An effective staging helps buyers picture themselves living in the house, highlights its positive attributes while minimizing its negative ones, converts odd spaces into functional ones, creates an atmosphere (stagers refer to this as “emotional” staging), and improves the appearance of the house in photographs.
Well, prospective buyers aren’t just looking for a place to live; they’re also trying to find a way to achieve their goals and enhance their quality of life. Staging can make a buyer’s decision more emotionally driven, which ultimately makes the seller more money.
The fact that prospective buyers don’t want to see the work that needs to be done after they move in is another reason why home staging is advantageous. They will deduct the cost of any issues from the asking price for each one they notice. If they find too many issues, they might decide not to buy the house at all.
Therefore, you ought to stage it before listing it for sale. However, there are additional factors to take into account when staging your home. After making this much effort, you can’t just take the chance that your customers will complain. Right?
So, here are a few things we believe you should think about before staging your home.
Clean the house
Having your home clean and clear is one of the most important things that you should consider while staging your house. It simply conveys that you have maintained your house pretty well. From the floors to the ceilings and everything in between, you should ideally clean the entire house before staging it out.
If you don’t have any new kitchen appliances, make sure the ones you do have are spotless. Likewise, make sure every inch of your bathroom is spotless, including the area behind the toilet and the drain in the sink.
Decluttering things
Those random things lying around your house distract buyers and make it seem like the home has less space. You probably won’t want that.
It is necessary to package up and store all of these items for this reason. Simply throw away anything you no longer need, including expired food, soiled clothing, and outgrown toys if you have kids. It’s actually very easy to understand: the more empty storage space you have, the better.
Depersonalize the house
Here, what depersonalising the house means is that you must remove all your belongings of yours from your house before putting them into staging. Things like family photos, and keepsakes of yours, must be removed.
You can simply keep your clothes hidden away to not be noticed by your to-be homeowner. Likewise, you must make sure the bathroom counters are empty.
Also, you should put away all the toys and anything else that is highly personal or evocative to you. So that the buyers could find a way to make their memories over there.
Focus on a fresh environment
Plants, of course, help to make your house look more lively. It gives kinda positive vibes. Therefore, if you have a lot of plants, make sure to strategically space them out so they don’t crowd any one area.
However, don’t forget to remove plants that are dead or dying. They don’t contribute much to the appearance of a well-kept home.
Eliminating odours is another way to give your home a fresh appearance. You can use different methods to get rid of the bad smells but you should be careful about using odours and deodorising your home since there are people who can have allergic reactions and asthma to such smells.
And, yes, don’t forget to manage your trash.
Wallpaper and paint
Yes, there are a set of differences between staging and decorating your house, but painting the walls with a neutral colour does not sound like a decoration, does it? However, it’s actually better to paint your home with warm, neutral colours than any bright colours.
Putting the wallpapers somehow could not please the potential buyers. So, you could simply avoid putting any wallpapers on your walls.
Lighting
You can use natural lighting in your home for illumination. If you don’t have one, then you should think about adding more lights to your lighting because it improves the aesthetics and safety of your home.
You have two options when showing your house: either let all of the drapes and blinds open, including those in the closets or turn on all of the lights.
This literally saves potential buyers from having to search for light switches and makes your home appear brighter and more inviting.
Fix walls and ceilings
For buyers, cracks in the walls or ceiling are a deal-breaker because they could be signs of a foundation issue. If your house does have foundation issues, you’ll need to either fix them or let potential buyers know about them. However, fixing any foundation issues would be preferable from the standpoint of selling the house.
In order to avoid scaring away buyers unnecessarily, fix the cracks if the foundation only appears to be weak but has been found to be sound by an inspector.
Set some new exterior design
Because the exterior and entryway can significantly affect a buyer’s first impression, these are some crucial areas to concentrate on. They might even decide whether someone wants to see the inside of the house.
Thus, you must make sure to carefully prune your lawn, hedges, trees, and other plants. Likewise, to make windows even more cheerful, thoroughly wash them and think about adding flower boxes.
If at all possible, power wash the exterior of your home to give it a look that is almost as good as a new painting but with less work and expense. Purchase new doormats for the front and back doors, and make sure the sidewalk leading up to the house is free of debris and spotless.
If you have a pool, make sure it is crystal clear to highlight it. Another way to make the most of your home’s exterior is to create some sort of outdoor living space in the backyard, like a deck or patio with patio furniture.
These are some of the fundamental factors that, if taken into account when staging your home, may help your business move along more quickly. We would appreciate hearing your opinions on this article.