Where is the line between Stagers and Listing Realtors?

Assumptions

A Stager's job is to help the homeowner sell their home?

They do this by "styling" and merchandising the place so as to appeal to the widest group of potential buyers?

Their sphere of influence/responsibility ends with the perimeter of the property?

Yes? Do we agree so far?  What do you think?

 I'm no longer sure.   I need advice. 

I'm asked for advice all the time.  Where does my "piece" of the overall puzzle end?  More and more I'm being asked to give a diagnosis on why a home hasn't sold.  How many layers am I allowed to examine before the listing realtor feels I've crossed the line?

When a seller asks me

• why my home hasn't sold in 15 months?
• why no-one's even come to see it in 6 months?
• why hasn't there been even one offer on this home in the time it's been listed?

I look at the whole picture. You can't SEE the whole story if you don't.

Now, thanks to AR and all I've learned here, I start with the home's "web presence".

• What do the photos look like?  94% of all home searches start online nowadays, it's said.
• How does the MLS listing describe the home - language, emo-connect points, etc?
• Where else is it listed?  How many eyeballs are being given a chance to see it?
• Has there been an Event Marketing Plan - how much exposure has the home had?

Then, and only then, do I look at the home's condition, the USP (unique selling points), the illustrations of lifestyle.

Lastly, I look at price.

When I first got into this business, I found it very hard not to get into discussions of price, and was frequently remonstrated with and chastised for butting into matters that were not mine to discuss!  Now, I phrase those discussions in terms of lifestyle!

I can imagine realtors thinking I'm butting in all over again with all of this "examination".  I can hear them shaking their heads with a modest outrage in their throat -  "marketing is not the purvue of a stager!"  maybe it wasn't, but I think it has to be.  I think we have to team up and smudge the line:-

The staging is completely pointless, and money wasted, if the photos are bad (or non-existent), if the copy doesn't sell the points the staging is trying to illustrate, if the home isn't being exposed property to its correct market.  But is all that our job, as stagers?  Just because we can do it, should we?  And if we do, how do we charge for it?

The bottom line is

get the house sold for as much money as possible in the least amount of time

If that's the case, can the stager's job really end at the property's perimeter?

_____________________________________________________________________________________________

Juliet Johnson Staging provides home staging in NJ.