To figure out whether or not your small town will support your home staging business, you have some homework to do.
Some rural areas are great for home stagers and others, not so much. Whether or not it will work is dependent on many things, so it is wise for you to do your research before you learn home staging and start your business.
Here are three things you can look into to decide if a home staging business will work in your small town:
- How close is the largest city? The first thing you should do is decide how far you’re willing to travel for a home staging job. If you’re a one hour drive to the nearest city, are you comfortable driving that far a couple of times a week to home staging projects? If so, you can market to home owners in that city as well as your own smaller town, and neighboring ones, to supplement your income.
- How many homes sell in a year? Contact your local real estate board and find out how many homes sold in the past year in your geographic area. Realize that only a small percentage of that number of sellers would be likely to hire you as a home stager. That will give you an idea of how much potential business you would be looking at and whether or not you can earn enough to support your financial goals. It’s important to note that since home staging pays so well, you might earn enough with as few as 50 to 70 clients doing mostly consultations and few full staging projects.
- How many homes are listed in a year? While you’re speaking with your contact at the real estate board find out how many homes are listed per year, on average. The number will be different from the number of sales because not all homes that go on the market stay there until they sell. If there are quite a few more homes listed than sold, you can use the percentage for the difference in your marketing materials. Presumably, if some of those homes that went off the market had been staged they would have sold quickly.
On Friday I’ll share two more questions you should ask to help determine if home staging will work in your rural area.
Are you a home stager who operates in a small town or rural area? What helped you decide to start your business? How far do you travel for home staging projects? Please add to the discussion by leaving a comment below.
Debra Gould, The Staging Diva®
President, Six Elements Inc. Home Staging
Debra Gould knows how to make money as a home stager and she developed the Staging Diva Training Program to teach others how to earn a living doing something they love.
[tags] home staging in a small town, home staging business, learn home staging, home stagers, staging diva, home staging, home staging in a rural area, small town stager, rural stager[/tags]
You have made some good points Debra, however, not all rural areas are equal, i.e., residents of rural areas close to large cities tend to adopt and accept “big city concepts” whereas rural areas comprised of many small towns and villages are prone to be less accepting of progressive ideas. Also the value of homes and the number of low priced homes should be considered. Where I live at least 75% of homes are priced under $200,000; less than 10% would be over $300,000. I have seen evidence that a beautifully staged home in my town does work with owners selling their properties faster and at a higher price — these properties sell and attract buyers from large centres. There major problem is getting local realtors on side to see the benefits of home staging. (The staged properties I have referred to were listed by out-of-town realtors.)
Mariann