The best way to get your home ready for Sale? Get your Realtor involved! Our Realtors are savvy when it comes to home-staging and they are ready to share their advice and experience with you!
According to the National Association of Realtors, thirty-nine percent of sellers’ agents stated that staging a home greatly decreases the amount of time the home is on the market.
The most common home improvement items agents recommended to sellers were decluttering the home (93 percent), entire home cleaning (89 percent), carpet cleaning (81 percent), and removing pets during showings (80 percent).
It's important to understand that more than 77% of buyerfind it easier to visualize the property as their future home if it is staged. The most common rooms that are staged include the living room (83 percent), kitchen (76 percent), master bedroom (69 percent), and the dining room (66 percent).
Check out these tips from our Realtors for staging your home for sale.
"Stage the most important rooms like the living room, kitchen, and master bedroom even if you don't stage the other rooms," said Lacie Banks, a Realtor in our Coldwell Banker Upton-Massamont Amherst office. "The furniture should have neutral colors but use accents and accessories such as pillows, pictures, or rugs to give it a pop of color. Use a mirror in smaller or darker rooms to make the room appear bigger and brighter. Use the brightest light bulbs possible for each light fixture".
Paula Davitt, a Realtor in our Amherst office gives the following advice when staging a home for sale:
- Your House needs to be super clean, particularly kitchen and baths. Think hotel baths when staging. Hide all personal toilet articles and put the toilet seat down.
- Address all minor repairs and touch-ups. Buyers assume there are other things wrong if you ignore maintenance that you thought were non-issues.
- For an open house or showing, leave lights on anywhere they provide illumination the sun doesn’t reach.
- Trim shrubs around house and make sure pathways to doors are cleared and shoveled in winter.
- Get pets out of the house when showings take place. A high-energy dog can make people nervous and not want to focus on the house.
- Put up shades and pull back curtains. Natural light is critical. Make sure windows are clean.
John Riley, also a Realtor in our Amherst office advises his clients to "Minimize personal belongings. Do a light cleaning every day. Keep your kitchen and bath pristine." In addition, "Get a large plastic tub or two…and when there is a showing, throw personal items that would normally be out, into the tub. Low overhead, low hassle, immediate retrieval."
Mike Pratt a Realtor in our Shelburne Falls office is adamant! "Yes you should stage! If it's a vacant empty home, furniture gives perspective and scale to room size for both online photos and showings. If the house is occupied and full of furnishings, a good start is to declutter by storing away extra decorative items and furniture, less is more. Rooms will seem bigger with fewer furnishings and knickknacks."
Also, a fresh coat of paint is a great way to make your home look cleaner and more contemporary. Remember to keep paint colors neutral. And don't forget to clean out your closets to showcase space. Declutter. Declutter. Declutter.
Pamela Sclafani is the Marketing Manager for Coldwell Banker Upton Massamont. She lives in the Pioneer Valley and enjoys everything it has to offer, gorgeous scenery, hills and mountains for hiking, lakes for paddle boarding, the change of seasons, and the close proximity to Boston and New York.
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