtors in Kitchener-Waterloo, and Cambridge. 
 
The Elite Agent designation is designed to increase understanding and marketability of real estate staging; to provide a realtor with better opportunities to differentiate their services from that of their peers through a proven strategic process; and to have an improved listing package with statistics, articles, DVDs plus an abundance of information for sellers.
 
CSP Elite Agents will be affiliated with one of the most respected names in the staging industry worldwide, Certified Staging Professionals, and will have increased exposure through the CSP website, use of recognizable logos and artwork and access to CSP Elite Stagers.  
 
After completing the one-day workshop, you will also receive a voucher for the full value of the CE Network tutorial for Professional Home Staging to earn CE credits.
 
If you have any questions about CSP Elite or upcoming classes please get in touch with me directly, or visit www.cspelite.com

2 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • November 11 2009 07:22AM

Moving Up? What These Buyers are Probably Looking For.

Research suggests that the Moving-Up Buyer is going to purchase a new home for perhaps 50% more than the one they're selling.  You've probably worked with these buyers, and typical wish lists are for a bigger kitchen, a 4th bedroom, a luxurious "spa" ensuite, and more room in general.

Getting into the head of the Moving-Up Buyer may be hard sometimes, because they know what they want, but they may not be able to explain it in so many words.  What they really want cannot be truly defined, or physically built for them.  They'll just know it when they see it. 

And so what is the "it"?  It's intangible... it's a feeling... a sense of opportunity and excitement... a suggestion of a better lifestyle.

When Moving Up Buyers are out looking at homes, they're often not so much looking at the house as they are looking into the lifestyle that it suggests they could have, and it needs to be a step up from the home they are leaving. 

This is where working with a professional Home Stager can make a huge impact, to both the Buyer AND the Seller.  The price needs to be set right (realtor expertise required here), but it also needs to look great and provide the intangible IT factor... the lifestyle influence.

The perfect combination for a sale to the Moving Up Buyer is a property within their price range that exudes the quality of life they want.   For Sellers that understand this and Realtors that guide the process, it's usually a win-win-win situation.   

0 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • October 29 2009 09:39AM

STATISTICS YOU CAN TAKE TO THE BANK!

These days there's a statistic for everything, so let me throw one in about staging.  Staged homes STATISTICALLY sell for between 5% and 10% more than their unstaged competition.
 
So using those figures, a $260,000 home will sell for between $13,000 and $26,000 more.  That's great news for your client because you've protected their equity, but it also means that the 3% seller's commission has increased between $390 and $780, or on average $585 per home. 
 
From there the math gets easier to understand.  If, on average, you earn an additional $585 per home and sell 24 homes per year, you're AT LEAST $14,040 ahead of where you would be if you hadn't recommended staging.
 
All this is based on just a $260,000 home ... and only the commission.   Now, because we also know that a staged home typically sells 2 to 3 times faster, start factoring in the need to host fewer open houses, spend less money on advertising, leaving more time to focus on other leads... PLUS the additional referrals from satisfied clients who have realized greater profits themselves, and it becomes clear that staging makes good financial sense.  

New View Home Staging is a full services real estate staging and property styling company serving Kitchener-Waterloo, Cambridge, Guelph, Stratford and surrounding communities.  We pride ourselves in exceptional customer service and would welcome the opportunity to work with realtors and homeowners in southwestern Ontario.

Christine Bird, owner and lead stager, is a Certified Staging Professional and CSP Elite Agent trainer.  Please call 519-505-0892 to speak with Christine about your real estate staging requirements.

8 comments • Christine Bird (New View Home Staging) • October 07 2009 11:36AM