10 Tips to Stage Your Home & WOW Your Buyers
Getting ready to sell your home in North Jersey? Before you start showing your home to buyers, take time to give your home some love—even the simplest home staging and sprucing can be the difference between a buyer that walks away and a buyer that’s impressed. These DIY staging tips can really make your home stand out from the crowd.
The Exterior
1. Create curb appeal.
Before a buyer will set foot inside, they have to be impressed by the exterior of your home. So spend some time making your home welcoming and attractive. Powerwash your siding and driveway, mow the lawn, weed or prune the garden, or plant some bright flowers. Wash your windows, replace old house numbers or a tired mailbox.
2. Invite visitors with a welcoming porch.
An extension of your curb appeal is your porch. Tidy up any furniture, buy a new welcome mat, add some potted flowers, and replace your doorknob. Add a tasteful wreath to your door and leave your porch light on in the evenings, especially if you will be showing at night.
3. Spruce up your outdoor area.
Whether you have a large backyard or a cozy balcony, your outdoor North Jerseys should not only be attractive, they should be inviting. Help your buyers to envision a lifestyle by adding seating or dining North Jerseys such as chair and tables, a hammock, or even a fire pit. Make sure gardens are cleaned up, lawn is mown, and any fallen leaves or branches are tidied up.
Cleaning & Repairs
4. Finish your repair projects.
Nothing is more intimidating to a buyer than walking into an incomplete project! No missing floorboards, crooked shingles, cracked windows, or any other sign that anything needs to be replaced or repaired. Your home should appear in good maintenance from top to bottom.
5. Clear out the clutter.
Take some time to go through your closets, shelves, cabinets, and counters to clear out anything that’s taking up space or making your rooms appear cramped, crowded, or dirty. Donate clothes, partially empty your closets and cabinets to make them appear larger, even rent a storage unit for furniture that is too large, unsightly, or mismatched.
6. Deep clean EVERYTHING.
It might not be the most fun part, but it is an absolute necessity that your home sparkle. Get all those hard-to-reach places, scrub dingy tiles and grout, deep clean the showers and tubs. If you’re not a fan of cleaning, hire a professional to help. The results will be worth the expense. If you have a pet, you may want to steam clean your rugs or add some type of fragrance, such as soft-scented candles or potpourri, to mask pet odors.
Interior Decor
7. Depersonalize your decor.
Your home might have a certain style that you find tasteful—but not all home buyers have the same tastes in decor. Neutral and simple are always best. Repaint any bold or bright colored walls with neutral colors. Remove any personal decor and replace with tasteful yet neutral art and centerpieces. You want to create the sense of a home that’s lived-in but not yours, as the idea is to allow buyers to imagine their own personalizations in your home.
8. Use furniture to create balance.
Placement of furniture can change the whole feel of a room. Your furniture should not overcrowd the room, or leave it feeling too open. Floating the furniture away from the walls can actually make rooms feel larger and create a cozy, conversational feel.
The Final Details
9. Increase your lighting.
Make your home warm and welcoming by increasing the lighting—both natural and artificial—throughout your home. Open windows if the weather is nice, or at least pull back the drapes to let in as much natural light as possible. Increase the wattage of the bulbs in your lamps and fixtures, and aim for three types of lighting in every room—ambient (overhead), task (reading or under-cabinet lights), and accent (table or floor lamps).
10. Bring the outdoors inside.
Your decor might be neutral, but that doesn’t mean it has to be boring. Bring in bright splashes of color in the form of potted plants, clipped flowers, or fall branches. This can help increase the sense of warmth and welcoming throughout the home.
Your North Jersey Selling Resource
If you’re ready to sell your North Jersey home, then it’s time to contact AVNU Realty Group. These staging tips are just the beginning of the expert advice and knowledge we can use to help you successfully sell your home. Contact us today and let’s list your home.
