THOUGHTS & QUESTIONS FOR REAL ESTATE AGENTS

THOUGHTS & QUESTIONS FOR REAL ESTATE AGENTS

NOTE - THIS PHOTO WAS TAKEN OFF A GOOGLE WEBSITE - IT IS NOT MY OWN PHOTO

Over the past few years, I have had the opportunity to meet many Real Estate Agents and talk about the services of Professional Home Staging that are offered through Clarity Over Clutter in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada. The comments and support from many of the Agents has been very positive, with a great appreciation for what we as Professional Stagers to do help the Homeowner prepare their property to sell faster and for increased profit.

The response from some Real Estate Agents is that they agree with Home Staging - BUT they do their own (either themselves or family or Associates ) Home Staging for their clients. They carry a fresh crisp white shower curtain, some white fluffy towels and a few accessories and maybe a couple of pieces of furniture that they use to Stage. They discuss with their clients what to remove from home and then reposition (at times) the remaining furnishings.

Some Real Estate Agents agreed that Home Staging works - but do not offer or incorporate the Professional Home Staging Services as part of package to clients.

Listed are just a few of the benefits of having a property Professional Home Staged:

- lower days on the market

- avoid expired listings

- reduced marketing costs

- increased ability for the Agent to sell more listings more often

- get more referrals from happy clients

- photos for Internet, MLS and Feature Sheets of properties that have been Professionally Staged create more interest (FIRST IMPRESSIONS ARE LASTING IMPRESSIONS - NO ONE GETS A SECOND CHANCE TO MAKE A FIRST IMPRESSION)

For many of the Professional Home Stagers, there are a number of items that have been accomplished and required to carry out a Professional Service, they are as follows:

- Initial (detailed training) and Continual Education (on a variety of topics) - to keep up with the market trends and offer updated information to Homeowners

- Being a Licensed Business and carrying proper valid Business Insurance (in some cases carrying WCB - Workers Compensation)

- Having or having access to a variety of accessories and/or furniture to work for a specific property. Not all accessories and/or furniture work for every property. Our goal as Professional Stagers is to show off the features of the property.

- For many Professional Home Stagers - being part of an Association is key to building a support amongst the Staging Community and credibility. As part of an Association, Professional Home Stagers have Codes of Conduct and Codes of Ethics that they must adhere to. - This also brings credibility to the Staging Industry.

Costs associated with many of the above are all just part of running a Professional Business and allows us to offer a Professional Service to clients.

There are many people in the marketplace who have not heard of Home Staging or have a misconception of what or how much Home Staging costs, or the process of how it works. I have had a few different Homeowners that had not heard of Home Staging and once their properties were Professionally Staged by Clarity Over Clutter and SOLD, they were very willing to share the benefits of having a house Professionally Home Staged. It was a huge benefit to each of the clients.

As a Professional Home Stager, I would not recommend details or try to sell a property for a client, as this is not my field of expertise. I do and have given a list of Real Estate Agents that I have recommended to Homeowners, for them to talk to and choose the Agent that they want to market their property. If I had the training and was licensed as a Real Estate Agent, I then could offer that service to clients.

There is a process to Home Staging. The initial Consultation is where the Professional Home Stager meets with the Homeowner and tours the property, making recommendations and suggestions of what to do in order to prepare a house for the market. This could be decluttering, cleaning, removing excess furniture, repainting, replacement of fixtures, exterior work or repairs and many other suggestions - each property is unique and so are the recommendations. One way, some Real Estate Agents are working to help Homeowners get their properties ready for market is to offer the Consultation as part of their services. For some Homeowners - all that is needed is a Consultation. The property might need some minor tweeking that the Homeowner can do. Offering the Consultation as part of your service to your clients is 'Value Added' to the Homeowner and at the same time takes the owness of the Agent of what recommendations to do to a property. This allows the Agent more time to connect with other Homeowners for listings. The cost of the Consultation is minimal compared to the costs of marketing for an unstaged property that can by far outweight the cost of a Consultation.

With all of these points to ponder, I would like to ask for feedback from Real Estate Agents, by asking a few questions. By doing so, this can help us as Professional Home Stagers to work better with the Real Estate Agents and meet the needs together for the Homeowners. As I say many times, my first priority is the Homeowner. By providing the best Professional Home Staging service to clients, it allows the Home Staging Industry to grow to serve the needs of Homeowners and Real Estate Agents.

The feedback questions are as follows:

- Do you work with a Professional Home Stager? On all of your listings? or Some?

- Do you offer Consultations with each and every one of your listings?

- Are you as a Real Estate Agent doing your own (or with the help of family or Associates) Home Staging for clients?

- If you do not encourage or have as part of your Team the services of a Professional Home Stager - What are the thoughts as to why not?

- As a Real Estate Agent, are you not mentioning or offering to Homeowners (clients) the Professional Home Staging services because of concern of not getting or loosing the listing?

Your comments / responses are greatly appreciated, as it allows an opportunity to take the information and continue to improve the education to both the Real Estate Agents and the Homeowners. I feel, that as a Professional Home Stager, that it is important to continually look at ways to improve the services, in turn building greater credibilty to the Professional Home Staging Industry.

Sincerely,

Susan Macaulay

Clarity Over Clutter

THE QUESTION MARKS BELOW WERE COPIED FROM GOOGLE - NOT MY OWN WORK