In Part 2 of this blog series, we started to take a look some of the specific tasks a home stager completes to help your home sell faster and for a higher price.
Here are five more ways a staging your home can add value to your home when it’s time to sell.
1.Declutter & Declutter Some More
It’s like there are different levels of decluttering. First there’s the straightforward tidying up, where you get rid of the actual clutter. Second, you might realize that the wall that’s packed with family pictures can look cluttered to visitors.
And then there’s the decluttering a professional home stager might do.
One of the things homeowners do to make a house a home is fill it full of stuff they like, stuff that makes them comfortable. but it doesn’t necessarily make prospective buyers comfortable. Too much ‘stuff’ not only makes it difficult for buyers to imagine how they would decorate the house, it makes the space look smaller. Whether your house is large or small, the larger it looks, the better.
A home stager will usually recommend using the ‘one-quarter to one-half’ rule, which is to get rid of 25% to 50% of the things in all your rooms. It might mean you’ll need to temporarily rent a storage unit, but it will help open up your home and make it more inviting.
You can use the ‘one-quarter to one-half’ rule throughout your home, including in closets where being over-stuffed looks like a lack of closet space, but the same closet with a few items neatly hung makes it look like there’s lots of space.
2.Make it Spotlessly Clean
Homeowners tend to develop their own sense of what is clean. But that’s not necessarily how a buyer sees the home. You’ll need a ‘top to bottom’ cleaning of every nook and cranny, including behind the toilet, under the couch, in every closet and throughout your storage areas.
3.Get Rid of the Home Gym
A least if you have it in a spare bedroom, family room or any space that normally has another purpose. We all have a preconceived notion of what a home should be. When you walk into what you’ve been told is a bedroom, you expect to see, well, a bedroom. When you don’t, it can be a little off-putting. In the case of buyers, it can shatter the image they are putting together in their minds of how they would live in and decorate the house.
A home stager will make sure every room in your home looks like it’s used for its intended purpose. That means they will likely suggest that you move your home office desk and equipment out of the family room, and get rid of a lot of that excess storage you have in the garage.
4.Put Everything in Good Working Order
You’ve been living with that dripping faucet in the laundry room for years. The crack in the ceiling was there when you moved in. The creaky step on the stairs leading into the basement isn’t that loud.
But every one of those things, while perfectly normal in most homes, can, together or separately, work to erode a buyer’s perception of the value of your home. Almost anything that isn’t in good repair can be seen by buyers as a sign of bigger problems. And once the “house needs repairs” idea enters a buyer’s mind, it’s not easy change it.
5.Update the Décor Wherever Possible
Again, maybe you had your home professionally redecorated 10 years ago, so you figure it still looks sharp. But, every year, there are shifts in colour trends, design styles, even technology, that can make relatively recent redecorations look dated.
Starting with the almost mandatory new coat of paint, which at very least gives you the opportunity to add the latest colours to your décor, a stager will suggest you update anything you can. Even if your furniture is in great shape, but it’s outdated, it might be worthwhile to rent a suite of furniture and some artwork to make your home look more contemporary.
If you have any questions about selling your home in Markham and the benefits of staging it, please give The Tar Team a call.