The Continuing Story of a Labor of Love

A few weeks ago, I shared the story of updating and staging Walt’s mom’s house.  We painted her house with spectacular colors; updated the bathroom light fixture; changed out all of the cabinet pulls and staged vignettes in key rooms of the house.  For about $500 and a good bit of sweat equity from my husband, me and his sister’s family, we made Mary’s house look fresh and almost like new.  It was truly a Labor of Love.

The next chapter in this continuing story is remarkable and worth sharing.  Mary lived in a 55-plus retirement community in suburban Chicago where the real estate market has been stagnant.  The comps for her model townhome showed a few models that have been on the market for over 300 days and a few more for over 90 days.  In those cases, the sellers priced their homes at the amount they paid and not at the market price.

After consulting with multiple realtors who they interviewed for this listing, Walt and his sister decided to price Mary’s house to sell – at a loss from what she paid but not a dramatic reduction.  They were prepared for the long haul – expecting it to take 4-6 months.  Hedging her bets on the upgrades, staging and pricing, Mary also buried a statue of St. Joseph in the backyard!

In spite of all of the gloomy forecasts of the suburban Chicago real estate market, I am quite pleased to tell you that Mary sold her house in a little more than 2 weeks!!!  Even more amazing, she had multiple offers with the cash offer being the one selected.  Walt’s sister spoke with a relative of the buyer who told her that he liked the floor plan and really liked the fresh paint job and the kitchen cabinets that looked like new.

I preach the benefits of home staging on a regular basis in this blog and in conversations with sellers and realtors.  We did not preach home staging to Walt’s family – we just did it.  I am so happy and proud that the updating and staging helped Mary sell her house quickly and for the price the family hoped to get out of the house in this tight market.  She gave me a great real life example about how professional home staging can make a huge difference. 

It was a Labor of Love with a very happy ending.  Now Mary can focus on the possibilities of the next chapter of her life in the assisted living center.  And I am thinking about buying a case of St. Joseph statues too!?!?!

Dwell in possibilities

Cindy

FOR REALTORS ONLY - Giving Away the Store

I have been asked on more than one occasion whether I am “giving away the store” by sharing too much about home staging in this blog.  It is true that I share quite a bit of information about home staging in my regular blog posts. 

As you know, the mission of “to be continued” is to educate and inform proactive Realtors and savvy sellers.  I am not sure how I can meet that mission by being miserly with the information and experiences that I share about staging. 

My hope is that if you follow “to be continued” on a regular basis, you will learn a great deal about staging.  You will appreciate the challenges and value of home staging.  You will be more discerning when deciding to work with a professional home stager.  You will be armed with facts, figures and anecdotes about what a big difference professional home staging makes in selling a home.

I am not really concerned that I am putting myself out of business by sharing information, ideas and experiences with this blog.  The reality is that home staging is more art than science; more craft than procedure manual.

I perfected my craft (and actually feel that I am continuing to learn my craft every day) through a combination of training, study and on-the-job learning.  Of the three, the most valuable was the on-the-job work.  Each of my more than 175 home staging engagements taught me valuable lessons and helped distinguish my work from that of other home stagers. 

With home staging, you take the principles, practices and approaches and then you adapt, create and innovate based on the strengths and weaknesses of each home.  Home staging is more jazz improvisation and less symphonic note reading – and I say the same thing about the work of my Realtor partners.  Technology can make our work easier but machines will never replace the Realtor or the professional home stager!

It is one thing to understand the principles of room flow and furniture placement and quite another to make those staging concepts work in a real house with real clients under a real deadline (and still make money in the process). 

I do hope that “to be continued” inspires some readers to consider home staging as a profession.  I really hope that it inspires Realtors to use professional home staging in the portfolio of services offered to their sellers.  If nothing else, “to be continued” shows you the possibilities of home staging.

Dwell in possibilities

Cindy

“BEST STAGED PLANS”

As you know, I eat, sleep and breath home staging and interior design.  I guess that’s not enough.  I will now have to be entertained by what sounds like a good book.

The buzz in the home staging world is a new book by Claire Cook called “Best Staged Plans”. 

RESA (Real Estate Staging Association) posted “Home Staging Hits Amazing New Novel, Order Today!”

According to the Amazon.com review:

“As a professional home stager, Sandy Sullivan is an expert at transforming cluttered rooms into attractive houses ready for sale. If only reinventing her life were as easy as choosing the perfect paint color. She's eager to put her family's suburban Boston home on the market, to downsize, and to simplify her own life. But she must first deal with her foot-dragging husband and her grown son, who has moved back home after college to inhabit the basement "bat cave."

After reading them the riot act, Sandy takes a job staging a boutique hotel in Atlanta recently acquired by her best friend's boyfriend. The good news is that she can spend time with her recently married daughter, Shannon, in Atlanta. The bad news is that Shannon finds herself heading to Boston for job training, leaving Sandy and her southern son-in-law, Chance, as reluctant roommates. If that's not complicated enough, Sandy begins to suspect that her best friend's boyfriend may be seeing another woman on the side.

Filled with characters who are fresh and original, yet recognizable enough to live in your neighborhood--plus plenty of great tips and tricks for fixing up houses, and lives--this is a wise and witty story of letting go and moving on. Best Staged Plans is Claire Cook at her most humorous and heartfelt.”

I just placed my order.  Stay tuned for my book review!

Dwell in possibilities

Cindy

The “Put It on the Market” Myth

On occasion, certain Realtors (not usually the successful Realtors I describe in “to be continued”) will advise their home selling clients to just put the house on the market and then if it doesn’t sell in a month or two, stage the house.  I call this the “Put It on the Market” Myth.

My assumption is that if the seller balks at the cost of professional home staging, then the Realtor offers this wait-and-see advice.  Or, possibly, the Realtor is skeptical about the value of home staging. 

Either way, this advice always baffles me. 

Why suggest that a home seller lose the advantage of impressing every potential buyer?  The maxim that you are never given a second chance to make a good first impression truly applies to the real estate process.  If you want to make this house stand out from the competition, why are you waiting to make that happen?  How many missed opportunities have walked in and turned around never to return?  How many Realtors have seen this house and will be hard to convince to bring their buyers back again?

As every Realtor knows, there is an initial flurry of activity when a house first goes on the market.  This flurry includes Realtor tours, open houses, and advertising.  If this house does not show well during the initial flurry of activity, it is quite likely it will not get shown again.

While I recognize that the cost of home staging can appear to be significant to some sellers, my strong belief is that it is more of an investment to be returned when the house sells quicker and for a good price. 

My guess is that these “Put It on the Market” Realtors do not understand or do not really believe in the value of professional home staging. 

My hope is that those Realtors find ways like “to be continued” to learn more and become believers in the value of home staging.  My plan is to keep proving the value of home staging so that it becomes “the standard” for home sales in our area as it is “the standard” in areas like Atlanta, Minneapolis, Chicago, Dallas and New York City. 

Every day I demonstrate the possibilities of professional home staging.  It can make a huge difference and usually does.

Dwell in possibilities

Cindy

Friday Treat - Staged Home / Designed Office

Happy Friday!  Today, we use real projects to demonstrate the difference between home staging and interior design. 

We keep making the point that the ultimate goal of home staging is to make a house buyer friendly – appealing to as many buyers as possible.  The corollary is that the ultimate goal of interior design is to make a home Smith or Jones friendly – comfortable, functional and reflective of their personal taste. 

A real sticking point with some sellers is that they resent having to take their personality out of the house to appeal to as many buyers as possible. 

A real life case in point is Dr. K.  Our first experience with this client was to restyle, update and stage her home in order to put it on the market for sale.  Dr. K and her husband followed all of the advice of my Realtor partner and me by updating their kitchen and bar area with new granite and backsplash, painting the entire interior of the house and installing all new carpeting.  Their goal was to make their house totally competitive with new construction.

Dr. K has definite bold tastes in colors artwork and her home reflected her personality.  We needed to make her home buyer friendly which meant that her fantastic Native American artwork, bold colors and music memorabilia needed to be removed.  After several conversations, she understood intellectually that her house was now a product to sell and not her home.  She was a good sport, but this was not easy for her.  By the way, she affectionately refers to me as the “house rapist”. 

You can see the results of this restyling, updating and staging project at http://www.transitions-home-staging.com/Camelot-Court-Staging-1.html .

It is worth noting that Dr. K’s house sold in about 1 week for their premium price.  The buyer was heard remarking to his family that “it doesn’t get any better than this”.

The second project came about when Dr. K wanted my assistance in designing her new office space.  In this case, my goal was to not only make her space pleasant and comfortable for her patients but to reflect her personality, interests and style.  There was no question that it had to be “Dr. K Friendly”. 

Dr. K loves purple! So we implemented “eggplant” with some beautiful shades of gray and taupe in the design of her new office space and furniture.  She and I picked out some original Native American prints from her collection to complement and accent the color palette.  Then, we accessorized to reflect her style and personality in the waiting room; patient rooms; and, her personal office.

You can see shots of her waiting room in the accompanying photos. 

While she was pleased with selling her house quickly and for a premium price, she loved, loved, loved her new office!  Her staff also enjoys working in this fresh, light and comfortable space.  Dr. K tells me that she receives great feedback from patients, administrators and other doctors who visit her space.  It has been most gratifying to me to have folks stop and tell me how much they love her new office and what a great job I did in capturing Dr. K’s personality!

It is not often that I have the benefit of staging and designing space for the same folks.  In this case, my Realtor partner and I saw the possibilities in updating and staging the house so that it competed with new construction for all of the right reasons – and it did.  Then, I was able to help Dr. K see the possibilities with an office space that was unique and still reflect her style, interests and tastes – and it did. 

Dwell in possibilities

Cindy