For frustrated home sellers, home staging can mean the difference between getting on with your life or feeling like you’re in an expensive endurance test with no end in sight.
That’s why home stagers are frustrated hearing real estate agents insist all that matters in a real estate sale are price and location.
An overheard phone conversation between an angry home seller and her Michigan real estate agent led to a speedy sale after a 5-year wait. More on that in a moment!
Feedback from real estate open houses and showings identified 3 problems that the Realtor insisted were the reasons the vacant home hadn’t attracted a single offer:
- Property priced too high for local real estate market.
- House needs too much work for buyers to be interested.
- Problems with the floor plan are turning off buyers.
Many frustrated sellers have heard similar explanations from their real estate agents. While these are sometimes justified, they are often symptoms of the major problem which is that the house isn’t decorated to sell!
Home staging can make all the difference
Home staging helps prospective buyers fall in love with a property. It takes the focus off “problems” like an awkward floor plan or the price. This is especially true of vacant homes, which is why I’ve written so much about why selling an empty home leaves money on the table.
When Michigan Staging Diva student Peggy Harrington of WOW! Factor Real Estate Staging & Interior Redesign overheard a home seller complaining to her agent about the 5 year wait to sell her home, Peggy decided to put her fears aside and seize an opportunity to promote her home staging services.
After apologizing for overhearing the cell phone conversation which took place in an almost empty retail store, Peggy began to share her knowledge of how home staging can make all the difference for a speedy real estate sale.
The woman was in a hurry but took one of Peggy’s home staging business cards and called her back later that evening. This lead to a home staging project to furnish the vacant home following the process I teach in Course 3 “Taking the Mystery Out of Home Staging Consultations.”
As you can see from Peggy’s before and after photos, there was nothing to catch the eye of home buyers, or give them a sense of how large the space was, until Peggy added home staging furniture and accessories.
Proof home staging works
Proof that home staging works lies in the results Peggy achieved for her client. Despite the property going on the market over Father’s Day, it attracted two offers the first day.
Remember this is a home that sat on the market for 5 full years before staging, costing the homeowner many thousands of dollars each year — not to mention the ongoing frustration and inconvenience of not selling.
Peggy writes about the training she received from me:
“Debra is very encouraging, and the Staging Diva Training Program provides above and beyond what any other staging training has to offer. I am convinced that she genuinely cares about the success of each and every one of her students! Unlike other training (wasted $$) Debra’s is not a ‘production line’ course. In addition, she offers business savvy and marketing in her training that was NOT available with other people’s training courses and it has been quite valuable to me.”
Thank you Peggy for your feedback and sharing this fabulous project with us. It’s always inspiring to read proof that home staging works and to see examples we can share with our own home staging clients.
Please feel free to use the sharing buttons at the bottom of this post to help real estate agents, prospective clients and your fellow home stagers. Also realize the power of home staging stories over statistics in selling your services.
Would you like to see your business or home staging project featured in one of my articles? Give me your information here using our easy-peasy submission form!
what a fabulous success story! job well done, Peggy for being brave enough to speak up and for the incredible transformation and results!
Thank you so much Lori!
Debra! You’ve done it again! Your timing is impeccable! I’m meeting with a client TODAY who’s vacant lakeside home has been on the market for over 2 years! In response to her inquiring if staging was necessary, her agent told her “Your house is big enough, people can see where to put their furniture.” There are some issues with the demographics (I know what you’re thinking, how can a lakeside home have issues?) The homeowners were warned not to build such a large, expensive home in that particular area (the “walkability” is “0”, no schools, shopping or real employment opportunities-it’s a “bedroom” town) HOWEVER, I hope that staging this home will make the difference for her. Her agent shows the home every 4 to 6 weeks so traffic is an issue. Wish us luck!
Jackie, that’s fantastic! Let us know how your meeting goes. Feel free to share this article with your client and don’t forget to say something like, “Clearly what you’ve been doing so far isn’t working. With so few showings, it’s imperative that we stage your home and then have your agent take new listing photos. You can’t sell when you can’t get enough potential buyers to even walk through your front door.”
Thank you so much for your wealth of knowledge. You have a way of pairing down to the essential issues and presenting a way to handle it that is sure to result in success! I am just starting out after taking your Staging Business Courses and have also just purchased the Script. Can’t wait to jump in and make it happen! Thank you also for addressing so much of the fear that we experience starting out. Oh my goodness am I fighting it hard. But I know that with the support and resources you provide I’ll get through it.
Crystal, thanks so much for your feedback, it means so much to me! That fear is something we all share, me too! Just keep moving forward bit by bit and know that you’re on the right path. I’m really excited to share your staging success stories and watching where your talent takes you.
Good luck Jackie! ALso I saw the answer to the question I just asked you Debra, thanks
Thank you so much Debra for sharing my story! It’s so true, staging makes all the difference, it is one powerful tool! A little follow up to my story — the Realtor for the home was so pleased with the results, that he and I worked together several more times and have since then formed a very nice working relationship and we stay quite busy. I so enjoy staging!
Fantastic results all around Peggy!
Congratulations on getting a staging job by being courageous and passionate about home staging. It can feel scary but wow- It feels pretty wonderful when what we do is valued by home sellers’ who just need a true professional to help them sell their home! Home staging = Hope for Home Sellers! 🙂 Enough with all the excuses by real estate agents, lol.
Stacy, you’re so right “Home staging = Hope for Home Sellers! :-)”
Some of the comments I hear from sellers who are having a difficult time selling their homes are: “Am I going to have to pay for your services?” and “Really? You think you can do a better job marketing my house than my realtor?” and “You think you can do a better job selling my house than my real estate agent?” Oh boy, it’s sometimes difficult to reel in the remarks that want to fly out of my mouth, but I educate them that the job of a home stager and the job of a realtor are two very different and separate businesses altogether.
The sad reality in my area is: the agents who do take my business seriously simply rip me off of the material I present (either in person or in writing, such as website, facebook page) and use it (and take credit for it!) themselves, or they infer to sellers that I’m just a scam artist trying to bilk sellers out of their money. One agency even went so far as to say that sellers should expect home staging assistance without having to pay for it! Good grief.
It’s been a pretty discouraging process. I’ve recently revamped the type of services I offer, and I realize that I’ve become burnt out on the pervasive and persistent negativity surrounding the real estate agents in my area when it comes to home staging.
Catherine, educating people about what we do is part of the process of marketing our services. No you don’t necessarily do a “better job of marketing or selling a house than the realtor,” because your job isn’t marketing the house or selling, it’s actually packaging the house.
You’ve just inspired me for a whole blog post on this topic and what we can say to potential clients who are confused about this distinction, thanks!
I totally understand your frustration with realtors in your area. I’ve written several articles on this topic which you might find helpful. Look in the search box on the right sidebar and pull up the category for Real Estate Trends. Or use this handy link!
Your experiences are not uncommon which is why I teach my students that the real money in home staging isn’t with real estate agents at all.
Thanks for commenting Catherine and sharing your experiences.
Janine, glad you found this helpful. Absolutely you can re-print and share this article, as long as you include the credit of where it came from. You can also share it on your Facebook business page using the links at the bottom of the post.