Staging Properties – Do You?

We’ve just started staging properties. In fact, we’ve just staged our second property after selling around 100 without staging.

I love the look. The homes feel so much warmer and we found that lookers tend to stay longer than when a property is vacant. Potential buyers seem to get comfortable and want to hang around to talk. With vacant properties, they walk through and leave, as if they feel awkward being in them.

I’m not sure how to judge the effectiveness of staging. Our houses are typically sold within 90 days, six months is an outside time for our company. Our staged property also took about 90 days with one of the early lookers coming back to purchase it. Did staging help? Who knows.

What I do know is that the houses feel more like homes — very clean, very uncluttered homes! I don’t see that staging takes away from anyone being able to visualize their own furnishings there. And, I thought the rooms looked larger once they were furnished.

We used staging the first time to hide what we considered inherent flaws. For example, the house had one long narrow room off the kitchen that looked odd and unfamiliar. A natural buyer question would be, “What is this room for and how do we furnish it?” The stager put a seating area at one end, a child’s play table and toys in the middle, and a desk with chair for a home office at the other end. The result? As soon as you walked into this space, you saw tremendous potential in using it for multiple functions all at the same time.

Another flaw that was “hidden?” was in the master bedroom. The room had fabulous light because it had large windows on two walls. The third wall had the entry door, closet, and door to the bathroom. The only solid wall was the wall directly to the side as you entered, not ideal for bed placement. So, the designer placed the bed at the far corner of the room angled between the two windows with a tall palm behind the headboard. The nightstands sat on either side under the windows and the dresser with mirror were along the solid wall. It looked beautiful, well designed, and what could have been a detriment was no longer noticeable.

Whether we continue to stage has yet to be decided. Do you use staging? What are your pros and cons? Obviously, it has to be a benefit to justify the cost.

Anxious to hear your thoughts!