Selling your home requires the kind of attention to detail that helps prospective buyers envision the space as their own. This is where home staging comes in, helping to make any home look like new and reflect care, quality and cleanliness.
Industry surveys show that homes which are staged sell faster and at higher prices than those that aren’t, so the effort and minor expense you invest in the home staging process can definitely put dollars in your pocket at closing time.
Here are nine essential home staging tips to help sell your home as quickly as possible:
Tour with a buyer’s eye view
Take a subjective look at your home’s interior and exterior. What do you notice first? Everyday clutter or the home’s best features? Make a list of what needs to be cleared away, cleaned up, repaired and repainted.
Edit furnishings
Along with clearing away everyday clutter and stowing family photos and personal effects, trim down furnishings for the kind of just-right balance and scale that would suit Goldilocks. There needs to be enough in place to suggest proper scale and capacity within each room, but not so much that traffic flow is hindered and architectural elements are obscured.
Neutralize interiors
Make sure your home staging work includes a neutral paint job. Create a backdrop for buyer imagination by replacing patterned wall coverings with off-white paint, and install low-grade tan wall-to-wall carpet.
Clean, clean, clean
Ensure that every inch of your home sparkles for a fresh, welcoming appearance, from ceiling cobweb hideaways to windows to floors. Also address and banish odors resulting from pets, cooking, smoking and the like.
Tune up the details
Repair or replace inoperable hardware, touch up interior trim, and make sure all light fixtures are clean and loaded with brand-new bulbs to makes sure there’s plenty of light available to show off your newly staged home.
Re-accessorize with care
Limit wall decorations to fewer and larger pieces of artwork, and include a couple of strategically placed mirrors to expand the space and reflect its best assets. When introducing display pieces to a room, use the rule of threes to create attractive, uncluttered groupings, and add a few well-placed plants for welcome vitality.
Spend time in the garage
Home staging is just as important in the garage as prospective home buyers will be visiting that space as well. Clear away corner cobwebs, sweep floors, dust surfaces and pack up any straggling tools and project materials.
Create curb appeal
Lush landscaping is one of your home’s best exterior assets, and according to the Professional Landcare Network, it can add as much as 15 percent to the property value. So get out the mower, fertilize all turf and plantings, weed diligently and add seasonal color to flower beds.
Build a grand entry
Touch up exterior trim, clean windows and repair loose or damaged shutters, supply light fixtures with new bulbs, polish front door hardware and address numbers, roll out a new doormat, and add a few pots of colorful blooms on the front porch.
Spending a couple of weekends on your home staging project is an important home selling tip that is a worthwhile investment of time and money that delivers great results. As the saying goes, you only get one chance to make a great first impression and staging your home assures that the impressions buyers walk away with will be positive.
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