Staged for success

Dianne Jeffries, Realtor and Accredited Staging® Professional

Staging® Tips

1. Stand in the doorway. This is where buyers stand before they decide to step into a room. If a buyer won’t step into a room, he or she is not going to buy your house. You need to see what the buyers see, so you can make the changes that will get them into every room of the house. Take a good look from the doorway to give yourself a buyers point of view. Staging draws buyers into every room.

2. Pick a Staging point. This may sound like a fancy term, but it isn’t. Just ask, “How will a buyer use this room? If it’s a bedroom, the Staging point is usually the bed. If it’s a music room, the Staging point is probably the piano. In the living room the Staging point could be the beautiful fireplace. Stage the room around the focal point.

3. Make a plan. Once you know what the focal point will be make a plan to Stage the room. This plan isn’t cast in stone; it’s made to be changed. But a plan helps get you started. If you don’t like the feeling of the room as you initiate the plan, change it.

4. Clear the clutter. De-accessorize the entire room. Take out all the pictures, mirrors and accessories. Put them in the hallway so you can see the “bones” of the room.

5. Divide things into piles. Pack, toss, give away and sell. Some things will go back into the room as you finish Staging.

6. Get rid of some of the furniture. Or move it to another room. Is something crowding the room? Move it out! You can often move a chair from the living room to the master bedroom, where it adds a cozy touch.

7. Decide what furniture will stay. Keep the basics and get rid of the extras. Let’s say a living room has a sofa, love seat, two wing chairs, two barrel shaped chairs, four end tables, one coffee table and four table lamps. Here’s how your thought process might go: First, you decide that the sofa and coffee table should stay. Then you decide to keep the wing chairs. The love seat and barrel shaped chairs are crowding the room—fine for living, but bad when selling. Out they go! Without the love seat, you don’t need two for the end table or two of the lamps. The room looks much larger already!

8. Arrange furniture the way you want it. In the same room we are imagining, put the sofa in front of the fireplace, with a wing chair on either side of the fireplace. The coffee table goes in front of the sofa. Put an end table on either side of the sofa. Does it work? Yes! Less furniture, more space. The room looks open, balanced and twice the size it did when you started. That’s what Home Staging can do.

9. Rebuild with accessories. When you bring accessories back into the room remember that less is more!

10. Fine-tune. Stand in the doorway again. Is there anything else you can do? Anything else you can do? Anything else you can remove? Anything missing that needs to be added? Have you cut the tags off the pillow and throws? Can you see any electrical cords? Take a long last look before you decide you are finished staging the room.

Thanks to Barb Schwarz for the tips.

Here are 10 simple steps for Staging
Text Box: WHAT BUYERS WANT Light , bright rooms Clean rooms Fresh, uncluttered rooms

      Dianne Jeffries, Realtor

  Accredited Staging Professional

       360 606-0313