Staging home for sale
Over the last few years the concept of home staging has changed the way we sell our properties. This is mainly due to the TV shows that have allowed most people to realise that one person's décor style might be another's nightmare.
Your home is the place where you live, relax and display your collections of objects, memories & styles that reflect and inspire you. When you decide to sell your house it is perfectly natural that you just want to move on and are not interested in redecorating or spending more money on your current property. However, the home you no longer want has to be to be wanted by someone else. So you have to think about presenting your home in a way that appeals to the average buyer. When it comes to styling our home, we are actually quite individualistic in our choice of decoration - so you must not believe that your favourite decor style will appeal to others. Unless your house needs complete remodelling, most buyers look for a clean & airy space that has a neutral style - a place that they can move into and later stamp their own personality.
Home staging principles
In order to attract more interest (and hopefully higher returns), a process of depersonalising, restyling or just refreshing should be applied to your property to make it appealing to more buyers. Sometimes this only requires subtle enhancing or reworking of existing spaces - de-cluttering rooms, rearranging some furniture, adding a few chic elements and so on.
Bear in mind that a newly decorated home is more attractive to everyone - it looks good, it smells fresh and it sells your house much faster. It costs very little to do a good spring-clean, to clear the clutter, to update a few pieces of furniture and to put away personal stuff. Dated paintwork can easily be freshened up, while strong colour & design schemes should be toned down and neutralised. This might sound boring, but remember, your aim is not to make a style statement - it's to sell your property quickly and for the optimum price. You might need to borrow or hire some decorating props to create the “buy-me” factor. If you've already found a new property to move to, you could buy some furniture & decorating accessories with your new home in mind.
Sometimes more extensive improvements or refurbishments are needed, such as fitting new kitchen units, appliances, bathroom-suites, flooring etc. In some cases, rearranging spaces or complete redecoration can make very good financial sense. In most scenarios, any money or time spent on preparing a property for sale is well worth it in terms of return.
If you're unsure about staging your home for sale and need a professional interior designer's advice to get the maximum benefit from your sell, read more about our home staging consultancy service.
Staging home for letting
Decorating properties to let is very different to decorating your own home. To attract the most interest from potential tenants many issues need to be considered: easy maintenance, stylish but not precious furnishing, simple lines, clean colours and sensible materials. ForLook can design a feasible scheme for your property to let that will look stylish and inviting but not cost you too much. We can offer a one-off consultancy or a full service where we redesign and redecorate the property to appeal to appropriate tenants. A “refreshing” design service between tenancies is also available.
Read more about our home staging services.
See some home staging tips and ideas or discuss them in our interior design blog.