All the World's a Stage, Part 2 - Selling a Home Tips

You really love green.  I mean you LOVE the color green.  Your bedroom is painted green, your kitchen is green, your living room furniture is green, your bathrooms are all shades of green:   chartreuse, sage, emerald, kelly, mint, pine, spring, teal, olive, Celadon, neon, sea, light, dark... When Johnny Cash wrote the song "Forty Shades of Green", he was actually thinking about your house.

the colors in a home play into staging a home for sale

Unfortunately, not everyone shares your affinity for green and if you're getting your home ready to sell, it may be something you need to address.

NEUTRALIZING NOT STERALIZING

Staging a home when you're still living in it, as I mentioned in my last post, means making your home a little less personal.  When it comes to personal taste, you sometimes need to neutralize the colors, lighten up a darker room, let the buyer be able to imagine bringing in their furniture, seeing their passion for the color red be able to play out in the home.

If you're living in the house, you don't want to make it so bland that the buyer wonders what kind of neat freaks live here and don't they have any personality?  You do want to tone it down, by packing up your 1,342 piece collection of Star Wars memorabilia, removing personal photos and keeping horizontal surfaces clean and clear of clutter (aka personal stuff).

PAINTING



  

Painting to stage a home

A good paint job is an investment, but a few thousand dollars spent to neutralize that aubergine room into a soft taupe could be what sells the house, and could be what keeps the price up.  A buyer who is worried about the cost of having to paint everything might be putting in a lower offer, if they offer at all.  Many times I've been with buyers who just can't get past the color on the wall or, more, the color of the carpet.  Some understand "it's only paint" and others don't and move on to other homes for sale.

Work with your agent and a staging consultant to see where you really need to paint and where adding in a few accent pieces will be enough to break up the color saturation.

WANT MORE INFORMATION?

 

If you'd like my full report on "Getting Your Home Ready to Sell" as well as monthly newsletters with Long Beach/West Orange County real estate updates, tips on homes and life, please send me an email to katielarson@kw.com and I'll get that report to you right away.  You can also "LIKE" me on Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/KatieLongBeachRealtor?ref=hl

All the world's a stage, but your home is what matters

Staging a home creates a welcoming feeling

One of the first questions sellers ask me, after how high can we price this house, is "Do we need to stage the home?"  Many of you watch the HGTV shows that tell you staging is very important, and it is.  You want a potential buyer to walk in, feel good about what they see, be able to imagine their life unfolding in the same space yours has unfolded.  You want them to see themselves as the home's next chapter.

STAGING VERSUS REARRANGING

If you are living in your home, you can't very well move out all your well loved furniture and bring in the fancy new stuff, so I bring in a staging consultant on listings that will have the owners still living in the home, who still need to cook meals, host parties, entertain kids, watch TV comfortably in the old chair.  The staging consultant works with the furniture and furnishings in the house and might bring in some accent pieces.

The consultant will make suggestions to make rooms feel more open, to show off the features, to let in more natural light.  The staging feedback can also be a simple as "declutter and depersonalize", which means clean up the piles, straighten items in drawers and closets and remove personal photos and awards from walls and shelves.

CURB APPEAL

Curb appeal brings them in the door

You want to invite buyers into your home by welcoming them when they first drive up.  Fresh flowers planted, fitting the season, and a nicely trimmed lawn are a start.  The staging consultant can also make suggestions as to whether or not that garden gnome collection is welcoming or scary.

If you'd like my full report on "Getting Your Home Ready to Sell" and my monthly newsletters that include local Southern California information, Long Beach real estate updates, as well as tips on homes and life, please send me an email to katielarson@kw.com and I'll get that report to you right away.

I'm never too busy for your referrals, so if you know anyone looking to buy or sell a home, please let me know and send them my way.