Tag Archives: home stager

Is There Any Meaning to Staging Designations?

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RESA logo

Part of the RESA website banner including their logo www.realestatestagingassociation.com

Recently I posted a link on facebook to an article on the Real Estate Staging Association (RESA) website entitled “Designations, Certifications and Accreditation. What does it all mean for the home staging and redesign industry?” One of my fellow stagers, Jennifer Putman-Macleod, of Belleville, ON asked:

“What does this mean for us in Canada? Or with the CSP label!”

Such an excellent question, deserves a thoughtful answer.

The above mentioned RESA article compares the evolution of the staging industry to that of the real estate industry. The writer gives the formation of the National Association of Realtors® in the US as an equivalent to the formation of RESA.

In Canada, real estate organizational development has a similar history. The Canadian Association of Realtors® evolved out of localized real estate boards formed from 1888 onwards. In 1943, eleven boards joined to become the Canadian Association of Real Estate Boards (CAREB), a national body concerned with industry advocacy in the post-war era.

The Canadian Institute of REALTORS® was established in 1955 to encourage provinces to create real estate courses and designations. Correspondence courses for the designation “Fellow of the REALTORS® Institute” or FRI were organized through the University of Toronto.

Eventually CAREB evolved into today’s Canadian Real Estate Association (CREA), located in Ottawa, who undertake increasingly important government lobbying activities. Read more details of their history at http://www.crea.ca/public/crea/history.htm.

The author of the RESA article says that, similar to members of the national real estate bodies, its members:

“. . . are people with common interests coming together to advance professionalism, excellence and legitimacy in the home staging and redesign industry.”

RESA allows all staging practitioners to become members and encourages them to demonstrate their commitment to ethical standards and continuing education by qualifying for programs such as RESA-PRO, True Portfolio and Staging Excellence Alliance. Members are also able to take advantage of an array of services provided by vendor partners. Annual staging competitions and an International Conference serve to educate,  and inspire the industry as well as elevating its public profile.

One of the most important functions of RESA is to be an impartial third party in evaluating training courses for home staging. Certified Staging Professional (CSP) is one of the training courses accredited by RESA. As an independent third party, RESA reviews these training programs to make sure trainees are actually getting what they need to know. Training companies like CSP pay an admin fee to have their curriculum reviewed but they can’t buy accreditation.

People who want to take a staging course can look to RESA to find courses which they have accredited. Furthermore, accredited trainers have agreed to comply with a grievance process where a student can file a grievance with RESA and have it independently investigated and resolved. In the role of course accreditation, RESA is to staging what the Council for Interior Design Accreditation (CIDA) is to Interior Design education.

For the public, RESA provides quality assurance when they are hiring a stager with RESA approved education. As RESA becomes more well recognized as an industry self-regulating body, this role will increase. Current consumers have to determine for themselves exactly what makes good staging and how to ensure they get it. RESA provides useful information for consumers in this regard. As the RESA article explains, lack of accreditation may not mean a stager’s designation is of no value. However, referring to the RESA website is a quick and easy way for a home seller to quickly find a good home stager.

In my opinion, growing the recognition of RESA as the primary independent trade association for home staging can only help the home staging industry build and preserve its reputation.

Off Site Storage – 7 Things to Consider

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messy storage area

One of the top things buyers ask themselves when considering a home purchase is: “How much space and storage does this home have?”
If you are selling, you want their answer to be “Lots!”

So when your Realtor or Home Stager advises you to start pre-packing and moving out excess furnishings, avoid simply sticking everything in your garage or basement. Off-site storage is preferable for selling. After all, the basement or garage you are filling up is also valuable real estate. Showing it stuffed full and disorganized defeats the purpose. It makes potential buyers think:
“Hey this house is too small. The people who live here don’t even have enough room for their stuff. I won’t even be able to use this garage/basement because I’ll need it for storage.”

Out of sight is out of mind. When selling, seriously consider storing excess items off-site. Without a generous friend or relative to store your things for you, you need to plan for a commercial storage option. Here are seven things to consider as you start your research.

1. What will you be storing? Is it household good and furniture; boats, vehicles, RV’s; specialty goods like a collection of fine wines; or business records. Each has it’s own special storage needs and you may look to different providers for each. This series of posts is about storage for household goods, furniture, appliances and personal items.

2. Will you need to access your belongings periodically during storage? During what hours? Will you eventually need the items to be picked up by a larger moving truck and added to your other belongings for a move? The answers will affect which facility you will choose and conditions of access will be an important question for you to ask.

3. How much space will you need? Remember to allow extra square footage for walking room if you need access to your items without unloading the whole space to get to the back. If your needs increase, will there be more units available in reasonable proximity? You can find estimates of unit capacities online. For example, contents of a small two bedroom apartment might take about 10 ft. x 10 ft.

4. Should you choose a climate controlled unit? Certain items such as photographs, paper, documents, cloth, mattresses, upholstered goods, furniture, antiques, artwork and electronics are affected by heat and humidity. They are at risk of damage without climate control.

5. How will you move your items to storage? Will you need a truck? If so, you may consider a mobile container that is delivered to your locations for you to fill, or a mover who handles everything or possibly a self-storage that offers truck rentals. The alternative is to do a bit more leg work and book the truck separately. Don’t forget the cost of the truck rental, insurance and gas in your estimates.

A related question here is how hard are your items to carry? Do you need the type of storage where you can back right up to your unit? Or can you deal with getting them some distance from the door to your assigned space?

6. How long do you expect to need storage? Overestimate a bit here if you are unsure. Is the storage a temporary stop on an eventual move? Perhaps you should be booking movers now and letting them handle the storage. It might save in the long run. However, a need to access items in the interim could make it unfeasible with certain movers.

7. And finally, what is your budget for storage? You don’t want to risk losing your items because you aren’t able to keep up with storage fees. Having to bring them home while still trying to sell would be counterproductive if not disastrous. Consider whether the cost of storing easily replaced, bulky items might end up to be more that just buying new when you need them again.

Next post will be “Choosing an Off-Site Storage Provider – 7 Questions to Ask.”

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In the Kingston, Ontario region, you can call upon Martha Stanton-Smith of Rearrangements Home Staging for all your home staging needs. Visit the Rearrangements website at http://rearrangements.ca. Be sure to download your free Special Report “Get Off The Home Selling Roller Coaster: 5 Reasons Houses Don’t Sell and What You Can Do About Them.”

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Objections to Staging; “It’s Too Expensive”

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Sold sign by house

Having the Sold sign go up - - Priceless!

In spite of 30+ years of studies and thousands of pieces of anecdotal evidence, some people are still on the fence about hiring a home stager when they decide to sell their homes.  Let’s talk about the objections people have to staging  based on the home stager’s price.

When I took my staging course with Christine Rae of Canadian Staging Professionals(TM), the subject of how to deal with this objection came up.  Trying to be the class clown, I offered this rebuttal:

“I have no problem with what the other stagers charge.  They know what their service is worth.”

Christine mentioned recently that she still quotes me on that one in her classes. And, I noticed she quoted my comment in her book, “Home Staging for Dummies” on page 82.

In reality, I would never say something that flippant – well, almost never.  The point behind the comment is this. There are various levels of staging which can be provided, and there are also various skill levels among practitioners. Perhaps the less expensive stager is not giving as much for the money.  Perhaps they are struggling for business and price cutting to get some work.

You wouldn’t compare the paintings of Picasso to sketches from someone who draws as a hobby. Before you hire a stager, you should dig a little deeper and not compare on price alone.

Another reason someone might think staging is too expensive is because they saw a TV show where the staging bill was $8,000.  They might think all staging jobs are in a price range which is only appropriate for a luxury home.  For more typical homes, most full staging projects, including all the pre-staging preparation work, should fall between 1% to 3% of asking price.  The staging work itself is usually more like 1/4% to 1/2% of asking.

In deciding whether to stage or not, many home sellers neglect to calculate the offsetting savings achieved by selling a home faster. A staged home sells in 1/3 to 1/2 the normal time.  This saving is especially relevant for investment properties or when homeowners are paying expenses to keep two homes.  The Real Estate Staging Association has a handy calculator which you can use to determine your own potential savings from staging. To the Realtor, a faster sale means less expense for advertising, open houses and travel – not too mention the boost to their reputation.

Staging can save you money, but it can also MAKE you money. Each year Home Gain surveys a large number of realtors in order to rate the modest improvements which can bring a home seller the greatest return on investment.  The 2011 Home Gain survey estimates that for every dollar spent on staging you get back $2.99.  Interestingly, the other measures found in the Home Gain top ten are all things your home stager will probably recommend or help you with.

Then there is the great relief  felt by sellers who avoid long listings, tough negotiations and price cuts by staging their homes. Compared to the modest investment, no doubt they feel that the benefits of staging are “priceless.”

Days on Market = Half the Usual
Selling Price = 5% Higher
Stress Relief = Priceless

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In the Kingston, Ontario region, you can call upon Martha Stanton-Smith of Rearrangements Home Staging for all your home staging needs. Visit the Rearrangements website at http://rearrangements.ca. Be sure to download your free Special Report “Get Off The Home Selling Roller Coaster: 5 Reasons Houses Don’t Sell and What You Can Do About Them.”

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On Defining Home Staging – Part 1; Why do we need a definition anyway?

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I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the definition of home staging. You’d suppose when something is your passion a definition would flow easily. But, in the words of American novelist, William Styron, “Let’s face it, writing is hell.” I’m tempted to include every detail and nuance. Besides simply telling what it is, I try to also cram in where, why, when and who.  My little welcome video above actually works in the key points to a definition of staging in a fairly concise way.

You may be thinking “Who cares; why does having a definition matter at all?” After all, a definition is really just a common understanding of a term, and it can change over time. Here’s why I think it is important. Having a common understanding of the term allows everyone to be on the same page when they speak of home staging. Practitioners will know what their offerings imply and consumers will have a general concept of what they should be receiving for their money. In an self-regulated, growth industry like home staging, a clear definition could avoid a lot of heartache. It matters.

It matters to practitioners. The latest online discussions on professional forums have voiced concerns about consumer confusion. The term home staging is being used in ways other than originally intended. In the beginning, the term ‘home staging’ was what California decorator and realtor Barb Schwarz called her process of preparing a home to show for sale. Now the term crops up in slogans like ‘staging for living’. ‘Staging for living’ is really just a make-over or re-design without intention of selling. Under the original definition staging for living would be an oxymoron.

Then there are all the other somewhat interchangeable terms that have been used for home staging: real estate enhancement, house doctoring, and even house fluffing. There are terms which seem to refer to what I feel is only the final phase of home staging: home styling, showcasing and open house preparation. You also might encounter terms which refer to home staging for one particular kind of home, namely model home merchandising.

And a definition matters to consumers. They have a right to understand that if they want a space customized for their own enjoyment then they are looking for advice on interior decorating. If they are preparing a home for sale, they need advice specific to home staging.

Consumers of home staging services have a right

  • to understand ahead of time what the general process is,
  • to be clear about what they will be getting for their money,
  • to know ahead of time what is not included and what their part will be, and
  • to understand which attributes and training are relevant in selecting a good professional.

It is not clear that a consumer would even know what term to look up if they did want to locate a home stager. Some people still don’t even realize that there are professionals who do this business. Some people have no notion at all about the term. For them to get it, I have to translate the words very roughly into “preparing homes to show for sale.” If they do know there is such a thing as home staging, they have a variety of preconceived notions about what it entails. There are those who think home staging is just a good clean and tidy. They probably would look for a cleaning service to do their staging. On the other hand, there are others who think home staging always entails removing everything from the home and starting afresh with new furniture and accessories.

As professional home stagers, we owe it to ourselves to participate in industry associations such as the international self-regulating Real Estate Staging Association (RESA). There, we can come to a common understanding of what home staging means.  We can work together to educate and promote our industry to home sellers.

I propose the following definition:

“Home staging is the art and science of preparing a home to be shown for sale within time and budget constraints by creating maximum appeal for the most likely buyers, and, thereby helping it sell quickly and for the highest possible price.”

What do you think of this definition? Do you think the term home staging should include the other things we do to open our homes to the public which don’t anticipate a sale such as ‘staging’ for holidays, parties, special occasions or public tours? Do you think there are grounds for including make-overs or re-designs for living under the staging terminology?

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In the Kingston, Ontario region, you can call upon Martha Stanton-Smith of Rearrangements Home Staging for all your home staging needs. Visit the Rearrangements website at http://rearrangements.ca. Be sure to download your free Special Report “Get Off The Home Selling Roller Coaster: 5 Reasons Houses Don’t Sell and What You Can Do About Them.”

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Keep the Big Picture in Mind for Your Little House

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This afternoon I had the pleasure of meeting a young homeowner with foresight. He has a semi-detached home that needs a little work. He plans to do it in stages as he can afford it over the next two years. At that time he knows he will be moving and will have to sell so he’s hoping to make a little on his investment.

At first he thought he could just do each project in isolation. However after the first room had new flooring and he was trying to decide on flooring for the foyer that adjoined it, he started to ‘get it’ that everything was going to have to work together. His questions multiplied and he sought our help. It can be quite overwhelming for the homeowner who suddenly realizes how one project can snowball.

Many homeowners decide to do one room per year. That helps them break it up into manageable chunks to save their sanity and protect their bank account. There is a pitfall in this approach, however. If you don’t have an overall plan, your home can start looking very chopped up. Each year there are new trends. If your room of the year follows them, a decade later after 10 rooms have been done, you will have quite a diverse collection of looks.

I saw a good example of the room-of-the-year effect in the home our class staged when I took my Canadian Staging Professionals(TM) training in Kingston. Although it was a great house, it didn’t really flow. You could take a guess at the date of last decorating in each room and most of them really had no relationship to the whole.

master bedroom was neutral and up to date

pink and grey ensuite


These two rooms, a master and its ensuite, should relate to each other. Obviously they were re-decorated at different times without any master plan. This illustrates that a little professional help from an interior decorator or designer could really help you maintain some consistency throughout your home as you do your re-decorating bit by bit. Then, should you decide to sell, your home stager can easily help you pull together whatever you have using a few accessories and perhaps a little re-painting. The pictures are from CSP(TM), Kingston, 2006.

How the Stager’s Job Overlaps Other Professions

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Stagers job overlaps others

The Canadian Staging Professionals’ training emphasizes how staging differs from decorating. There are other overlaps besides decorating. I thought it would be useful to discuss a few of them.

Starting with the least overlapping, let’s consider how staging differs from the home inspector’s job. Stager’s are not required to know anything about structure or building systems. However, if they do, their recommendations in a pre-staging consultation are apt to be more feasible and economical. Many stagers have a lot of personal experience with renovations or real estate flips which serves them well. But, others gravitated to staging because of their decorating flair, and may not previously had to worry much about what goes on underneath the wallboard.

Home inspectors, on the other hand, are specialists in diagnosing problems with a bulding’s structures, systems and it’s envelope. If your shingles have a remaining life expectancy measured in months, the inspector should be able to alert you to that fact. Whereas, if the stager comments on the condition of your roof, it would be only to say that it LOOKS like it will be a red flag for nervous buyers.

The next greatest amount of overlap, would be with the real estate agent’s job. Although the real estate agent will be quite aware of how the property’s ‘presentation’ affects its price and saleability, it’s not their job to actually create that selling look.

There are many agents who are also stagers. I suspect if the staging profession had been better developed when they started business, they might have gone the staging route. The agents who do both jobs are rarely the top selling machines. More likely they pick and choose their listings and have a little more time to stage. As for their staging businesses, I haven’t often seen them out staging listings besides their own. They also don’t usually have warehouses full of furniture or props and staging crews at the ready.

The stager’s job doesn’t overlap the realtor’s much, except by requiring a good understanding of how the real estate agent works and what she needs. The stager also has to keep abreast of buyer trends and preferences in the local market. That involves looking at a lot of pictures and touring plenty of open houses.

The next biggest overlap is with the professional organizer’s job. In fact, many home stagers also offer professional organizing services. The difference is that to meet the tight timelines of selling, the stager usually has only time to bundle the homeowners collection off to storage. Only when there is the luxury of a little more time, can the professional organizer have the luxury of working with the homeowner to develop an ongoing system.

Professional organizers are trained to deal with the cause of disorganization, not just the symptoms. Sometimes they have to work with people who have personality disorders such as hoarders. Professional organizers are also trained to deal with hazardous situations such as chemicals and biohazards that would be beyond the normal scope of staging.

The largest overlap, as I perceive it, is with the interior decorators and interior designers. They have much more formal training, in fact to be an interior designer requires a college degree. The designers are trained about structural elements, and sytems such as lighting as well as the beautification of interior space. Decorators also will usually have completed a fairly rigourous course, although that is not regulated by law in Ontario.

Many Designers and decorators offer staging as an sideline of their practice. They are absolutely capable of preparing a home for sale in a way that will make it look stunning. If they only stage homes for sale occassionally, they will have to put on their stager’s hat and do a little market research to develop their design criteria instead of working with a specific flesh and blood client.

They will also have to remember the staging objective when it comes to timelines and budgets as staging is usually done quickly, and by spending no more than necessary to make the home saleable. When you contrast this with the longer, richer design projects and the process of working one on one with the person who will use the space, it gives the staging work a whole different flavour.

Stagers are problem solvers

No chandelier. We solved it with a drum shade and fishline.

Stagers need a good eye for detail and a creative flair. Design training or experience never hurts. But their main talent is to be problem solvers, expediters. Stagers are everyman’s decorator. The stager will probably never meet those buyers whose tastes they cater to, but, somehow they have to create the vision of their most precious dreams — all in a few hours and on a shoestring budget.

Author, Martha Stanton-Smith, owner of Rearrangements, is a Certified Canadian Staging Professional who helps serious home sellers in Kingston, Ontario get full worth for their homes. She completed her staging training in 2006. Visit her website here.

Smoking Lowers Property Value

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cigarette

As a home stager, it’s my difficult job to discuss with home sellers how the smell of their home can be detrimental to it’s saleability – and it’s price.  That includes the smell of tobacco smoke.  But, after doing a bit of research, I realize that the lingering odour of tobacco smoke is an increasingly serious buyer concern, especially for young families.

As of 2008, only 16% of Ontario residents over 25 were smokers.  Who is going to buy a house here in Kingston?  Odds are they will be over 25 and will live in Ontario.  Believe me non-smokers’ noses pick up that whiff of tobacco a lot faster than smokers.  If you don’t want to put off more than 4 out of 5 potential buyers when you put your home on the market, you’d better resolve this issue.

Ridding your home of the smell completely is not an easy task.  It sticks to and soaks into every surface.  It can seem to be gone but heat and humidity will cause it to release again.   If you’ve been in the habit of smoking in your bathroom, the new owner will know it as soon as he goes in for a hot shower.   There are some things you can do but you have your work cut out for you.

What makes this issue even more serious than a mere smell turnoff is the fact that we now have many studies showing our health can be seriously harmed by smoking and by breathing in second hand smoke.  The most recent news is that we can also be harmed by breathing or touching the smoke residue called “third hand smoke.”

Doctors from MassGeneral Hospital for Children in Boston coined the term “third-hand smoke” to describe these chemicals in a study that focused on the risks they pose to infants and children. The study was published in the January, 2009 issue of journal Pediatrics.

In February, 2010, a study sponsored by the University of California’s Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program was released.  Lara Gundel, a staff scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California and one of the authors of the study, says of the findings:

“We have considered that nicotine on surfaces has been pretty benign up to this point. It turns out we shouldn’t say that now. People can be exposed to toxins in tobacco smoke in a way that’s never been recognized before.”
“The burning of tobacco releases nicotine in the form of a vapor that adsorbs strongly onto indoor surfaces, such as walls, floors, carpeting, drapes and furniture. Nicotine can persist on those materials for days, weeks and even months,” said Hugo Destaillats, a chemist with Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in San Francisco,  co-author of the study.

“Our study shows that when this residual nicotine reacts with ambient nitrous acid it forms carcinogenic tobacco-specific nitrosamines or TSNAs,” Destaillats said. “TSNAs are among the most broadly acting and potent carcinogens present in unburned tobacco and tobacco smoke.”

This is pretty scary stuff.  Furthermore, these studies indicate that infants and children are the most susceptible group to these cancer causing chemicals.  Now it becomes not only a comfort issue for home buyers, but a true health and safety issue.  For young family homebuyers, providing a safe home for their children is a huge priority.  Their concern will make them pass completely on the smokey home or, at the least,  lower their offer substantially to cover the cost of dealing with the stubborn residue.

 

Cut the B.S. How Much Does Staging Cost?

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At the Kingston Home Builders Association Home & Trade Show this weekend, I gave three presentations on home staging.  At the beginning of each session, I questioned the audience to find out what they most wanted to hear.  One fellow surprised me a little when he stated flatly that he wanted to cut through all the b.s. and find out how much it cost.

Since I read a lot of what is written about staging, I too am tired and frustratd by hearing the same statistics and trite sayings.  But, since every property and every staging  job is a little different, stagers do have to rely on statistics to prove their worth.  And, for the same reason, it’s risky to toss out a set number for cost because what you get for that amount will vary too.

Research, surveys and volumes of anecdotal evidence repeatedly show that staging increases selling prices and cuts selling time..  Higher selling prices bring return on investment for both seller and their agent by way of increased commissions.  Faster sales save holding costs for the homeowner and marketing costs for the agent.

The bottom line is if you don’t anticipate savings or a return on investment from staging a property for sale, then you shouldn’t be doing it.  At the end of the transaction, staging should cost you nothing; it should pay you to do it. 

As in making any other investment, your first steps should be to know your goals and research the market; in this case specifically your goals for selling and the real estate market in your area. Then you’ll have to choose from an array of things you could do to help your home sale based on which ones have the best potential.  Here’s a link to the results of the latest Home Gain survey which spells out the things you can do for the highest returns.
http://blog.homegain.com/home-improvement/homegain-2009-top-12-home-improvements-survey-results/

Brain Research Offers Insight Into Human Behaviour

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Feb. 10, 2010. Business Week reported on research by neuroscientist, Benedetto de Martino of University College London (UCL), a visiting researcher at Caltech. The recently completed study shows that an almond shaped part of the brain called the amygdala is the source of human aversion to money loss. This function seems similar to the amygdala’s role in fear and anxiety. This part of the brain registers rapid emotional reactions. Previous studies at UCL had shown that decision making triggered both the amygdala and the prefontal cortex which is known to be involved in higher order reasoning.

If we thought our decision making was totally rational and logical, perhaps not. It seems that emotional responses play a part in our decisions before we even start the rational thought process.

As a realtor, a home seller or a home stager we shouldn’t ignore the scientific evidence on the role of emotion in human decision making. When a buyer is home shopping, we certainly don’t want to trigger his sense of caution with the “red flags” that hint of deferred home maintenance. We would be better off to use the impact of emotions to provide positive first impressions.