The first impression is often the most important, not only with people, but also with homes. When you’ve put your home on the market, one of your main priorities is to make it as appealing as possible. A vibrant, inviting home allows you to increase the sale price, and hopefully find a quick buyer.
To improve the odds of this, many sellers will complete home staging: a process where they add and take things away from their home to make it more attractive to prospective buyers. But who puts the staging together, and what are the cost expectations behind that process?
Central Self Storage has created this guide to tackle these questions for you. Whether you’re in the midst of selling your home, or you plan to disembark on that journey soon, you’ll know what to expect should you choose to stage.
What is Home Staging?
Home staging is the act of setting up a home to be presentable during the window of time that it’s on the market. Generally, inquiring buyers will want a feel of the place before they commit to spending a lot of money. They want to know what it’s like to be in the space they might call home and if it’s entirely empty or in disarray, that can leave a sour impression.
This is the same principle used in apartments, and why most complexes will have a ‘model’ apartment outfitted with furniture, decorations, and other things that make it feel like a place that’s lived in. This makes it easier for the buyer to imagine what it will be like once all of their belongings and furniture are moved in.
Who Pays for Home Staging?
The most understandable question now is, “who takes care of this?” However, this question has a variety of answers. It almost always boils down to the home seller needing to foot the bill, but the route taken to that point isn’t always a straight line.
Method 1
The most straightforward method is for the seller to pay for the home staging upfront. Realtor surveys of clients have consistently indicated an impressive return on investment for home staging, for many years. In light of this, many sellers are willing to accept the immediate cost for the investment, as they have the most to gain out of the exchange.
Method 2
The real estate agent can also pay for staging. More precisely, they will pay for a limited consultation window (usually two hours) as a gift. If the sellers want any consultation beyond that, they’ll need to cover the additional service.
Method 3
A concierge service, usually through one’s own business or a company in the vein of Zoom Casa, is a good way to defer all the staging costs, at least until the house is closed upon. Do your research into the different concierge services before committing, so you know exactly what advantages you have in each.
Method 4
There’s another method that involves the real estate agent and the home seller splitting the cost (and the returns) in half. From the realtor’s perspective, this can act as a show of faith that they are confident the home will sell well, and in a reasonable time period.
How Much Does Home Staging Cost?
With so many variables, there isn’t a hard and fast rule to this. The cost for staging a home is subject to change based on the amount of space, the location, etc. For example, home staging in Austin, TX may be a bit higher than places surrounding it because of its growing popularity and population numbers. However, there is a basic range you can expect to pay. The initial design consultation usually bottoms-out at $300, and can go up to $600, with each additional room costing $500-$600 per month.
That sounds like it could rack up really quickly, right? It could, but fortunately the strength of staging a home lies in how quickly it gets you from the show to the paperwork. On average, a staged home sells up to 88% faster than non-staged homes, with some slight variation accounted for based on the parameters mentioned above. Because of this, chances are you won’t be biting off a large fee each month to keep your staging active, because hopefully you’ll already be on your way to the closing table by then.
Who Can Help Find You That Extra Space?
Home staging is what can make the difference between an easy sell, and a long, drawn-out one. It can be a delicate process, because as important as it can be to add fresh new furniture into the living room, it’s just as important that you take some things away to create a greater sense of balance and space.
In these instances, Central Self Storage has the solution, and space, you need. We have a variety of storage unit sizes available to accommodate anything you’d need to store, for however long you need to store it. A long-term contract isn’t necessary with our month-to-month leasing options.
Stop by your nearest Central Self Storage location or give our storage experts a call to get started on this process today!
