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Should your house be staged before you sell?

January 16, 2012 By 6 Comments

To Stage or Not to Stage – that is the question!
by Sveta Melchuk

Updated from the Home Staging archives. Originally published on Jun 18th 2007.

Staging a Home for sale will cost you money. Is it worth spending time and effort on it? After all, once the decision to sell has been made, you just want to get it over with as fast as possible, right?

First, did you determine the «right» price for your house? It should be based on certain objective criteria, such as the location of the property, sale price of comparable homes in your neighbourhood and today’s market conditions. But don’t forget the desirability factor…
While you can’t control some of the other criteria, you definitely have a say in the way your property looks, feels and is perceived by prospective buyers. Increase the visual/emotional value of your property and you will increase its desirability, therefore the price and the urgency to buy it from potential buyers. Why? [Read more...]

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Would you like to rent your property for more money?

December 15, 2011 By Leave a Comment

Posted by:  Sveta Melchuk. Founder of Home Staging Montreal

Professional staging/decorating for rental of a condo or an apartment is becoming more and more in demand. If you are looking for executive rental income for your unit, the property has to be presented accordingly.

Some of the apartments are quite new and others require some cosmetic renovations before decorating for rental. Some clients need help with managing the total project from beginning to end and taking care of things such as:

  • Make the list of what needs to be updated
  • Purchase all the materials, tiles, light fixtures, etc.
  • Provide renovation team to do the work
  • Provide cleaning team
  • Purchase all furniture
  • Purchase all accessories
  • Purchase linens, towels, even dishes if required
  • Decorate the apartment for rental

Decorating for rental involves some clever and creative thinking. We want it to look nice but we don’t want to spend a lot. [Read more...]

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How to Make a Small Room Appear Bigger

November 14, 2011 By 9 Comments

Updated from the Home Staging archive. Originally posted on May 08, 2007.

Small rooms are the bane of the home decorator. How do you achieve a pleasing look that doesn’t feel cramped and claustrophobic? Without to have to build an addition or knock down walls, you are limited to a few, but effective, decorating tricks that create the illusion of space.

small-spaces.jpg

Use color to your advantage

The strategic use of colour and light is the best way to achieve this. Choose light shades of paint or wallpaper for the walls. Lighter colours reflect light making for a brighter room. Use an even lighter shade of the same colour or white for ceilings and floors. A darker colour on the ceiling will make the ceiling look lower and tends to make the walls look as though they are closing in.

Avoid harshly contrasting colours. In fact, a monochromatic colour scheme that carries throughout the room into fabrics and accessories is very effective. Steer away from too many patterned items. The goal here is to blur perspective. [Read more...]

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Les rénovations les plus payantes

November 15, 2010 By 5 Comments

Comme vous pouvez constater, il est possible d’accomplir beaucoup avec des petits moyens! Une professionnelle de home staging saura vous conseiller dans les priorités et les démarches à faire pour bien préparer votre maison à la vente. Cette étape est cruciale avant de compléter le tout avec un home staging pour un effet irrésistible!

Tout le monde souhaite maximiser la vente de sa maison mais est-ce que vous savez par où débuter?

On doit bien se préparer afin de réussir et cela prend un peu de temps, un peu d’argent et, surtout, de l’effort!
Dans cette partie de mon article, je vais discuter de la première étape – les travaux de rénovations qui augmenteront la valeur marchande de votre maison. La deuxième partie de l’article portera sur les astuces au niveau de home staging (ou la valorisation résidentielle) – à ne pas manquer!

Il faut distinguer, bien évidemment, les travaux majeurs des réparations et améliorations cosmétiques. Si vous avez l’intention d’habiter votre chez soi encore pendant quelque temps avant de procéder à la vente de votre maison, allez-y pour des rénovations majeurs mais surtout celles qui sont rentables.

Selon l’Institut canadien des évaluateurs les rénovations les plus payantes sont: [Read more...]

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Renovations that generates the best return on investment

September 20, 2010 By Leave a Comment

Everyone would like to maximize the sale of their house, but do you know where you should be starting?
It’s imperative to prepare well in order to succeed and that requires a bit of time, a bit of money and some effort.

In this article, I would like to cover the PRE home staging steps, namely the renovation work – which projects are more important, when and what will be your return on investment?

The first and foremost question is whether you are planning to live in your house for a while and enjoy the fruits of your labour or are you ready to move out.
If you will be living in the house for a few more years, go ahead and renovate, keeping in mind the projects which will increase the resale value of your home in the future. In 2008, all energy saving and GREEN home improvements were a big hit!

The Appraisal Institute of Canada released the following numbers:
Renovations which generate best return on investment

  • Bathroom renovation: 75 to 100%
  • Kitchen: 75 to 100%
  • Interior and exterior plastering and paint: 50 to 100%

Renovations which generate average return on investment

  • New roof: 50 to 80%
  • Replacing heating system : 50 to 80%
  • Finished basement: 50 to 75%
  • Adding of a family room: 50 to 75%
  • Adding fireplace: 50 to 75%
  • Installing hardwood flooring: 50 to 75%
  • Adding a garage: 50 to 75%
  • Replacing doors and windows (unless energy saving, then higher): 50 to 75%
  • Adding a deck: 50 to 75%
  • Central AC: 25 to 75%

But if you are ready to put your house on the market now, your strategy should be different: you should focus on some cosmetic improvements only which will increase the resale value of your property.

As per www.homegain.com survey of 2 000 real estate agents in the USA in 2009, here are some examples of recommended improvements as well as their return on investment:

  • Decluttering and a major clean up – 874%
  • Improving and updating lighting – 586%
  • Minor Landscaping – 473%
  • Electrical and plumbing repairs – over 300%
  • Interior paint – 250%

As you can tell, it’s possible to accomplish quite a bit on a reasonable budget. A home staging professional will help you decide on the priorities and the budget required to get your house sale ready. This is a crucial step before the home staging per say which is certain to give your house a WOW factor you are looking for!

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Home Staging – 10 tips for better sale

September 22, 2009 By 8 Comments

Are you interested in selling your house fast and for top dollar?
If the answer is ‘YES’, then you need to get it ready to look and feel its best. The concept of Home Staging is not new and is used extensively in the USA and Western Canada to market real estate.

These Home Staging tips cover some of the things you can easily do yourself at a minimal cost.

  1. Before you do anything, you have to stop thinking of your house as a HOME and start thinking about it as an investment, for which you want the largest return possible.
  2. If you don’t have pictures that show your house at its best, you are probably missing out on dozens, if not hundreds of potential buyers.
  3. Curb appeal (or, lack of thereof) can deter a visitor from wanting to pursue. The exterior of your house has to be clean and taken care of.
  4. Buyers want to see space, above anything else. You have to declutter, so the visitors can focus on the house and not on your stuff.
  5. Chipped paint, loose or missing tiles, broken door handle, a closet door that doesn’t quite close properly can become a BIG turnoff for a potential buyer. Fix!
  6. Painting is the cheapest way to transform a room! Repaint main rooms in fresh, neutral colors.
  7. Refresh and update. Simple things such as a new bed ensemble, a few decorative pillows and two nice table lamps will transform a bedroom.
  8. Make the house as neutral as possible to please a variety of potential buyers and their lifestyle and taste.
  9. Make sure there is sufficient light in every room– you can’t have too much light!
  10. Space optimization and proper furniture and accessories placement is essential. It will give a home a warm and appealing look and feel and create the WOW factor.

So, a small effort will pay of at the sale time. Stage your house-sell your house WELL!

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A Staged house that sold in 3 hours

July 10, 2009 By 5 Comments

I wanted to share this recent story with you – a Staged house sells in 3 hours! Of course it’s exceptional but it does happen inspite of a slower real estate market.

I was recently asked to help a lady prepare her home for sale. The house is small (2 bedrooms only and a very small office), but very well located and well maintained. The paint was recent and the color neutral enough on the main floor but needed to be refreshed in a couple of rooms on the upper floor.

The problem? Old and outdated furniture, outdated and darkish curtains, some clutter and several personal items, such as the owner’s artwork displayed everywhere in the house (pretty but not to everyone’s taste).

We worked on a very limited budget (approximately $700). I made a list of accessories to purchase and we split the tasks – I went off to IKEA and the owner shopped in smaller local stores to locate items such as decorative pillows, a vase, branches, a mirror and some fabric. She repainted her old dining room table a dark brown (instead of a previous blue color) and recovered the chairs with dark brown microsuede fabric. She also repainted a small office and a bathroom over a weekend. The seller also worked very hard to declutter and put some of her furniture in storage.

Last, but not least, we rented two small white chairs and we reorganized her furniture to optimize the spaces, changed the curtains on the living room and set up the accessories.

livingroombefore

Before

After

After

As soon as the photographs appeared on the Internet, the phone started to ring. Three appointments were set up for the evening. The second visitors made and offer to purchase on the spot and it was accepted. The house sold the same day for %96 of the asking price. End of story!

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