D.C. Area Nesties
Dear Community,
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
If you have questions about this, please email help@theknot.com.
Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Selling a house-staging ?
We are listing our house in Arlington this summer. It will be vacant and we are trying to decide whether or not to stage it. We have talked to 3 agents who all have different opinions. I'm inclined to stage it Dh is not. Since we are all over the map does anyone have any experiences either from a seller or buyer perspective? Thanks!
Re: Selling a house-staging ?
I know that a lot of realtors say that it is best to stage, but when we were looking at houses, I found it easier to imagine my own things in a house without competing furniture to look beyond. I preferred looking at rooms that were empty.
My opinion would be if you have a house that doesn't have a weird setup (ie, you HAVE to put a table in it so people understand that it is a dining room) and it is clean and neutral, that you don't have to spend the $$ on staging. If you don't already have neutral colors, or if anything needs to be repaired, I would be more inclined to paint or fix those things, rather than to pay to have some furniture put in, etc.
It's definitely neutral and fairly straight forward however the main floor bathroom is a Jack and Jill between what we use as our master bedroom and the baby's. There is another bathroom in the upstairs suite but I'm guessing some folks won't like this layout. wasn't keen on it until I had a baby and it was awesome. I'm wondering if some creative staging might help this issue ( make the nursery and office for example) On the other hand the layout is what it is and Dh maintains there's really no hiding it. I see both arguments and I'm really torn. We have to move this house ASAP
I personally like having some furniture in the house because I think that rooms seem much smaller without furniture in them (but maybe that's just me). When there is furniture in them, I feel like people can at least understand the size better even if they plan to use the room for a different purpose.
We recently moved and had our other house on the market. What we did is we left some of the furniture at the house that was on the market so that it was somewhat staged. We left our dining room table and chairs, the living room furniture, and the master bedroom furniture. This worked for us because we were planning to get a new king bedroom set anyway for our new house (and the old bedroom set was just going to go into our guest bedroom). As far as the living room furniture, we just did without living room furniture until the house sold. At the new house we used a folding table and folding chairs in the dining room. I think it worked well for us. We got a very reasonable offer the first week the house was on the market. A few weeks later, we were able to get our furniture moved to our new house. So, that's just an idea to consider.
The houses I have seen recently- I appreciate furniture in rooms that are small because it shows me that things can really fit. It might be just my spacial issues but small rooms with furniture do appear bigger vs small rooms with no furniture.
However, vacant houses show more 'problems' and as a buyer, I like that.
For me, I like furniture in a room if only to give me a perspective on size. Now, if the rooms are huge and there is no question a king bed, dresser, etc will fit in the master, then you are probably ok.
But, if it has smaller rooms for me it helped to see things in there already.
Staging absolutely works to help sell a home. That's why new home developers spend lots of money on a designer for their models. Have you ever been to a model and been so in-love, and then go to see the undecorated, vanilla version with the same layout? The way a room is decorated, whether good or bad, leaves an impression on the buyer.
That being said, whether staging is worth it for you also depends on your space. If your home is updated, then not having furniture in there won't be a problem. If your space is unique, then it's a good idea to place furniture in there so a buyer can see a purpose for the room.
One solution, if you aren't able to leave some key pieces of your own furniture behind during the listing period, is to take pictures of your home prior to moving out. That way, buyers will be able to see what it looks like furnished on the MLS and marketing materials. They'll know, for instance, that a queen size bed can fit in the guest room, even though it won't be there when they get to the house.
Or, buy some inflatable air mattresses and set them on milk crates, throw some hotel-like bedding over them and voila! Instant bedroom! The smaller scale your furniture, the larger the room will appear. Modern drapery and shower curtains also help to warm up a space, without being too costly. I've known people to buy some of those things just for the showings and return them afterwards. Whatever works!