Chrissie Sutherland

Hi fellow stagers,

I found this cool wall art that I wanted to share. If you want something different instead of framed art or canvas art, check this out. The only thing is, you stick them to the wall, but it says they are with 3M backing. As long as they don't pull the paint off, I would definitely try them. They come in white so you can spray paint them the color you want. How cool is that? Here is some more info. You can do a search on Wallter and there are many places that sell them. If anyone has tried them, I'd love to hear what you think. http://2modern.com/designer/Wallter/Wallter-Circles-Wall-Application?leadsource=DTI

Hi everyone,

I'm having a dilemma. How would you arrange the furniture in this room? The fireplace is throwing me off. I'm staging it next weekend. Here are some pictures, and thanks in advance. I admire all of your work and your comments and suggestions. Thank you, thank you, thank you!!!!

Here is the room from upstairs.

Here is the room from standing in the kitchen, as you can see, it opens to the kitchen

Here is the view from standing next to the fireplace

Here is the view looking from the room into the kitchen

Hello,

I had the sweetest lady call me and wanted some help with her home that has been on the market for 18 months. She and her husband have separated and she didn't have a lot of money to spend. I went over there and together we started re-arranging furniture and accessories. I brought a few of my own accessories to add to help her out. I think it turned out nice and I hope we can help her sell her home. Here are a few of the before and after pictures.

Before the family room had a busy rug and childrens toys that were distracting. We needed to add some height and brighten it up a bit.

We moved the couch in front of the big window and moved the seating area to the opposite wall. We brought in a cream carpet to calm the room down and added some cream pillows to the couch to brighten it a bit. We also added a tall tree in the corner to bring in some height and a coffee table to bring the room together.

Here is another view of the room

Her master bedroom wasn't bad, we just moved the a few pieces of furniture and it looks great

She purchased a kitchen table and we moved the larger table that was in the kitchen and put it in the dining room.

In the master bath all I did was add a red towl and a picture. It makes such a difference.

If you had a chance to read my blog An experiment that will hopefully be a win, win, win for everyone. We approached a furniture company and asked them if they would help us with furniture and in return, at close the builder would purchase a $5000 gift certificate to that store for the new home owner. It seemed like a great plan that would be a win, win, win for everyone involved. The builder had no money to spend since the home has been on the market for 3 years. Well, here is an update:

My sales guy was onboard all the way. He thought it was a great idea. He approached his manager who was also very excited and thought he would give it a try, but had to go through the owners for approval. One of the owners was thrilled and wanted to know how many houses we were going to do. I went in and picked out all the furniture. Then the sales guy came back to me a few days later and said the other owner wouldn't even discuss it. He was not interested at all.

We were back to square one. Then the builder remembered she had a friend who had a showroom in High Point. She took a chance and asked if we could borrow the furniture. He said YES !!!! Bad news was, we didn't get to pick it out. He gave us what he could. We worked with it. We were limited with accessories because I have a lot of vacants staged right now. I was scraping the bottom of the barrel and I didn't want to spend any money because I was doing this for free. I went over and put some accesories in the house and the Realtor opened it the following weekend during the parade of homes.

Result----they got an offer on Sunday (10 days after we staged it) and the builder accepted it. Needless to say, I had to call the furniture store and tell them they missed out on a great opportunity. Sometimes, you just have to take a chance. The furniture store has been very slow, I was told. Too bad...they could have had a better month if they would have helped us.

Here are some pictures I took. I didn't get a chance to take the one of the bedroom.

Literally...You save money when you stage your house. Sometimes, you make money. How you might ask?

Say you put your house on the market for $350,000. After 3 months with no bites you lower the price to $340,000. Three more months go by and you lower it again to $335,00. You finally get an offer for $329,000.

Next scenario. You hire a stager to stage your home BEFORE it goes on the market. It costs $1,800. You list your home for $350,000. After 9 weeks you get an offer for $345,000. If you subtract out the $1,800 you spent on staging, you saved $14,200.

Studies show that staged homes sell in half the time than homes that have not been staged. They also sell for more money. This is because when you stage your house, it shows better, which brings more traffic. More traffic brings more chances for offers. The less time your home sits on the market, the more money you will get. The 2007 Home Gains Report shows that Professionally staging your home yields a 343% Return on Investment.

Hiring a professional home stager will also save you money. It is hard for homeowners to stage their own homes because it is hard for them to view the spaces objectively. That is why I truly believe that staging should be left to the experts. Doctors are experts in their field, Realtors and experts in their field, and stagers are experts in theirs.

Here is the room vacant

A homeowner trying to stage it on their own might think, "I'll just put some furniture in here, put up a picture and voila, I've staged my house"

Here is the room with furniture

Now one might think, "ok, I'm done, I've staged my house. I put the furniture in and I'm ready to show my house."

Staging a house is not about just clearing it out, packing it up, depersonalizing, or in this case renting furniture and putting it in a room. It is about creating a mood, a feeling that will grab the buyer and help them visualize living in your home. Buyers buy homes based on how the home makes them feel.

Here is the room staged

Emotionally connect with the buyer