subject: Using Home Staging When Selling a House [print this page] Using Home Staging When Selling a House Using Home Staging When Selling a House
As popularised in the UK by the House Doctor, Ann Maurice, home staging is the process of preparing a property for sale to increase its appeal to a wider number of potential buyers and therefore reducing time to sell and increasing price.
A subsection of interior design, home staging has a very specific goal. Preparing a house or flat for resale is a very specific process. Inside the house a home stager will help de-clutter and de-personalise, remove or re-arrange furniture and suggest soft furnishing or colour scheme updates. Outside the house they will suggest where changes to the exterior can increase drive by appeal.
Home staging should ideally be carried out before attempting to market the property with your estate agent, such that you capture every potential buyer with the enhanced appeal. It can also be implemented on a house that has failed to sell so that it becomes more likely to be sold. Sometimes, an estate agent will suggest that home staging should be carried out on a property that has stalled in the selling process in order to get it moving again.
The purpose of staging a home is so that it appeals to a broad spectrum of buyers. This often means de-personalising a home so that it is easier for people viewing the property to imagine themselves living there. At a basic level this means removing family photographs, knick-knacks and esoteric items. A general de-clutter is always a good way to improve any house, and removing extraneous house contents makes the space look larger and easier on the eye.
Making the space feel larger is very important in a house sale, and an evaluation of the furniture will be carried out to remove items that are over-sized or too fussy. This enables buyers to more easily see the space that is available and envisage their own furniture in the house.
Another important feature of a home staging project is cleaning. The property should have a thorough clean from top to bottom, in anywhere where the viewer might see. Pay particular attention to making sure that the outside of the front door is clean and well presented. Having good visibility in the property is also very important, so clean all of the windows inside and out to allow visitors to see out clearly and allow the light into the rooms.
Professional home staging companies claim that you can sell your home in half the time, with up to 10% more on the house price.
