Set Your Stage

Archive for the 'Before and After Home Staging' Category

Add Some Light

March 01, 2013 (posted by Jennifer Campbell, Home Staging Calgary)

It’s winter. It’s dreary. And the last thing a potential buyer wants to experience when they view your property for sale is more darkness. Stage each room with extra lighting to create an inviting atmosphere and set your property apart.

Science has shown that light has a psychological impact on people. Darkness creates a feeling of being cold, negative, and tired. Light can be energizing, positive, and create a feeling of ease. It’s a simple choice to make if you’re selling your home. Lighten it up!

Consider these four types of lighting in each room when you’re staging your property for sale.

Ambient: General or overhead lighting, it’s the main light that fills a room. If all you have is a ceiling light, update it with something modern that gives more light and makes a statement. Use the highest watt bulb recommended for that fixture.
Task: Used as extra light for a specific task in a room. Grooming, working, or under kitchen cabinets. Don’t forget these. They help create atmosphere. Imagine a cozy reading nook with a perfectly angled lamp.
Accent: The most dramatic, it’s used to highlight a specific focal point. Art, architectural features, or a great view. Think of adding light to an area that you would like the potential buyer to notice.
Decorative: Adds to the overall atmosphere of a room, not for much extra light. Think candles or a unique lamp.

Before: Living room before home staging.

See the difference professional home staging makes?

After: Adding the white cushions lighten up the living room.

Lighting in a staged room is critical, yet, it’s often overlooked. Potential buyers don’t want to feel like they will be living in a small dark cave. So spend some time and make a small investment in upgrading your lighting to create an inviting space that your potential buyers can’t resist.

For more staging ideas or help in the Calgary area, contact me.

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Dark Feature Walls

February 16, 2013 (posted by Jennifer Campbell, Home Staging Calgary)

Staging your home for sale doesn’t mean that you have to keep everything boring builder’s beige. In fact, being a bit bold with your colour choices can make your property stand out from the competition and get sold. This is especially true for newer condos or townhouses where all listings start to look the same.

Help the potential buyer remember your property – avoid the same cookie cutter look as your competition.

Before: Living room before home staging.

To be successful with a bold colour choice, you must know your buyer. Once you do, choose a feature wall and paint a bold colour on that wall only. The key to success in this technique is to keep the surrounding walls light and neutral.

It’s about creating balance.

After: This open concept living & dining room is the perfect space for entertaining or relaxing.

In the photos you can see that the dark feature wall is the longest wall, surrounded by light walls and the door. The dark blue wall serves to ground the space and welcome you in.

Balanced with light furniture, white lamp shades, and a light rug, the room doesn’t feel dark at all. It has some character.

After: This open concept living & dining room is the perfect space for entertaining or relaxing.

Large artwork and soft, colourful pillows add the feminine touch to balance the more masculine feel of the dark blue.

The cozy feel created in the room is balanced with modern touches in the furniture and accessories.

If you don’t have a natural feature like a fireplace that you want to highlight, create a feature with colour. Balance cozy with modern, light with dark, and masculine with feminine. Be bold and stand out from the competition to get sold.

For more staging help, check out the rest of my site, or contact me. I’m here to help people get their homes sold faster! (After a long listing, the property in the photos sold one day after I staged it!)

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How to Deal with Dated Flooring When Selling

February 10, 2013 (posted by Jennifer Campbell, Home Staging Calgary)

Flooring covers so much space that it can’t be avoided when staging your home for sale. Take an unbiased look at what you have and make it easy for the buyer. If you have dated flooring, you must address it – by updating or through staging.

A potential buyer will definitely consider flooring, asking:

Can I live with it as is?
If not, what needs to be done so I can live with it in the short term?
How much work? Cost?
Is it a total gut job?

Before: Kitchen before staging.

Your job as the seller is to stop them after the first question – because they know it works for them as is. The more a potential buyer worries about something as significant as flooring, the longer it will take to sell your property, and the lower the offer will be.

Notice the dated black and white pattern tile in this property that I recently staged. It’s not everyone’s ideal choice.

After: The green pears and green Perrier water bottles help to
showcase an active healthy lifestyle in this kitchen.

But through staging, we made it work. Most importantly, it’s in great condition and it’s sparkling clean.

Light walls, bright lighting, and staged kitchen countertops keep the buyer’s eyes focused upwards and away from the floor.

Contemporary dark furniture feels grounded by the black in the tiles. Furniture placement draws the eyes to the gorgeous windows, natural light and views outside.

After: The perfect space to read the morning paper and
enjoy your coffee.

Strategic camera angles by a professional photographer make it look funky, not old.

It works for two reasons. There’s nothing wrong with the flooring (disrepair, grime) to draw the buyer’s attention to it. And, by highlighting other areas, the buyer’s attention is drawn away from the floor. Dated flooring becomes a non-issue.

Mission accomplished. The potential buyer walks away feeling that, “I don’t love the floor, but I can live with it”. This house sold within two weeks after I staged it.

Contact me for home staging services in the Calgary area.

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Make a Sad Windowless Room Feel Cozy

January 29, 2013 (posted by Jennifer Campbell, Home Staging Calgary)

Before: Family room before staging.

Ever wonder why the Christmas video of a burning yule log became such a hit? It suggests warmth and comfort. Human psychology can feed on suggestion alone. That’s the reason home staging works.

As home stagers, we can use this power of suggestion to solve a lot of issues. One of these is how to make a windowless space feel appealing. Turn on lamps, ignite the fireplace, drape thick blankets on the sofa and throw a sheepskin rug on the floor. If a cozy space is the goal, make sure to appeal to people’s sense of comfort.

After: At the end of a long day, this living room is the
perfect space to unwind.

Another way to create the illusion of a window is to hang a large picture of a nature scene in a place where a window would likely be found. This can simulate the sense of having a view, and the sun never sets on these nature scenes!

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Archive for the 'Before and After Home Staging' Category

Add Some Light

Dark Feature Walls

How to Deal with Dated Flooring When Selling

Make a Sad Windowless Room Feel Cozy

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