CHAPTER 7 Getting Your House R our House Ready to Sell: o Sell: Staging for Effect When preparing for sale, think of your home as a hotel room or as a movie or stage set in a play, arranged precisely for the intended purpose, to sell quickly and earn you more money on the sale of your home. Home staging is preparing, dressing up, and presenting the for-sale house to appear, especially attractive and extremely welcoming to any prospective buyer. A staging strategy is effective in any market, no matter the type of property being listed. It applies equally to single-family houses, apartments, townhouses, and condos. Most home shoppers are looking for a home that will give them a fresh start. Perhaps they’re just starting out and it’s a fresh start from apartment living, or maybe they’ve outgrown their starter home and need more room for their expanding family. On the other end of the spectrum, if the kids are grown and moved out, a couple might be looking for a way to declutter their lives and downsize. There’s also the situation in which a marriage is ending in divorce and the couple must face the reality of selling what is often the single largest asset of the union. Agents and sellers staging the home enhance the prospect of selling the property for more money. Home staging takes extra time and work and may require the home seller to invest money and sweat equity, but the payoff is well worth the effort. Staging is one of the most effective marketing tools to sell homes for 49
Powered by FlippingBook