Why to invest in Home Staging

Why to invest in Home Staging

Many homeowners underestimate the power of Home Staging and they decide to save on it. Is this a good and actually profitable home selling (or renting) strategy? Not necessarily… 

You can only make a good first impression once. And these days, the real estate market is very saturated and competitive, that’s why it’s so hard to distinguish your property from the others and make it memorable. There is a way to do this though! 

People buy on emotion. If you influence the feelings of the buyer and make him imagine his future in your property… that’s what you won with others! With so many people still treating Home Staging as an unnecessary expense, the fact is that it can turn out to be your best investment. 

Do you want to maximise sales potential and shorten your listing time? Make friends with Home Stager!

What is Home Staging?

Home Staging is a real estate marketing tool designed to make your home as appealing as possible to most potential buyers. It helps emphasise the main features of your home and present it in the best light, increasing significantly interest in your property. When it’s done correctly, Home Staging will also increase the value of your home and speed up the selling process at the highest possible price. 

Home Staging is often confused with interior design, which involves arranging home according to the owner’s tastes. In Home Staging, all attention is focused on styling the house in a neutral way, so that each potential client can imagine their everyday life in the property they are viewing. This will help potential buyers connect emotionally with your property, which can have a real impact on their purchasing decision.

What activities can be included in Home Staging service?

The Home Staging service is often tailored to your needs and will vary by the type of property (vacant or occupied) and its condition. Contrary to appearances, Home Staging is not only about arranging cushions and lighting candles – this is usually the last stage of the service and before that, there are many other activities, like: 

  • decluttering – accumulation of various items and general clutter usually give a really bad impression on potential buyers and will take away the charm of even the most beautiful homes. This is why getting rid of unnecessary things is crucial and Home Stager knows how to remove them quickly and cleverly,
  • depersonalisation – baby toys, travel magnets, religious symbols, family photos – these “details” perfectly prevent potential buyers from visualising them living in your home. Home Stager catches various such trinkets / elements of the interior design that may work against effective sale / rental,
  • small repairs – leaky faucets, holes in walls, broken cabinet door knobs – some corrections will not cost you much, and may have a huge impact on the property’s final valuation and not constitute the basis for possible price negotiations. Home Stager will suggest what needs to be repaired, and in some cases it may be necessary to replace the floor or repaint the walls. Some Home Stagers (e.g. me!) Work with a handyman and can organise help from proven professionals 🙂
  • home cleaning – sometimes the most obvious things can work wonders, and I don’t think we need to convince anyone that only a perfectly clean property can make a good impression. I collaborate with cleaners and offer this service when needed,
  • identifying the target audience – understanding who is a potential buyer, what age he is, what his lifestyle is, how he spends his free time, has a key influence on the preparation of the styling concept and subsequent sales success. That is why every Home Stager carries out an in-depth target customer analysis first to select the best practices,
  • preparing moodboards – Home Stagers prepare moodboards in order to differentiate an apartment from others and make it unforgettable and unique. It is about preparing the concept of styling the apartment: choosing neutral leading colours, finding interesting furniture and accessories inspiration. This service is provided for Serviced Accommodation and Holiday Lets,
  • shopping – Home Stager can also order online or buy personally all the things necessary for styling the apartment and take care of delivering them to the apartment (for example, I work with the van driver and I can organise loading things into the property). This service is provided for Serviced Accommodation and Holiday Lets,
  • assemble furniture – Home Stager can also take care of assembling the furniture if needed
  • property styling for photo session – this is probably our favourite part of the job when we can express ourselves artistically and change the property beyond recognition! Making beds, arranging accessories – our work is most often associated with this stage, but as you can see, it’s not the only job we do 🙂
  • being with the photographer at a photo session and providing photos – Home Stagers often collaborate with professional photographers for years, they will be with them during the sessions and they will oversee that everything is going according to plan.

Of course, not every Home Stager offers all the services listed above. I have already cooperated with many investors from different parts of the world and in addition to the classic Home Staging service, I often help them manage their properties during their works, helping to organise all of the above activities. So if, for example, you live away from your investment, I can take care of everything from picking up the keys from the estate agent to providing photos. If you are interested in this type of service, drop me a message 🙂 

Or maybe you prefer to prepare a property for sale / rent yourself, but do not know where to start? In such a situation, it is worth making an appointment for a Home Staging consultation – here you will learn more details about it.

Why is it worth investing in Home Staging?

Home Staging investment

Mostly because through the appropriate styling (adapted to the needs of the target group) of the house for rent or sale, you help potential buyers create an emotional relationship to the house. Thanks to the right details and accessories, they can imagine how e.g. how they will be drinking coffee in the morning in your beautifully styled garden or having family Sunday dinner by a large wooden table in the dining room. If your home evokes some emotions in the buyers, you don’t have to worry about the competition in the area. Such a buyer will also be able to pay more and make a purchase decision faster.

Staged houses stand out from the crowd and they are sold quicker, which means that they do not spend long months on the market, thus avoiding the first costly price reduction.

Home Staging significantly increases the value of the property and generally staged homes sell over 8% above asking price. I’ll give you some real life examples!

Before I met the client for a consultation, she had already done two valuations and both were well below the price the client wanted (£550k and £650k). After consultation, the client implemented all the suggested changes. Then I did Home Staging. When it came to the next valuation, the estate agent was happy to put the house on the market at an asking price of £700k. The house finally sold above its asking price! 

In this case, before I met the client for a consultation, he had a valuation of £135k. After Home Staging, the estate agent was happy to put the house on the market at an asking price of £170k. The investment in home staging paid off because the house was sold in 24 hours after going on the marketYou can read the whole case study here.

My name is Marta and I am the owner of Pearl Home Design, a company that specialises in Home Staging. I will help you increase the value and the appeal of your property in order to sell your home quickly at the highest possible price. Need help with Home Staging? Contact me.

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