Home Staging

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Staging Your Palo Alto Area Home For Sale

Home Staging facilitates a Buyer’s Emotional Connection to a Home

When a potential buyer walks into your Palo Alto Area home for sale, the most important factor influencing their decision to purchase your home is their ability to envision themselves and their family living happily in your home. They want a home that does not need extensive repairs, and that is in “move in” condition, because home prices in the Silicon Valley are so high, they won’t be able renovate for several years. Conversely, when I am working with a cash limited, but savvy buyer or investor, we search for homes that are dark, cluttered and jam packed with personal belongings. These homes will sell for tens of thousands less than if they went through a “pre-market” home preparation makeover” and were then Staged. The buyer gets a great deal!

Sellers must “Let Go” When Listing a Home for Sale

Every seller wants their home to sell fast and bring in the most amount of money. Yet, most sellers have difficulty seeing their cluttered home as a buyer sees their home. Once a home seller signs a listing agreement, essentially their home is now a product on the market, and no longer their home. In a few short weeks or months, the home seller will no longer be living in that home. Why not start the packing up process before the home goes on the MLS (Multiple Listing Service), when it will bring the most cash to you, the seller?

Realtors® Who Were Surveyed Say Home Staging Works*

Very effective: 80.3%
Effective: 17.6%
Combined: 97.9% recommend staging

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Benefits of Staging Your Palo Alto Area Home for Sale*

Staging “depersonalizes” your home so that potential buyers “see themselves” as the owner of your property-this makes them primed for purchase
For every dollar spent on staging the home owners could realize a return on investment of $16.45
On average, professionally stated properties were on the market for 25% fewer days than non-staged properties.
Staged homes sold on average for 11% more.
Staged homes show well on the Internet and in Print Media.

Tips for Sellers Who Hire a Professional Home Stager

Hire a stager two months in advance of putting your home on the MLS (Multiple Listing Service)
Remind yourself: “This is no longer my home. It is a house that will soon be on the market. My goal is to net the most amount of money from this home sale.”
Follow the Stager’s advice and recommendations
Make the mental decision to “let go” of your emotional attachment to your home
Say goodbye to every room
Picture yourself depositing that huge check for your home sale into your bank account
Clear out all of your belongings and move furniture the stager will not be using into the garage or a storage facility
Don’t look backwards, look forward to the future

Tips for Staging Your Home Without the Assistance of a Professional

Visit open houses and photograph staged listings similar to your own home
Emulate professionally staged homes with your own furnishings
Depersonalize: pack up all personal photographs and family heirlooms. Buyers can’t see past personal artifacts, and you don’t want them to be distracted.
De-Clutterize: pack up only but the most basic necessities for living. Store items in the garage
Re-arrange, and pack away most of the items in closets, drawers and kitchen cabinets
Buyers will snoop: they WILL open drawers, closets and cabinets. Think of the message it sends if belongings are jam packed into closet and drawers helter skelter! Now imagine what a buyer believes about you if everything is ultra organized, and full of extra storage. It says you probably take good care of the rest of the house as well AND your home has adequate storage.
Homes show better with less furniture and smaller furniture: some sellers rent stylish furniture from Cort Furniture Rental when staging their home on a budget
Less furniture makes your home look bigger, brighter and more open
Remove extra leaves from your dining room table to make the room appear larger. Set the table for four or six with stylish updated tableware.
If you want to take a chandelier, window coverings or fixtures with you, remove and replace them now. If the buyer never sees these items they will not desire them. Once you tell a buyer they cannot have an item, they will covet it, and it could sink your deal.

When a seller says “It looks bare, it’s not like a home anymore!” I know the home is ready to sell!