When selling your home, staging is key. Staging gives prospective buyers a better look at how they might fit their personal style into your home, and often leads to a quicker sale and higher sale price. So paint those bright orange walls, take down your family photos, and check out these tips from Terrie Stiles, co-owner of local staging company HOMETENDERS.
1. Make your home clean and comfortable. “It sounds obvious, but it’s so important for your house to be spotless,” says Stiles. “Make sure your yard looks nice, clean all the windows, floors, everything. Make sure all the lights are functional and have bright bulbs, and leave all the lights on before you leave so buyers don’t enter a dark and dreary home. Also, make sure the house is climate-controlled. The house has to be cool or warm depending on the season. Even if the home is beautiful, if it’s too cold or too warm, it can be a big turn-off. It’s worth the couple extra dollars in energy costs.”
2. Stage your house before you list it. “If you wait to stage your house until a few weeks after it’s been on the market, the serious buyers will have already come and gone,” Stiles says. “Make sure it’s ready to be shown to prospective buyers right away.”
3. Neutralize your home with warm paint colors. “If you’re re-painting, don’t use white. You want your home to have a warm feel. We love using Ralph Lauren Thunder Bay, creamy yellows, and warm grays.”
4. Remove anything personalized. “It can be hard for some sellers to do this, but it’s so important to remove any kind of personal photography so people can imagine living inside your house. You want it to look like a blank slate. You don’t want sellers to see you living there, you want them to see themselves living there.”
5. Pare down. “You want to create the illusion that you live perfectly. Get storage for the toys and throw a blanket over it, clear out your closets, thin out the basement—all of this gives the illusion of more space.”
