I’m delighted to have the opportunity to share some before & after stories with you. Here, you’ll get a look at some rooms SellWell Home Staging has staged and some insight into the process and decisions behind the transformations.
I’d love to talk to you about your home and getting it ready for the market, so give me call – Miriam
Identifying what kind of buyer is likely to be interested in buying your home is an important first step in preparing your home for sale. Is the likely buyer a first-time buyer? a buyer with a young family? an empty nester? This likely buyer must be front and center in your decisions, when staging your home for sale. While it is important to declutter and depersonalize, you need to take it a step further and offer buyers more than a blank slate. SellWell Home Staging always has the target market in mind when staging each home.
In the case of a home in the Minneapolis and St. Paul North Metro (Anoka County, MN), price range $625 -$675K, the seller had decluttered and put in neutral bedding and curtains but, when SellWell Home Staging took on the home, it had been on the market unsold for five months.
Evaluating that the buyers for this home would likely be midway through their professional careers, perhaps with teen or older kids, and looking for space and luxury, SellWell Home Staging put together an inviting oasis.
In this BEFORE picture, you will see that the furniture set was too big to allow a nightstand to fit on either side of the bed – pushing one nightstand out of reach to the adjacent wall. This was a very spacious bedroom, there was no reason to leave the buyer with the impression “my furniture might not fit!”.
In the AFTER picture, another furniture set (also a king bed) fits perfectly and prevents the buyer from even forming the thought “my furniture won’t fit”.
In the BEFORE picture, the articulated gold wall sconces drew the wrong attention. This is a nice feature – individual wall lights with switches – but they looked dated and unwieldy. Also, because they were articulated and at an angle they did not photograph well. SellWell Home Staging switched these out for inexpensive modern fixtures with clean lines that added symmetry and warmth to the room, as you can see in the AFTER photo.
The white bed linen and curtains in the BEFORE picture are certainly better than a busy patterned fabric would have been, but they did not set the stage for our buyers to see the oasis that this room could be. Creating the tranquil, cohesive feel you see in the AFTER photo, SellWell Home Staging made easy modifications bringing in charcoal bed linen and peacock cushions, complemented by wall art, plants and simple accessories. The curtains were removed; blinds more than sufficed. Our buyer can enjoy the tree filled vista outside, giving them that feeling of space they were looking for. The walls were painted in a calming muted green (Northern Lights -PPG1137-2).
Finally, when staging a home for sale, look for the hidden spaces – these are treasures. In this room, it was the window alcove. A pair of chairs, only one visible in the AFTER photo, gives purpose to the space and elevates this room from owner’s bedroom to owner’s suite.
When you are putting your house on the market, it can be useful to take a trip back in time and remember why you bought the home in the first place. Was it the great schools and nearby park with adventure playground? The spacious yard, perfect for a play set?
If you are an empty-nester, these may no longer be why you value the neighborhood but it is quite likely a potential buyer will be attracted to your location for the same reasons you were.
For a recent staging project in the Minneapolis and St. Paul suburbs (Hennepin County, MN), price range $425-$450K, the room the owner’s originally treasured as a baby’s room had over time become a storage room.
This house was going on the market in an area perfect for families, with four good-sized bedrooms, three of which were in use by the owners and their college-aged kids.
SellWell Home Staging helped the owner stage the three bedrooms that were in use and then turned our attention to this fourth bedroom. Situated right next to the main bedroom, it made a perfect room for a small child.
All it took was a bed, neutral bedding, wall art and a chair to stage the room as a child’s room. Without being age or gender specific, this fourth bedroom has personality and a reason to be remembered by potential buyers.
At SellWell Home Staging, we make recommendations based on what’s going to give the best return on your dollar and on your time. We only recommend making changes that we believe are going to have an impact on your bottom line.
Bathrooms are one of the most important rooms of the house to buyers and can make or break a sale. They must be meticulously clean and function perfectly, no leaky faucets or running toilets!
While having an updated and on trend bathroom is a great plus, not often does it make sense to take on such a renovation for staging.
Having a bathroom that showcases its best features well and invites the buyer to feel it is move-in ready goes a long way to assuring the buyer that this bathroom does not need to be calculated in (that means deducted from) their offer price.
For a recent Anoka County (North Metro Minneapolis/St. Paul) home staging project, SellWell Home Staging gave this family bathroom a quick makeover. The time available before this home went on the market did not allow for redoing tile or countertops but we were able to address the distracting fussy light fixtures, gold faucets and glass hardware. These changes made a world of difference!
This bathroom was spacious with dual sinks, a separate shower and tub and a closed off toilet. This was an ideal family bathroom for the likely buyer, a family with school age kids. However, the two candelabra style light fixtures, the gold faucets and the crystal cabinet hardware were old fashioned for this twenty-first century house.
One stop at a Big-Box Home Improvement store gave us all we needed to have the light fixtures replaced with simple oil-rubbed bronze fixtures along with coordinating faucets and hardware. We also changed out the out-of-place chrome towel rack with a single oil-rubbed bronze rail and brightened things up with artwork.
Staging a vacation rental offers unique hurdles, the property has to photograph beautifully but it has to function intuitively. The photographs will determine if a first-time renter will book, but the return visitor and reviewer bases their opinions on their experience; it must exceed expectations.
This waterfront vacation rental had become a little tired and bookings were down. The busy sofa, oversized side table and mismatched lamps drew the eye away from the window and the view beyond. The carpet was dated and impractical for the space.
The TV hutch had had its day, vacationers expect a big screen to watch the game or relax with a family movie in comfort and clarity. In this room, SellWell Home Staging was able to remove the hutch and keep the lower half of the unit as a TV stand with storage.
SellWell Home Staging replaced the furniture and flooring in this vacation and reupholstered the dining chairs in complementary colors. The fake plants were removed. The art work, faded by the sun, was replaced with a simple colorful print reusing the same frame.
In addition to these visible changes, SellWell Home Staging made sure the vacation rental would function perfectly from the first day of each visit. That meant making sure the kitchen had every utensil that might be needed – (one reviewer actually commented on the scissors in the kitchen drawer!) and that rooms are set up for the vacation lifestyle – hooks to hang wet swimsuits, an outside faucet to rinse off sandy feet and paws.
Finally, vacations are made of moments that our busy schedules rarely allow, a comfortable chair to enjoy a book and the sound of the waves or a perfect spot to enjoy a glass of wine at sunset.
SellWell Home Staging completed this project in 2019, the vacation rental is booked out through the 2021 season with many repeat renters from 2020.