Have you ever noticed how perfect the rooms in a model home are set up? Or how some of the homes that you have been taking tours of with your real estate agent seem to just cry out to be lived in? Do you think that the home seller is so meticulous or perfect; that their life is so well ordered? Of course not! They are no more perfect than you are; they just might be a little smarter. If you are getting ready to list a home on the market, you need every edge you can get. Consider hiring a home stager as an investment in making your home sell just a little faster.
What a home stager does:
- Just like staging a play, a home stager can help the home make a better first impression.
- Makes clever use of light and shadow to make rooms look bigger, flaws smaller and the whole thing newer and cleaner.
- Draws the eyes to the most positive aspect of every room.
What a home stager cannot do:
- Cover the scent of baby vomit, kitty litter and whatever that thing was that died in the crawl space.
- Make a cozy bungalow look like a roomy villa.
- Hide the fact that the room is sloped slightly to the left.
- Make your home more valuable than it really is.
What a good home stager will do:
- Arrange furniture to encourage better traffic flow and space usage (this may involve asking you to move some furniture out of the area).
- Adjust lighting to the optimum level for the room.
- Make suggestions for ambience like candles, music and scents.
What a good home stager will NOT do:
- Try to hide obvious structural flaws that should by law be revealed to all potential buyers.
- Tell you that the home is “guaranteed” to sell or tell you an exact price.
- Suggest that your home is worth more than its appraised or market value.
- Suggest that you lie or keep things from the buyer in any way.
Hiring a home stager may be a simple phone call away in some areas and more difficult in others. If you cannot find a listing for a home stager inHouston, Texas, try an interior design school. A student might like to take on the project to use for class credit.