Ashley Whittenberger

SEATING IS LIMTED, RSVP to: jonathan.creath@sothebysrealty.com

This 3-hour course is like no other staging course. It is written just for Realtors by real estate packaging, marketing and staging expert, Ashley Whittenberger. You will walk away with:

• The confidence to give educated advice to your sellers on effective staging strategies.
• The knowledge of how to integrate staging into your business and marketing plan at little to no cost.
• A strategy for separating yourself from the other agents in your market during your listing presentation.
• The tools you will need to brand your listings and earn a reputation for always listing "model" homes.
• Materials and information you can use in your listing packet.

... is EXACTLY when they need to hire a stager.

An expert in real estate staging can help even the most cash poor sellers. As long as the homeowner has an open mind and is willing to invest a little time and elbow grease, a good stager can help sellers stretch their limited funds, time and energy by showing them how to focus on areas where they will get the most bang for their buck. That is what we are trained to do.

In today's segment on Fox 7's Good Day Austin, our focus was on the 5 areas of improvement with the highest return on invest. #5, HIRE A PROFESSIONAL STAGER. I included this point, not because I am a stager, but because I truly feel a good stager will pay for themselves 10 times over! Of course, I would have loved to go into great detail and share all of my staging knowledge, tips and hints in great detail, however, the short 3-4 minute segments we do never allow enough time!

So, listing agents, the next time you suggest hiring a stager to your client, and they say they simply don't have the funds, that's your biggest signal that they should run, not walk to their phone and call the best stager you can find. As a real estate expert, it's YOUR job to help educate your clients. Most sellers aren't trained in marketing real estate (that's why they hired a Realtor, afterall) and we all know they certainly can't view their homes objectively.

If you have any questions about how to integrate a home staging plan into your business and listing presentation, please don't hesitate to e-mail me at ashley@theinterioritycomplex.com . I'd be happy to share with you how top producing realtors are successfully using staging services to grow their businesses, set themselves apart from other agents and help their clients sell their homes. It's a win-win-win!!

The economy and current events are certainly affecting decorating trends and color palettes. I couldn't be more pleased with the current trends, color palettes and products being offered. An eco-friendly, simplified approach to decorating and real estate staging is part of our company's culture. At Interiority Complex, we don't think you have to break the bank to create a beautiful space and we're glad to see the rest of the world is realizing this, too!

•1.) General Trends: "Re" is très chic! Reducing, reusing, recycling, repurposing, redecorating, redesigning and remixing are key elements in design in 2009. (Currently, our one-day room makeover is one of our most popular services. We can transform a space in no-time flat, on a small budget.) Due to tighter budgets, homeowners are forced to re-use or re-purpose items from their own store rooms, ignored closets and neglected corners. In addition, some of the best finds can be picked up for next to nothing at flea markets, garage sales, thrift stores and craigslist. I LOVE THIS! This is a sure-fire way to keep from having a "canned" look, as if you just went to the nearest furniture retailer and ordered the whole room as seen in the catalog. Ordering an entire room as seen in the catalog has gone the way of the dinette set! Unique, affordable, creative and eco-friendly are just a few of the inherent qualities of being "Re-chic" when designing a room. What's not to love about this trend?

•2.) Products: Eco-friendly paints are all the rage. Low VOC and no VOC (VOC = Volatile organic compounds) are available in a variety of hues and excellent quality, so consumers can breathe easy knowing they've made an eco-friendly an non-toxic choice for bringing color into their space.

•3.) Color: Speaking of "green" paints - the hue green is definitely in. Consumers increased desire for healthy and sustainable locally grown fruits and vegetables provides bountiful inspiration for many citrus-inspired color palettes. Another twist on the "green" movement, these cheerful and refreshing palettes can be inspired by a visit to your local farmer's market. These fresh hues include citrus and slightly acidic greens, luscious mango, lemony yellows and gorgeous grapefruit.

•4.) Window coverings: simplified and eco-friendly. Woven wood shades made of renewable resources such as bamboo, grasses and reeds continue to be the dominant trend in window coverings. In addition, instead of seeing the elaborate swags, jabots and pelmets from years before, we are seeing very clean and simple lines, such as two panels flanking a woven wood shade or wood blind.

•5.) Design style: Transitional, casual and eclectic. (Transitional style is a marriage of traditional and contemporary furniture, finishes, materials and fabrics.) The furniture lines we are most commonly seeing are simple yet sophisticated. The simplicity of this style is perfect for these times when consumers want to get back to basics and simplify their budgets and their lives. Not to mention, a casual and eclectic approach to decorating is much easier look to achieve on a budget!

Downsizing... A Trend That's Here to Stay?

According to the Better Homes & Garden Real Estate Center, the down economy has an increasing number of American home buyers reconsidering their large, oversized and supersized homes.

A recent survey conducted on the magazine's website found that what homeowners want in 2009 are homes that are right-sized, organized and economized.

• When asked how their next home will compare in size to where they live now, 32% of the survey respondents said they expect a new home to be either somewhat smaller or much smaller. And that home will be family-focused.
• 56% of respondents said they prefer a combined kitchen-dining-family room.
• Consumers also want to cut down on luxuries and go green. 90% plan to have energy efficient heating and cooling systems in their next homes, and 31 % plan to have geothermal heat.
• 69% of respondents would prefer having no wasted space. They also want more storage, indicating that being organized is fast becoming an important issue to homeowners.

With that said, I thought it timely to post 9 Tips for Marrying Form & Function in Small Spaces...

Recently, I was thinking about Mother's clever going-away gift of a trunk/ coffee table for our friend who moved into the typical small New York studio apartment. One must definitely make the best use of space in small quarters. I have been decorating more and more lofts in Austin recently and I offer these space hints to clients who are downsizing to condominiums and apartments...

1. Over-the-Door Storage From shoe racks to shelving, there are great accessories to hang on the door for extra space.
2. Storage Trunks A chest is perfect for storing items that are rarely used. The chest or trunk can also be used as a coffee table, bench or end table.
3. Storage Ottomans Again, an ottoman can be used as a coffee table or end table or extra seating when not being used to prop up your feet.
4. Under-the-Bed Storage Clear plastic bins for under the bed are essential for small spaces. The clear bin allows you to see what is stored while the out of season or infrequently used items are store out of sight.
5. Stackable Plastic Drawers Inexpensive plastic drawers are excellent storage for the closet shelves and other out of sight areas.
6. Hooks Decorative hooks in the entry are perfect for hanging coats, scarves, umbrellas and bags by the front door.
7. Bookshelf That Serves as a Room Divider A simple freestanding bookshelf is not only functional for displaying books and knickknacks, but it can also serve to divide the living area from the sleeping area in a very small space.
8. TV Stand with Shelves or Cabinets A TV stand with storage space allows room to hide DVDs, books, a VCR or other miscellany.
9. Bed Frame with Built-In Drawers My favorite space saver is a bed frame with drawers that are underneath the mattress. So easy to access, this storage is much like an extra chest of drawers.

I just happened to read an article in Realty Times that stated staging is out in 2009. Here's a link to the article in case you're interested: http://realtytimes.com/rtpages/20081231_inout.htm .

Obviously, having many years of experience in real estate, marketing and home staging, I was shocked to see an "expert" write such a thing, so I took the time to reply. See below...

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Hi Mark,

I just read your article "What's In, What's Out with Home Buyers in 2009?" I was surprised to see that an author of several books on selling real estate and niche marketing and someone who is viewed as a real estate expert would not advocate a tried and true marketing principle of taking a product, improving upon it, therefore increasing its value. Really?

I've worked in real estate for over a decade. As a new home sales representative and licensed realtor, I recognized the importance of making the properties I was selling stand out among the rest. It's not rocket science, just basic marketing principles. I've sold millions in real estate and worked with hundreds of buyers. I know what sends them running and I know what compels them to make an offer. This same principle is why builders spend large portions of their marketing budgets on decorating their model homes and why they use the models as a very effective marketing tool. Malcolm Gladwell even wrote an entire book on the principle called, Blink. His book is about rapid cognition, about the kind of thinking that happens in a blink of an eye. When you meet someone for the first time, or walk into a house you are thinking of buying, or read the first few sentences of a book, your mind takes about two seconds to jump to a series of conclusions. Gary Keller even dedicates an entire chapter to the subject of home staging in his latest book, Shift: How Top Real Estate Agents Tackle Tough Times. In it, he says, "A seller should never ask if they should stage. This is simply the wrong type of thinking and the wrong question. The question they should ask is how should I stage? Staging is an essential part of the marketing process."

I'm surprised that you would diminish the importance of such an effective marketing tool that is recognized across all industries, not just real estate. Below is an example of effective marketing in a completely unrelated industry. Here, the competing companies have taken two similar products, and packaged them very differently. Which one looks more appealing? Which one stimulates a positive emotional response? Which one seems like a vacation in a bottle and which one conjures of images of living in a trailer park? (Not that there's anything wrong with that - my family and I are RV enthusiast, but I think you get my point.)

If you're referring to the minority of inexperienced or ineffective home stagers or agents who place bad silk floral arrangements and a few plants in a home and think that's going to sell it, then that's understandable that you would not advocate that as an effective marketing tool, however, I'm surprised you would write about the minority in your article. True home staging is much more pervasive than "tired silk plants" and "stale potpourri". It's the process of assessing all aspects of the property and figuring out a way to make that property stand out and look better than the competition. It's the process of creating value on a small budget and finding areas of improvement that yield a return on the investment that justifies the investment in the first place.

Mark, I'm not usually the type to respond to articles or write "letters to the editor". I'm far too busy and I believe that everyone deserves to have their own opinion, however, in this case, I feel that you have the opportunity to educate professionals with your article, and you're doing the opposite and perhaps misinforming them.

I'm passionate about this not because one of the companies I own offers home staging as part of our services, but because I see what a difference effective home staging has made in many peoples' lives. Most recently, our company staged a vacant property in a community with a 12-month supply of inventory. The owner had just been laid off and desperately needed to sell. The combination of an effective pricing strategy and a cost-effective staging plan created a property that stood out among the sea of other listings, and it sold in less than 2 weeks after being on the market. We have many more stories like this one.

One of the things that I love about what we do is that we don't just have a job. We do work that helps people who desperately need it in times like these. We make a difference in peoples' lives. We, along with their Realtors, help them to avoid foreclosure, bankruptcy, stress and turmoil. We help Realtors by assisting them to sell their listings, and by highlighting their true level of professionalism and expertise, which shines through every time they sell a listing more quickly than the other agents in town. This helps further their careers and ours.

As I say in the Texas Real Estate Commission approved MCE course I teach for Realtors called The Secrets of Staging to Sell: Strategic Marketing through Home Staging, an agent isn't doing their job if they don't help their sellers to effectively prepare their listings to go on the market. They are paid because they are experts and professionals. Part of their marketing plan should include the effective preparation of the home as a product. Some call it Home Staging, I call it Marketing 101. Whatever you call it, I often draw the analogy of my job as a parent to the job of a listing agent - when my 6 year old son says he doesn't feel like brushing his teeth or doing his school work, I wouldn't be doing my job as a parent if I just said, "OK!" and let him off the hook. It's my job to discipline my child. The root of the word discipline is to teach. I'm the expert - I'm older, wiser and have seen the consequences of poor dental hygiene or lazy school work habits. The same holds true for Realtors as it applies to marketing real estate.

Thank you for your time, and for writing an otherwise interesting read!

Yours truly,

Ashley Whittenberger

President, Interiority Complex

President & Founder, The University of Home Staging, Decorating & Redesign