To Stage or not to Stage? Preparing your Home for Sale

Gone are the days when you stuck a yard sale sign in a home that was
being prepared for sale, held an open house and printed out flyers as
some of the major tools for marketing real estate property. As homes
that are listed for sale populate the internet and are available to be
viewed by a national audience, professional realtors are increasingly
seeking to improve their skills in order to assist the homeowner to
market his or her home in ways that will showcase the property in the
best light and improve the final sale price. Often, these skills
include advising the homeowner on how to prepare the home for
photographs as well as the actual physical viewing of the home.

While, most realtors may know the marketability of a property based on
other factors such as the location of the property, size of the
property, etc., they may not be as adept in interior design principles
that will enhance the showcasing of the home. Thus a whole new
service industry, called "staging" has sprouted from these needs.
Staging is the new buzzword in the real estate industry used to
describe the de-cluttering, redesigning and in some case remodeling of
a home to prepare it for sale.

In the past, homeowners were left to their own discretion when it came
to home showings. If they didn't have any idea on how to prepare for
the home showing they often depended on their realtor for guidance.
While that may have been sufficient then, in this ever increasingly
competitive market (where sellers try to solicit the best prospective
buyers) staging has become a growing industry and a tool in the
realtor's marketing arsenal. In order to maintain a competitive
advantage, more and more realtors are adapting quickly to either learn
these basic principles themselves or to add interior designers to
their contact lists who can provide these services. Usually as part
of the marketing of the property, several photographs of the home are
almost mandatory and as virtual tours of homes become increasingly
popular the need to showcase the home properly becomes a necessity.

Professional home stagers are practiced in the art of preparing a home
for resale. They work with the "flow" of a home, eliminate clutter,
edit and arrange furniture, and may even assist in enhancing curb-
appeal. The interior design techniques that professional home stagers
use increase the overall look and desirability of the home. With ever
popular real estate television shows on HGTV such as "Curb Appeal" and
"Designed to Sell", homeowners expect their realtor to be
knowledgeable about these techniques.

In the current real estate climate where most homes have interior and
exterior photographs taken of the property and posted on real estate
internet sites this type of service is a plus. Some statistics show
that staging improves the final sale price of the house by anywhere
from 2% - 10%. For example, in the current California real estate
market with the median sale price of a home at $597,640 these figures
can mean anywhere from $11,952.00 to $59,764.00! That's quite a bit of
pocket change for a comparatively minor investment.

Depending on the home seller's budget, a home staging service can
prepare a home with simple tasks like rearranging furniture,
eliminating clutter, advising the homeowner on special cleaning tasks
to coordinating much more complex activities such as repainting,
carpeting and refinishing hardwood floors. When it comes to higher
priced homes in luxury neighborhoods sometimes extensive remodeling is
advisable. While the initial outlay by the homeowner may be
substantial a homeowner's equally substantial return on investment
usually makes it worthwhile. With such great returns, what might have
seemed liked a trend a few years ago isn't showing any signs of
stopping.