Home Staging
Preparing For Home Viewing

Home staging and properly preparing for home viewing is an extremely important step in the sale process. Start right.

Before Leaving for Work in the Morning

... to assist your REALTOR® (your partner in marketing), be prepared to invest some time and effort daily.

Before attempting to sell your car, you'd wash, wax and vacuum it. Right? So, why should your house be any different.

Don't leave without at least loading dirty dishes in the dishwasher, making the beds, cleaning the bathroom sinks and shower, polishing the sinks and faucets, organizing the kitchen counter-top, vacuuming the carpets, closing your closet doors and toilet seats, and placing any dirty laundry in a hamper.

There's a lot more to do for house staging, but not at the last minute.

Properly staging a house takes thoughtful planning and time.

If your REALTOR® lacks the skill for home staging, you could ...

Hire a Professional

Their fee will vary, depending upon what they feel is necessary to effectively prepare your property for home viewing. You may need to purge your home of junk, to de-personalize and de-clutter. Or you may need to add a few pieces of furniture and decor items to beautify your home. A home staging professional will probably have a contact from whom they can rent any pieces needed.

I've covered the topic of home staging and how to effectively prepare a home for viewing, in more detail on the page about how to enhance your home market value.

But for your convenience, I've copied some basics here:

If you plan to be present during the home viewing, or to greet the buyer agent and their client and then leave ...

Before They Arrive ...

... turn on all your lights - everywhere! Not only does bright make your home more welcoming, it also eliminates the necessity for the agent to search for light switches. They can concentrate on their client and address any questions or concerns that arise during the home viewing, and not in the car on the return trip to their office where it's more difficult.

Avoid cooking any foods that will leave an after-odour, like fish or spicy dishes. They smell delicious to you, but might not to a buyer prospect.

Having said this, I've never met anyone who didn't love the wonderful aroma of baked bread or desserts. Cinnamon rolls are a great idea. You might even leave them fresh and warm on a plate for your guests (or your own REALTOR®) during the home showing. Nice touch!

During a cold winter, before ...

Departing the House

... make sure your furnace is not in off-set mode, that is not set to a lower temperature. And turn on the fireplace if its gas, or start a fire in the fireplace (provided, of course, you have the right equipment for safe fires). Summertime? Make sure your air conditioning is on - but not set too cold.

It's best if you can ...

Vacate the House

... during the showing to provide the buyers with some privacy. If you're home, they may be uncomfortable about expressing their feelings about your home until after they've left. This eliminates the possibility of the agent addressing their concerns while actually in the house where they can more effectively resolve them. You want them to feel right at home, and not like they're invading your privacy. The more comfortable they feel, the higher the perceived market value.

However, if you plan to be home, do your best to stay out of the way. And don't follow them through the house!! It'll make everyone uncomfortable, including the buyer agent. Plus it will make you look anxious. Not a good bargaining position.

Turn off all televisions and entertainment systems, make sure all beds are made, nobody is sleeping, there are no dirty dishes in the sink, and your toilets are flushed and seats down.

Snow country? Shovel and salt your walkway and porch. Night time? Turn on exterior lights to welcome them to your door. It's really annoying for an agent to arrive at a front door in the dark, and have to open a lock-box to find the key, then the key hole. Think about it.

Bottom line? For effectively staging a house, do your best to make your home look like a ...

Model Home

Trust me - your extra effort at home staging will pay off. The buyers will appreciate your pride of ownership. And your property will likely achieve a higher sale price.

For more information on selling a home and how a REALTOR® can help you with home staging and obtaining a higher sale price, click here.

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