If you’re thinking of selling, most real estate agents highly recommend taking the trouble to stage or style your home.
You can hire a professional or DIY, which is what we chose to do after receiving a quote for $3800 – ouch! We felt that we could achieve good results for less even if it did involve buying some new furniture – and and at the end of the day, we could keep the new pieces or sell them to recoup some of our expenses. The other advantage was that it wouldn’t all be carried away after 8 weeks, regardless of whether we’d achieved a sale or not.
We went to a lot of trouble to de-clutter and start the home staging process, and as I told the stylist company, I felt we were 80 or even 90% of the way there, but just needed a bit of help. However they were keen to get rid of everything and start from scratch, turning up their nose at my Kmart homewares and gushing over an old terrazzo vase I’d bought from an op shop years ago (apparently terrazzo is the latest decorating trend!).
Getting a quote and chatting to the stylist wasn’t a total waste of time, as their comments really helped me to style my home for sale. Here are some of the “Before” pictures …
8 Tips for Styling Your Home for Sale
Tip 1 – De-clutter
We’d already completed this step, and had taken several loads to the tip and the local op shop. As our new house wasn’t yet ready for us to move into, we also rented a storage shed just so we could get as much stuff as possible out of the house.
Tip 2 – Clean the walls
If it’s anything like our place, once most of your furniture and belongings are out of the way, you will be shocked at how grubby they look. We treated the walls to a good scrub with laundry powder and a microfibre cloth.
Tip 3 – Think light and bright
Where possible use furniture in lighter tones, and bedding as well. Unfortunately I’d already purchased a quilt cover in a dark print, a bit of a boo boo, but I wasn’t prepared to buy another one.
Cleaning the windows and light shades works wonders too!
Tip 4 – It’s not about being practical
Our brown corner lounge has given us many years of loyal service and been the setting for much family fun, but … it was beginning to show its age and truth be told, it overpowered the space.
So I bought two new couches (and a dining suite) on Facebook marketplace instead. While the new arrangement looks amazing, I must confess it’s not very comfortable for relaxed TV viewing (you have to sit at a weird angle to actually look at the TV!).
Tip 5 – It’s about maximising space.
Unless you live in a mansion, choose furniture with smaller proportions. Again, it doesn’t have to be practical or comfortable! We chose a glass top dining table (something that would drive me mad if I had to live with it permanently) purely for styling purposes.
Tip 6: Aim for a cohesive look.
Try to stick to a limited colour palette throughout the house. I might have thrown away the rule book here! Our communal areas – including the undercover pergola – were decorated in what I like to think of as “urban jungle” – black white and grey, with hints of industrial, metal, and lots of tropical greenery. While the master bedroom and ensuite carried on the black urban theme (that dark quilt cover) I incorporated some blush pink accents. Here’s another bedroom which has some similarities to the master. The other bedrooms each had their own feel, but I still think it worked.
Tip 7: Create a welcoming entry.
This was a bit of a challenge in our case – it’s not easy to decorate a narrow entry and hallway!
Tip 8: Street appeal.
Another area where we could definitely have improved. The front of our house faces west and with multiple cars often being parked on the front lawn and nature strip, we hadn’t really done much with the front garden (beyond planting a hedge for privacy at the fence line). If we’d had more time we probably should have at least turfed and put more pots out the front.
Tip 9 – Move out!
A styled home is impractical and uncomfortable to live in, not to mention the effort that goes into removing every trace of you actually being there (washing up, sweeping floors, cleaning shower screens etc). Take it from me, I’m much happier away from the stress even if I do feel like I’m camping at home.
If it’s an investment property, wait until it’s vacant before you put it on the market. Apparently, tenants can take $50 000 to $100 000 off the sale price. In fact, I’m sure that’s one of the reasons we got our new home for such a good price – it was tenanted when we purchased it.
Tip 10 – Remember, people buy a house with their hearts not their heads.
Give them something they’ll fall in love with and they’ll overlook the little imperfections.
The hubster and I might pride ourselves on being sensible, level-headed folk but I’m pretty sure our desire to purchase our new home came from our heart, not our heads. We fell in love with the huge deck upstairs and patio downstairs, the amazing views and the sea breezes … and are willing to live with some of the things we’re not so keen on as a result!
Does Styling a Home for Sale Work?
While there are plenty of statistics out there, I can only share our own experiences. We’ve never had much luck selling in the past – we always seem to choose the wrong time, and wait months for a contract.
Sure enough there has been a lot of doom and gloom in our local property market of late with banks cracking down on lending, bridging loans a thing of the past, etc. While our neighbours achieved a good price a year ago, and our house and backyard are nicer, the market has definitely dropped so we haven’t been confident we could achieve the same.
We did our best to get our house listed as soon as possible (going on the market at the end of November), but I still think we missed the pre-Christmas rush, and it was dead over the festive season.
However I have some great news to report: we’ve just received our first offer, and we’re very happy with the amount. Now just to see if it all comes to fruition …
What do you think of my DIY home styling efforts?!
Congrats on getting a great offer Janet – there are a LOT of houses on the market that aren’t moving at all – some near us have been sitting around for 6 months or more. I think your styling would have made a great impact – reducing clutter and maximizing the perception of space would have made all the difference in the world. Hopefully the sale will go smoothly.
Thanks Leanne, yes the agent was just telling me October & November were quiet contract-wise so probably wouldn’t have mattered even if we HAD managed to get on the market earlier. We’ve had enough experience in real estate to know that a contract doesn’t mean much until it goes unconditional or even settles, so while we’re quietly pleased, definitely not counting our chickens before they hatch!