The only home staging tips you need can be counted on just one hand – good news if you find the prospect of home staging for a sale a little daunting. And yet staging is a key part of house flipping that can often make or break a sale.
Mastering home staging can definitely make a huge difference to how long it takes to sell your home, so if you're looking for advice on how to sell a house faster, you definitely need these expert tips.
Different experts may offer slightly different techniques, but fundamentally, home staging comes down to just three main components that you need to bear in mind before inviting viewers into your home.
1. Remember: you're not just selling a home, you're selling a lifestyle
This is the single most important thing to understand about home staging. Its purpose is not so much to sell your home as it is to sell an idea of what it will be like to live in this home. All your staging decisions should be based on this fact. For example, it's best to arrange furniture in a way that creates a conversational set, with pieces facing each other – even if you don't normally have it that way.
Staging experts from Staging Studio say: 'Home staging promotes a perceived lifestyle.' For example, if you're staging a bedroom, choosing matching and symmetrical furniture and lights will create 'a sense of peace and harmony', leading your buyer to 'subconsciously think that their relationship will be better in this home'. It doesn't matter that you don't like matching everything – it's about creating the right impression.
2. Go big – on everything
Again, this has nothing to do with what you personally favor, but with what creates a feeling of appealing spaciousness for your buyers, who all value a home that at least seems to offer more room than their current one. Paradoxically, this feeling of extra space is best created by opting for oversized artwork on walls, large mirrors, and large area rugs – and this works even in smaller rooms.
The trick is to use fewer large accent pieces rather than lots of smaller ones. To enhance the size of your rooms even further, use furniture raised on legs 'to create a sense of lightness' – a top tip from Christina El Moussa for Zillow.
3. Don't try to hide your home's unique features – show them off instead
If your home has an architectural quirk – a slanting ceiling, or an l-shaped room – treat it as a unique opportunity rather than something to try and hide (you won't be able to, anyway). Present these unique features as positive extras for your potential buyer.
That awkward corner can be used as home office space – so style it as such! Attics and other spaces that can't be used as extra rooms can be presented as attractive storage opportunities – but you have to show your buyer how it would work rather than just telling them.
Home staging is all about getting your potential buyer's imagination working – a well-staged home will sell quicker because they'll be able to see that the home is ready to be lived in.
