A Great Seminar on Staging

Last night at Church Street Flooring and Design in Franklin, TN we held an open seminar on staging, the basics of how to prepare your mind and your home for staging. Liz Jenkins with a fresh space and Karen Jones with Jones Home Staging were the co-presenters. We had a great mix of Realtors, home owners, suppliers, and even five other stagers.

The evening began with conversation, a little wine, and a few bits of food. The location was great and we were surrounded by beautiful flooring, cabinets, and design elements. It seems that though staging has been around since the 70's when Realtors "set up" a home, there are a lot of people who do not understand the concept of staging but do want to know all about it. We had wonderful interest, a lot of note taking, and some very intense questions.

We answered the questions about the different types of staging; vacant, vignette, and staging the dwelling. Vacant home staging is easiest to do because no one lives there and once they are staged they tend to stay that way. Vignette staging is not as often recommended because all you can accomplish is a sense of the purpose of the room and allowing the buyer to visualize. The occupied stage is the most common and the most complicated. You are turning an owner's world upside down to some degree and have the expectation that once staged it will stay staged. There are many tips on how to accomplish this and make it easy on the seller. We will be happy to share these tips with you. All in all I feel everyone came away with a better understanding of staging, how it can impact the time between list and close, and how it can help the seller, the realtor, and the buyer. The seller can realize a faster sell for more money, the realtor can be proud of their listing, and the buyer has a sense that the home is well maintained and move-in ready. Our next seminar is in late March 2009....spread the word, same place same time. More information to follow.