Deciding to sell your home brings a barrage of new people and thought processes to the homeowner. There is talk about money, their lifestyle, their values, and ohyes, their stuff. Personal, and pretty invasive. 

Staging a property can take many different routes, but successful projects always come down to a few basic points. 

 Good Stagers are not there to argue or judge; they are there to strategize and  facilitate; create a solution as well as a vision.

Sometimes the decision to sell a property is not a happy or easy one; often there can be unhappy circumstances, like a death or divorce, or just the realization that time is, in fact, marching on.

 Because you are dealing with people and their feelings, one of the most important tenets of the Accredited Staging Professional is to honor the client, and their possessions.  In the end, it all has to come down to the question-could/would/does _____ get in the way of selling the house?

Here are a few of the things many of us have in our own lives, but are less than ideal in a property that’s being sold.

Proud Parents  (Sigh) Yes, we’ve seen those houses…especially those refrigerators.  Photo below, right shows two, in the same house!  The macaroni art, the class pictures, the team practice schedules.

Those larger than life bulletin boards are  handy for parents on the go, and there are magnetized plastic envelopes made especially for seniors, to hold their vital health info , to be placed on the fridge.

Fine if you are living there, but if your house is on the market, clean it off. It’s distracting, but it’s also a treasure trove of info to any person who goes strolling thru your house with intentions other than buying a house.

I ask balky parents-do you really want strangers knowing little Johnny is in Mrs. Smith’s class at Park School, plays on the Raider’s PeeWee league, or has a dentist appointment next Tuesday after school? 

Similarly, buyers should have NO KNOWLEGE of a seller’s health status/issues.  (And in that vein, take all prescriptions out of the medicine cabinet and put them out of sight, in a safe place, like a big Tupperware in the fridge).

Party Central   Wine cellars can be a great feature in a home, and a small wine rack in the dining area is certainly appropriate. But elaborate displays of liquor and mass quantities of various stemware out in the open distract buyers, and add little to the value of the property.

Young families could find it off-putting, others could break, pocket, even tamper with an open container.  If having a bar cart was key to creating a specific ambiance, put colored water in an empty booze bottle, and hit Pier One/etc for some inexpensive bar ware; otherwise, tuck it away.

NEXT:  Yes,  religion and sex!