If you’ve just started thinking about selling your current home, no doubt you’ve already been thinking about different ways you can improve various elements of the property to increase your initial asking price. You might be considering transforming some of your older rooms into multifunctional spaces or possibly redesigning your kitchen to help with the “wow” factor during showings.
Regardless of what type of changes you’re looking at making, you want to consider the impact you’re able to make during actual showings. This is where strategic staging can be invaluable.
Having the right staging strategy in place can make all the difference when helping potential buyers feel more compelled to make an offer. When done correctly, thoughtful staging helps to highlight all the best elements of your property, making it easier for buyers to envision themselves living in the space.
Below, we’ll cover some helpful strategies you can incorporate to help get your property ready for a faster resale process.
Identify Your Ideal Buyers
When starting a home renovation project with the main goal of selling the property, you really want to keep your potential buyers in mind when making design decisions. A good place to start is by doing some preliminary research on comparative properties in the neighborhood and getting a sense for the type of amenities or buyer demographics that are commonplace.
Think about the type of homeowners that the neighborhood attracts—younger professionals, families, retirees, or other homeowner groups. By keeping these unique demographics top of mind as you incorporate new changes to your property, you’ll be more likely to choose upgrade options that actually interest those individuals most likely to tour your home.
Showcase the Right Features
Before opening your doors for home showings, you want to make sure that the furniture and decor on the property are telling the right story to potential buyers. To do this, you want to incorporate subtle improvements to guide focus to the best parts of your home.
A good example of this in practice is to think about how you can showcase a fireplace feature in your living room. If you arrange the seating in your living room to point towards the fireplace, it naturally helps to attract more attention to that selling feature.
In other situations, you may have vaulted ceilings or crown molding, which can be other great selling features for a home. By installing more unique lighting features, it helps to draw a potential buyer’s attention to the ceiling, making it easier for them to notice them.
Leverage Smart Color Choices and Natural Lighting
Although you may have your own preferences when it comes to color palettes or lighting options, when getting ready to sell a property, you’ll want to be more intentional with the choices you make in this area. Lighting and color can go a long way when helping a room feel larger and more welcoming.
In many cases, a more neutral color palette is a safer bet when staging a home for resale. Softer grays and whites help to keep rooms feeling new, clean, and more welcoming. This can help buyers feel more comfortable when touring the home and allows them to picture their own furniture choices throughout the property more easily.
Design Optimal Furniture Layouts
In addition to color choices, the furniture you have visible during a property showing is also essential to get right. The way furniture fits into a space can completely change the look and feel of a home and can either improve or hurt the home’s overall functionality.
One of the primary goals you should have when staging a home is to make sure there are adequate walking areas throughout the property. You don’t want rooms to feel overly crowded when potential buyers tour the house, but you also want to make sure all areas of the home feel comfortable.
Be Strategic When It Comes to Décor
There is nothing wrong with selecting some great decor throughout the home to help give it more personality. However, you want to be strategic when it comes to incorporating too many elements that you find appealing. The goal should be to help give different spaces enough personality to be interesting, but not so much that it becomes overwhelming for potential buyers.
For example, choosing a couple of unique art pieces on the wall or installing an interesting mirror can help to give hallways a more polished look without becoming too distracting. Keep in mind that you want your buyer’s attention focused on the biggest selling features of the home, and adding too many decor elements can steal their attention away from them.
Elevate Your Bathroom Aesthetics
Redesigning your bathroom can be a really helpful way to boost the overall value of your home. Bathrooms are one of the most used spaces within a home, and a good-looking and highly functional bathroom space is highly sought after by home buyers.
Start this process by doing a deep clean of your bathroom and looking for smaller improvements that can be made to add more value. For example, you could swap out older towels or shower curtains for newer ones. You can also replace older water fixtures with newer, more modernized options that also incorporate better water-saving features.
Create Relaxing Atmospheres in Bedrooms
Another area that should receive a lot of attention during showings is your bedrooms. Because of this, you’ll want to spend a fair amount of time staging these rooms just right.
By upgrading to higher-quality bed linens or comforters and adding in some nice pillows or a throw blanket, you can make the bedroom atmosphere feel very inviting and luxurious. Make sure you’re decluttering your bedrooms as much as possible to avoid distractions while also helping to keep walking areas as clean as possible.
Bring In More Qualified Buyers
Strategic home staging can help turn your recent home improvements into a successful sale. By making a conscious effort to highlight your home’s best features, you can better showcase the full value of the upgrades you’ve made.
Taking the time to identify your ideal buyer, using strategic methods to direct their attention to specific areas of the property, and creating a comfortable and inviting atmosphere for viewings, you can increase both the number of offers and your final profits.
Author Information: Michael Alladawi
Michael Alladawi, CEO & Founder of Revive Real Estate, is a Southern California real estate veteran with a proven track record as a builder, investor, and respected home flipper. Michael created Revive Real Estate to share his industry knowledge and help homeowners maximize their profits when selling their homes. Michael’s passion for his work is as big as his desire to create lasting partnerships. For Michael, it all comes down to how much value one offers, both in business and life relationships.
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