How to Stage Your Denver Home When Selling

If you’re thinking of selling your Denver home the most important thing you can

do aside from selecting an experienced real estate specialist is to properly stage

your home for sale.

Staging your Denver home for sale means making sure that your home’s best assets ‘pop’ so that a potential buyer sees them right away. After all, if a buyer has to search for the potential in your home they may just pass on it. Here are a few tips that will help you to stage and style your home to sell quickly.

Make Sure Your Home has Curb Appeal

You want to do all that you can to boost the curb appeal of your home.  Sure, you have heard this a thousand times, but do you really know what it means? Curb appeal means that when people take a look at your home from outside, the home is attractive and inviting. The fact is people are most likely to drive by the home, sometimes more than once, before they ever take a look inside. This is where staging can make a difference.

Cleaning from the Outside In

We all know that first impressions are the most important.  This is especially true when staging your home for sale in Denver. You will want to power wash the walkways, siding and so forth. Be sure that the house numbers are visible, clean, and easy to read. Fresh greenery and flowers in bloom are always a nice touch if they match the exterior décor.

The yard should be manicured and clean. Sod can be added as needed to keep curb appeal up. Windows should be maintained and sparkling clean for as long as the home is on the market. Pay special attention to the front windows. Finally, the entryway must say “welcome home” to those potential buyers visiting. Make sure that your outside lights are on in the evening times in case a potential buyer comes through. Illuminating lights aligning the walkway is also a good idea generally.

De-clutter your Home Before Showing it

This is very important as it sets the tone for a potential buyer’s visit. The goal is to maximize a feeling of openness and space so that a potential buyer can see themselves living there.  Clutter needs to be thrown or packed away and moved out of the home. A storage unit may come in handy, because if you are like most, you likely have at least one room with extra furniture that just doesn’t match the rest of the room.  The floors should be clear of anything unnecessary, with the cabinets and walls minimally decorated. The goal is to really maximize open floor space so that a potential buyer “feels” that your rooms are spacious.

While you are still living in the home keeping a showroom appearance may be tough, and that is ok. A balance is healthy. Small touches like flowers, your favorite vases and using decorative (or fresh) fruits on the counter are all good rules of thumb.

While you are at it, keep that dining room table fully set. It should be as inviting as it would be for a holiday feast, but not too formal.

In your bedrooms, you’ll want to ensure that the décor and colors are as neutral as possible. One of the toughest areas to de-clutter is the master bedroom as it has most of your day-to-day personal items and often many of your valuables too. Ideally, all of your valuables are moved to a safe deposit box in your bank. Another option is to move all of your valuable possessions (ie. jewelry) and personal items to a spare suitcase and lock that anytime you leave the home (you never know when someone will visit your house if its listed on the MLS and your agent has put a lockbox on the front door). Of course, you’ll need to keep the linens fresh in all of your bedrooms, and reduce artwork to a few contemporary pieces.

When there is a scheduled viewing or open house it’s a good idea to keep the closets open, but you’ll want to free up at least 30% of the closet space for potential buyers to really appreciate the size of the closet.

In the bathrooms you want to be sure that you have well hidden all personal accents other than things that are both pristine and appropriate.  Even the soap should be clean and fresh. Everything should be looked at as if you were a visitor.

If you have an upper floor placing an eye catching piece just at the top of the stairs may help entice your potential buyer to view the entire house rather than leaving after just looking at the first floor. You do want to add a pop of color or an interesting piece of art here and there to keep visitor’s interest throughout the tour. If you have areas that are a bit awkward like room under the stairs or a nook then find a unique way to showcase that area. An office area or built in shelves could turn that once awkward area into the homes biggest selling point.

A very important item if you have pets is to eliminate pet odors as much as possible.  There are numerous sprays and air fresheners that do this and you’ll have to ensure its done daily. The goal is to must remain vigilant in keeping everything picked up, odor free and clean.

Remember, staging your home to sell is really important, and it should not be taken lightly. The sooner you address this the better as it really is time-consuming and requires planning. Buyers will examine your Denver home from every angle, so make sure that your home is inviting and appealing from top to bottom, inside and out.

If you’re thinking of selling your Denver home and don’t know where to start in staging your home, please contact me today. I can provide you with expert advice after visiting with you or if you’d like the help of professionals, I can refer you to local staging experts we’ve worked with in the past.

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Looking back over a 10-year period of October 2005 to October 2015, the year-to-date residential market has experienced a 28 percent increase in price appreciation.

According to the October MLS, 5,407 new listings came on the market, while 4,792 homes were placed under contract and 4,332 homes sold and closed. The month closed out with 7,156 active listings – representing a 4.79 percent decrease over the previous month, and six percent more properties than what was available in October 2014. Additionally, homes under contract decreased by one percent, sold listings decreased 16 percent and the total sales volume dropped 14 percent to $1.57 billion from the previous month.

The single family home market saw a seasonal decrease of nine percent in new listings month over month, while the average and median sold prices increased slightly from the previous month at 1.68 percent to $403,795 and 1.76 percent to $346,000 respectively.

The condo market showed the supply of new listings dropped 3.5 percent over the previous month, while the average sold prices ticked up ever-so-slightly by four percent to $263,362 and the median price increased 1.54 percent to $214,500.

-information provided by DMAR