I first met Michele and Stan in the winter of 2007.  They understood that the once swift real estate market was changing and they hired me to help them prepare their residence for sale.  In a series of consultations over the course of many months, we worked diligently to update and improve their well-loved home. 

Finally, here in the spring of 2010, the house is listed. I think it shows very well on the virtual tour.  I have had success staging homes in this area of Lake Ridge, Virginia.  Let’s hope the luck holds for these two wonderful people.  (The third pair, coincidentally, to retire to the Carolinas!)

Here are some befores and afters:

The Living Room before decluttering, new floors and fresh paint.

The Living Room after:

The Family Room before: (This is after we painted the paneling white.  The photos of the paneling in its natural state were too dark for posting.)

The Family Room after:

The Kitchen before:

  The Kitchen after new counters, appliances and wallpaper removal:

The Dining Room before:

  The Dining Room after:

Bedroom before:

Bedroom after:

A concern of Diane’s was her deep red foyer.  She wanted to know if I thought she should change it to the neutral muslin tone of much of the rest of the house.  Once I walked through the entire house, I knew my original first impression was right.  The brick tone should stay. 

Yes, a deep red foyer speaks to the character of the homeowner, but not any more loudly than the clean, clutter-free, well-maintained rest of the home.  And this is crucial.  Because the impression the rest of the home gives would be appealing to anyone, the red serves to distinguish the home among the masses that may be viewed.  

Builders do this all the time with their display models.  Their designers attempt to create subtle themes that will make a lifestyle impression.  I have been to model homes with golf themes too many times to count.   A few years ago a builder in a new development near me displayed a 2 million home with every single room decorated in pink.  It was the talk of the town. Just about everyone I knew went to see it. 

You just gotta love the internet.  It only took me a few clicks to find it.  From Basheer & Edgemoore:

I met with Michele and Stan last March and again the next month, although it hardly feels like 18 months ago.  At that time, they were considering necessary updates for an eventual entry into the real estate market.  Their year long hard work, vast improvement in space, and the tanking market made a decision to stay easy. 

I have heard time and again how satisfying it is to fix all the little annoyances that were overlooked until Realtor eyes are on the property.  And how afterward, the homeowner’s need to leave diminishes.   So my question is , why wait?  Why not create the home you desire right now?  Dedicate some time to repairing cracks.  Put a little aside in the budget for small improvements, like paint or  new fixtures.  Get those new appliances you have always wanted, and will NEED to get when selling, and enjoy them for yourselves. 

Create a sense of place right where you are.   

Clean Everything.  Carpets, floors, windows, cupboards, closets, furniture. Murphy’s Oil Soap will be your best friend.  Solicit professional help for the big stuff.

Reduce to a bare minimum. Get rid of everything you can, and then reduce again by 50%. If you have to, rent a storage unit. Aim for open spaces, which make a home look larger. Closets must be included in this all important reduction stage. Personal Effects go into storage first. (Just think how happy you will be to see them when you finally move.)

Replace EVERY switch plate and outlet cover with a brand new white one.

Paint all trim and doors white, if not natural wood.  Colors and cream are not allowed. This is a big project, but will make the home shine. Even if it looks fine to you, do it anyway.

Paint the front door and the molding around it. Clean this area of all cobwebs and dust, scrub the porch and add a potted paint. Creating a clean and fresh first impression is crucial.

Replace all outdated light fixtures. All of them. Even in hallways. 

Throw away fake plants.  Fake plants are dust dwellings. They say to the potential buyer, “I have no time to care for my things, including my house. I would rather fake it.”

Home Staging in a nutshell consists of one thing.  Sleight of the eye. 

Just as a magician distracts his audience in order to covertly perform a trick, Home Stagers can distract attention away from warts and on to gems.

I heard about some people who were surprised when the homeowner was inside when these prospective buyers viewed the property.  The house was/is an example of curb UNappeal.  The visible exterior consists solely of a garage door, plain and without even a window.  Because the house is situated on the downward slope of a hill, this is all you can see from the street.  Inside is no better:  tiny chopped up rooms, awkward flow, low ceilings, dingy carpets, horribly outdated baths and kitchen.  The house has one shining star, a beautiful in-ground pool situated on a long backyard ending in a glen and a creek. 

The homeowner did a fantastic job directing the prospective buyers’ attention to the back of the house, where the pool was visible.  They wrote a contract that night.

Home Stagers can do this sort of thing without such personal intrusion.   

Tomorrow: My Top Home Staging Tips

Fasten your seat belts.  What I am about to say may look like bragging–shocking, I know,–but bear with me as there is a point.  I got this email today:

Denise, thanks for all your advice! I put my house on the market on Thursday and on Monday the stock market went down 770 points, but even so, it’s sold. The new light fixtures, the new stainless appliances and the changes I made on the lower level really enhanced the space and made a great first impression. All good advice from you.  When it’s time to move, I’ll be calling you for more advice.

 So here is my point. You can’t travel too far into the world today without hearing how terrible the economy and the housing market are.  But they aren’t dead yet.  People are still out there, buying things–even houses. 

Especially ones that look good.  (Sorry, I couldn’t resist!)

More rain is on the way. *frown*  I still do not have any of my pots planted outside, but who has lingered long enough to notice? This is the latest it has ever been for me.  Will it ever dry up? 

While we wait for the sun to stay out, I am repeating two fair weather articles here that ran last year in my newsletter.

Coordinating garden plants to architectural style is the first step toward what Realtors elusively refer to as “curb appeal”.  Curb appeal is a phrase created for the real estate market to describe the critical overall first impression a home makes upon approach. It is important to consider your home’s external appearance when developing a design plan.  Of course, no rules are hard and fast, but consideration of the color scheme and architectural style of a home as well as the visual space.

A long low ranch will need different plantings than a tall townhouse. Some styles, like the ubiquitous brick colonial, can be equally appealing with formal English landscaping or carefree perennial cottage gardens. Scale is the key here. A large home needs large beds with similarly scaled trees and scrubs. In this case, a tiny border bed of azaleas and low lying annuals looks silly.

Consider color as well. Use orange, yellow and red flowers with warm tones of brick and siding. Purple and green look wonderful against pale brick and gray or taupe siding.

Beware of garden clutter! Too many tschotkes can ruin an otherwise beautiful garden. One flag and one statue is enough.

Adding some blooming perennials to landscape beds can add color to the exterior of your home. It is not as scary as it seems. The first three are even easier than annuals; they are often found in commercial settings.

Rudbeckia Goldstrum Black eyed Susans grow easily and bloom most of the summer
Coreopisis Lacy and heat tolerant
Hemerocallis Stella de Oro Everywhere for a reason

Slightly more challenging, but well worth it are these…

Delphinium Tall and truly blue, stunning to behold
Echinacea Like a purple daisy
Heuchera Gorgeous deeply colored leaves that look like red wine. Looks awesome with purple salvias, annual purple fountain grass and and a little accent of chartreuse green
Geranium Johnson’s Blue Nothing like the annual type, low with small flowers

Any big box home improvement store will have this list, but for help and quality plants try a nursery.

New slipcovers and pillows, fresh paint, carpet removed and a decluttering.  Easy for me, lots of work for the homeowner.

So fresh and clean!  Now for the huge Family Room…

Paneling painted, carpet replaced with laminate, new recessed lighting and more decluttering.

Now the Master…

Bye Bye wallpaper and carpet!

And if you are still with me, here is one of the bedrooms…

 Finally, a bath…

Lots of new, to match the whole house. 

An essential element to good flow is a tight color scheme.  Choose only a few colors and use them throughout the home.  In this case, warm cream, taupe and white are grounded with black.  An occasional accent of slate blue can be found.  The same three paint colors are used very successfully, and one of these three is the white on the trim.

Like a chameleon, the taupe is so sophisticated and modern, it is hard to see that the paint color is repeated in the kitchen, above the chair rail in the Dining Room and in two of the three full baths.   

I am gifted with these amazing clients that not only see the task ahead, but follow through until there is flow.

Here are some befores and afters:

The Kitchen is made lighter and brighter by painting the cabinets white.  The counters are updated.  The wallpaper is strenuously discarded and replaced with the signature taupe.

The Dining Room needs only two small changes, but what a difference.  The wallpaper is removed. 

Again, the taupe appears above the chair rail.  New formal draperies are stylish and fresh.

Tune in tomorrow for more…

Layering can be an effective way to showcase art.  Plus, on a large brick wall such as this, hanging a single picture is tricky, and would require drilling into mortar.

I created this display for a home I am staging.  Notice how the large mat in the rear frame keeps the arrangement from becoming too busy.  The largest photo is, in fact, in the smallest frame, which creates an interesting bit of tension. 

The subject matter on all three is similar-basically Old Dudes.  Interesting and not too personal, necessary ingredients for effective staging. The colors are tight.  They are straight out of the tones in the brick. 

It appears from the “straight on” view that the decorative box is too far from the grouping of photos, but look at the angled view.  The distance serves to emphasis the dramatic length of the fireplace.