A huge part of selling your home is making it look attractive to potential buyers who come through during an open house or for a private tour of the property. The price is a factor, but if the look and feel of the home is unappealing, it will be difficult to get anyone to consider buying. Consider these house staging tips to help to give your home an edge.
Remove Your Personality and All of Your Clutter
When you lived in the home, it was all about making it work for your aesthetic needs. Maybe you loved the idea of having a purple room where you could meditate. However, the same can’t be true of everyone who will be coming to look at your property. You want to remove as much of yourself from the home as possible.
This means getting rid of personal belongings and clutter that might dissuade someone from buying. It also means repainting the home to have a neutral color scheme that can be appreciated by the most people. Even if they eventually repaint, you want to make sure they can see themselves living in the home when they visit. If you have too much of your own personality left in the rooms, this will be nearly impossible to do.
Do Not Forget the Outdoors
Many sellers spend all of their time making sure the interior of the home is perfect before they try to show the property and they forget about the outside. When people come to the home, the first thing they will see is the outside, so your curb appeal needs to be on point. Make sure the landscaping suits the property and that you do not have any clutter in the driveway or in the yard. Remove distracting yard decorations. Gnomes might be your idea of fun, but they can be off putting to some people.
The Scent of Successful Staging
One of the things that you need to remember about staging your home is how it smells to others. While you may think that your home smells fine, there is a good chance that your nose has merely become accustomed to scents that are there. If you have pets, you can become “nose blind” to their very distinctive odors. Make sure that you do everything you can to remove the scents and replace them with good scents. Scented candles are nice, and agents have been using the scent of baking cookies for ages to make the home seem more appealing.
Good Lighting
You should try to open up the blinds and draw back the curtains to get some natural light into the home. It can make it look more appealing. However, on overcast days, or if your home doesn’t get good natural light, you can use lamps to achieve a similar effect. Essentially, you do not want to have dark corners of your home, as it can give it a dismal and dingy feeling.
Talk With Your Realtor
Your real estate agent will have a number of other house staging tips they can share with you to improve the look of your home. They also know what people tend to be looking for, and can give you some ideas on what you might want to update in your home to increase your chance of getting a sale.
Take some time to think about the things that you would look for when you are buying a home. What would turn you off from buying a home when you are visiting during an open house? This can give you a better idea of what you should do when staging the property to be as appealing to the widest audience possible.