Welcome to the pageant!
Home staging puts your home in the spotlight while increasing its value
By Joanna Beresford 11/13/2009
According to the International Association of Home Staging Professionals, staging a home can increase the sale price by as much as 7 percent and lead to a successful sale at least 100 days earlier than a home that’s left unenhanced. In fact, “staged” homes sell in 37 days or less in 94.7 percent of home sale situations.
The association, established in 1999, includes thousands of members and apparently is the only formal organization dedicated solely to this emerging trade. I’m unaware of any licensing or designation that distinguishes “professional” home stagers from their more casual counterparts (savvy, dedicated, tasteful homeowners, real estate agents and developers), but at some point in the recent chaotic era of real estate routine, the practice has become a prerequisite for prompt home sales.
Here’s a table of cost benefits compiled by HomeGain, an association affiliated with the staging professionals group. HomeGain interviewed 2,000 real estate agents nationwide, asking them first to identify 10 significant areas of home improvement, and then soliciting the agents’ analysis of these categories:
I’m not sure I grasp the difference between home repair and home staging. To me, “cleaning and decluttering” would necessarily include carpet cleaning, for example. But the numbers are compelling, if self-serving.
Debrah Kemp, stylist and owner of Beaux Redesign, has staged homes and rental properties throughout Los Angeles. Most of her work has taken place in properties that were previously vacant. Owners have moved away, homes are new, or they’re in foreclosure.
“That’s when staging gives the most benefit,” says Kemp. “It’s hard for a buyer to walk into an empty space and envision living there. Staging the home helps a prospective buyer to identify with the home. It helps the buyer make an emotional connection to the place.”
Kemp also describes the process as “aspirational.” When a buyer walks into a deliciously staged home, he or she believes for a minute that life in this new, spotless and enhanced life is possible. Entering a properly staged home is like tuning in to a powerful film; you suspend disbelief, leave your doubts at the door and allow yourself to be swept from a dull, troubled world into a beautiful, effortless one.
In this regard Kemp describes herself as more of an expert merchandiser than designer. She’s a real estate agent with a background in advertising and marketing. She’s also bought, sold and rented properties that she staged for herself, and she believes in the power of staging.
“I recently staged a home that sold in less than two weeks,” she says.
Kemp maintains a storage space full of furniture, rugs, paintings, linens, books and accessories of all aesthetic genres. Most of the material can be used in multiple settings because, unlike home design, home staging is meant to be temporary. Basically, the whole point of moving all her stuff into a house or an apartment is to move it out again as soon as possible.
Perils of the trade: pilferage.
Like most of her colleagues, Deborah carries insurance to protect her against loss. She shops a lot and she donates items to charities when she can’t use them any more — even when they’re practically brand new.
Moving Mountains, a home staging and interior design company that serves neighborhoods in LA, Long Beach and the San Fernando and San Gabriel valleys, offers this advice on its Web site: “Once you put your house on the market, you’ve entered it in a beauty contest.”
Landlords, homeowners, agents and foreclosure-ridden banks: welcome to the pageant!
Contact Joanna Dehn Beresford at truewrite@yahoo.com.
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