The more time I spend living in the Sunnyside neighbourhood of Calgary, the more I love it. I love being so close to downtown but not being in the downtown core. I also love being so central for the whole city. It makes driving time to my various staging locations so much easier.
 
I’m not the only one seeing the benefits of the area. Two new condo developments in Kensington create an investment opportunity – or – you can make one your new home and enjoy it here too.
 
Pixel condos by Battistella and St. John’s Tenth Street condos have both got me excited. As a professional home stager and a person who lives in the area, I would love to get in there to stage a vacant condo for sale. I can envision how to create the ideal lifestyle feel for potential buyers. People who will become my neighbours and fall in love with the area as much as I have.
 
In my last post about Sunnyside, I included some links of interest for the area. Now I’ll add a new one that I came across when I was looking into the new condo developments. Check out the map and shops on page 18/19 (10 out of 25) in the section, “Walk the Walk”.
 
I’m slowly making my way through all the great stops in the Sunnyside/Kensington/Hillhurst area. Check back in next month to see what I’ve found.
 
In the meantime, if you live in Calgary and are considering hiring a professional home stager to stage your furnished or vacant property, contact Jen at Set Your Stage for a free assessment today.

In 2006, my brother and I purchased our first “fixer-upper” and slowly transformed it into a dream home during our spare time. As we all know though, goals change over the years and it was time for me to move on. My brother decided to buy me out of our place. Although may sound easier than selling to a stranger but it wasn’t. There was lots of red tape with the banks and negotiating with family isn’t easy when there are so many zeros attached to the property.
 
Selling was worth it though and my focus on this article is mostly my experience as a buyer however. Home sellers often forget about who is potentially buying their place. This can be detrimental in the sale of their property.
 
My boyfriend and I were very lucky to have an amazing agent who I would gladly recommend to anyone. We chose about 85% of the properties we wanted to see and our agent chose the remainder. We looked at almost 38 properties in Sunnyside, Hillhurst, Bridgeland, and Parkdale offered on 4 and 3 months later (in December – yes we purchased in December) we ended up with a perfect place for us in Sunnyside. The first property we offered on (also the first property we looked at) was staged. We ended up dealing with a bidding war (which wasn’t new to me from 2006 but wasn’t fun). The second property was this beautiful heritage building. Unfortunately, the building was 18+ and even though we aren’t planning on starting a family any time soon, we weren’t able to buy. The 3rd ended up having serious issues with leaks in the building.
 
Some things I noticed about myself while we were looking: I was determined to find something move-in ready. My previous experience with the renovations was exhausting and time consuming – I wanted a stylish home that would reflect my work. What I noticed about my boyfriend, he couldn’t envision vacant spaces. We looked at 2 suites with the same floorplan in the same building – one with furniture and one vacant and he felt the vacant one was too small. Interesting… These two points are what I tell my clients all the time…
 
So what about the other 34 we looked at? The memorable ones had dirty laundry out, bugs on window sills, a cute chihuahua(not a good idea if your buyers are afraid of dogs), the really “small” vacant one. But most of them… I don’t remember! Yikes, Out of 38 homes, I only remember 9! These 9 either were really good, or really bad.
 
This made me feel really good about my career choice to be a home stager. If those 29 properties in Sunnyside, Hillhurst, Bridgeland, and Parkdale had help from a home stager, they would have been more memorable to us as well as other buyers. If the 2 “gross” ones had advice from a home stager, perhaps they would have made more of an effort to present their home for showings. Both of these scenarios would have lead to quicker sales, better offers and who knows maybe even a bidding war.

I wanted to post a special thanks to Miki Somos for featuring our article Selling Vacant Properties in his January newsletter. Thanks Miki!