Do you want to sell your home for the most money in the shortest amount of time possible? Chances are, your answer is yes. Most homeowners want to earn maximum value from their home sale while receiving lots of interest and a buyer offer shortly after listing on the market. Home staging is how you position a home to achieve these goals.
What home staging does
Home staging’s objective is to make the property more appealing to the buyer. It makes rooms more attractive in photography and videography, encouraging buyers to view the property in person. Strategic choices in color, art, furniture, and layout showcases the potential lifestyle home buyers will have, which encourages them to make a strong offer.
What home staging involves
Home staging can be as simple as decluttering or it can utilize professional home stagers. Staging can involve:
- Repainting a room in a brighter, more neutral color.
- Small layout choices, like removing an end table or changing curtains
- Removing personal or controversial decor
- Rearranging or decluttering rooms for a better flow
- Virtual staging, which adds furniture to photographs of empty rooms
- Professional home stagers with additional furniture decor
Our Amanda Howard Sotheby’s International Realty team is happy to consult with you about how to stage your home for maximum results.
Home staging’s impact on buyers
Our team has seen first-hand the effect home staging can have on buyers. Vacant homes that lingered on the market received offers within days after being updated with virtually staged photographs. Using our proprietary app CURATE to show a room in our buyer’s style completely changed their mind about a potential home.
Surveys from the National Association of Realtors (NAR) back our anecdotal experiences showing the impact home staging has on buyers, the sales price, and the days on market.
In the 2019 Profile of Home Staging, 83 percent of buyer’s agents said staging made a home easier for the buyer to envision the property as their future home. Around 25 percent said that compared to other unstaged properties on the market, home staging increased the home’s dollar value 1 to 5 percent.
From the seller’s agent perspective, 53 percent found the days on market declined when homes were staged, with a quarter indicating it greatly reduced time on the market. The survey also found that home staging made buyers more willing to walk through a home they saw online.
Amanda Howard Sotheby’s International Realty uses technology to unlock the property’s potential with prospective buyers. One tool we use for home staging is CURATE, an immersive AR experience that showcases how different interior designs change a home’s possibilities.
Tips for home staging
Effective home staging highlights the home’s features while giving buyers ample space to envision the home as theirs. For example, in a home with dramatic windows, we want the curtains open and furniture facing toward them to accentuate the view. Find ways to draw attention to what makes the home appealing.
The details make a difference. Take color as an example. In advice for staging a home, Sotheby’s International Realty points out many hues lack universal appeal or are associated with specific time eras, like rooms painted red. A lighter color with a wide appeal imparts a clean, expansive feeling to rooms.
Emphasize the light in rooms with the right lighting. Natural light is appealing to buyers. Make sure all windows are clean and open. Check and clean lighting fixtures, and consider updating to a whiter light.
While many home staging lists discuss removing personal effects and decor for a more minimalist look, the truth is your art can help sell your home. Appropriately placed and curated art creates subconscious emotional cues that help buyers connect to the spaces. Appeal to a wider audience by leaving your abstract works, landscapes and interpretive pieces in place as a way of setting a mood and complimenting a home’s architecture.
When it is challenging to stage the property, we use technology to emphasize the home’s potential. Amanda Howard Sotheby’s International Realty is able to offer virtual staging options to discerning clients.
What you gain from home staging
By effectively positioning the property through home staging, sellers unlock their home’s full value and spend less time on the market. Buyers are more likely to want to see your home in-person and write stronger offers.
