Selling Your Pittsburgh, PA Home? Maximize Your Red Carpet Moment



Will your house be Red Carpet Ready?

 
Did you catch the recent Grammy Awards? Better yet did you watch the crucial and often more entertaining Red Carpet appearances of the celebs?  Now that is an interesting show!


Whether you liked the ensemble each “star” put together, you can rest assured that most of them put a lot of time, effort, and money into making the most of their few seconds in the spotlight.

And when you sell your home, you need to think along a similar line; the time when you first hit the market is your home’s Red Carpet Moment. You and your home better be well prepared to make the most of your crucial first impression. Just like the stars only get one shot at making their big entrance, your home only gets one chance to be a “fresh on the market” listing.

And this is the time to “WOW!” potential buyers. Think about it. If a buyer goes through your home online or in person and loves your house AND knows you just hit the market—they will be very concerned that they get an offer made before someone else snatches you up.

So if your goal is to sell your home quickly and for the highest possible price, you need to invest time, effort, and money into properly preparing for a successful sale. Expert advice from a Home Staging professional is the most effective way to ensure that your home makes the best first impression during those crucial first weeks on the market.  And it one of the few investments today that will pay for itself many times over!

So follow your Home Stager’s expert advice and avoid an embarrassing and costly Red Carpet Moment. Be the “star” home that impresses the buyers as soon as you hit the market and you will be the one taking home the Grammy-Solid Gold Offer!

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Looking to sell your house in the Pittsburgh, PA area successfully? Feels Like Home Interiors helps you maximize your home's potential. Please contact us at mary@feelslikehomeinteriors.com for more information.

Feels Like Home Interiors Nominated for 2011 RESA Rookie Stager of the Year for the Northeast Region

I am so excited and honored to announce that I have been nominated as a finalist for the 2011 Real Estate Staging Association™ (RESA®) Rookie Stager of the Year™ for the Northeast Region. 
Home Stagers from all across North America submitted before and after photos of their work to be considered for this award and then the membership voted to determine the finalists for each region.  The finalists will be judged by a panel of industry professionals and the winners will be announced at the upcoming RESA Home Staging International Conference in January in Las Vegas. 

I am thrilled and incredibly honored to be named as a finalist for this award.  And I am very excited to be heading to Vegas for the RESA Conference in January!

Another Rave Review for Feels Like Home Interiors Staging Services

Another Rave Review for Feels Like Home Interiors

I'm always delighted to hear from my clients how our home staging services helped them.  I just received this from Meryl Neiman, REALTOR® with Howard Hanna in their Squirrel Hill Office: 

"It has been a pleasure working with Mary to help my clients sell their home. Although their house was already in good condition, Mary's suggestions made the property truly stand out in a competitive market. She has a wonderful eye for detail and a genuine knack for knowing what buyers are looking for in a home.


My clients want advice that is concrete, practical, and easy to implement. Mary is on the mark in all these areas and she is very budget conscious as well, which everyone appreciates. I was so impressed with Mary and the impact her advice had on the presentation of my clients' home that I decided to offer her Strategy Session free to all my sellers. In today's market, buyers want homes that are move-in ready and HGTV pretty. I would not hesitate to recommend Mary to help your home shine."

~ Meryl Neiman, Howard Hanna, Squirrel Hill Office
   http://www.picturingpittsburgh.com/

Professional Staging Advice ~ A Smart Way to Avoid Costly Price Reductions When Selling Your Home

The number of homes for sale making price reductions has increased for the third month in row to 26% according to statistics just released by Trulia.com and reported in REALTOR® Magazine.   This news is not too surprising given the current market conditions.  But you can help avoid becoming part of this undesirable statistic. 

What is an important way to help avoid having to make costly price reductions when selling your home?  Of course your house needs to be properly priced to begin with and your Realtor® will be a huge source of advice on that decision.  And, in addition to proper pricing, it is essential that you make sure your home is properly prepared for sale so that it presents as well as possible to potential buyers. 

What is the best way to make sure your house maximizes its potential when selling?  Get advice and assistance from a home staging professional.  A home staging expert will help you take a fresh look at your home through the buyer's eyes.  A stager's goal is to help you sell in the least time for the highest possible price.  How great to have someone in your corner wanting to make you money and reduce your stress level. 
 
Want to get the biggest bang for your staging investment?  Consult with a Home Staging Expert before your house hits the market.  Remember, you only get one chance to be a fresh listing.  When buyers view a home that is "move-in ready" and makes an emotional connection with them, they will be more motivated to act.  They will be concerned that other buyers will likely be making solid offers on this hot new listing and they will be motivated to move quickly to make your house their home. 

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Looking to sell your house in the Pittsburgh, PA area successfully? Feels Like Home Interiors helps you maximize your home's potential. For more information, contact us at mary@feelslikehomeinteriors.com .

Dining Room Do Over

Take a look at the original MLS photo for this formal dining room.  This space has some terrific features like its size, a tray ceiling, great windows, but they are not being highlighted enough for buyers to notice them.  Also there are items in this photo that distract a buyer including an electric wheel chair and a stuffed bunny. 

 

Simple changes made a huge difference in the appeal of a room.  For a formal dining room make sure the lighting is up to date, the walls have a nice neutral fresh coat of paint, and that you create an inviting setting.  Also, taking the photo from the best angle to highlight the features works wonders as well. 

Now thanks to a few simple and inexpensive changes, this is an updated dining room where buyers can picture themselves enjoying holiday meals and entertaining friends. 

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Looking to sell your house in the Pittsburgh, PA area successfully? Feels Like Home Interiors helps you maximize your home's potential.  For more information, contact us at mary@feelslikehomeinteriors.com .

Feels Like Home Interiors Featured in Whirl@HOME Article on Staging

So excited to have been interviewed by Jessie Cadle for a recent article ~ Set the Stage in the fall issue of Whirl@HOME, a new Pittsburgh area magazine. In the article, several Pittsburgh professional stagers share excellent suggestions for preparing a house for a successful sale.  Feels Like Home Interiors explains the importance of the "bling factor" (think hardware, lighting, fixtures) as a wise investment when wanting to make a home appeal to potential buyers.  The article even includes before and after photos of one of our kitchen transformations. 

 

Sooner or Later? A Key Question for Savvy Sellers

Lately, I have been working with a number of clients who decided to seek my professional staging advice--AFTER a stretch of time on the market with no offers and little interest. 

I am happy to work with these smart sellers and Realtors(r) who now understand first hand that they need to package their home properly for a successful sale. We make key changes to the interior and exterior of the home that result in an increase of traffic and finally some genuine interest from buyers.

But I always wish they had called me sooner--long BEFORE the house hit the market.

Why?

Because despite the fact that the changes we make will do great things to help their home appeal to buyers, they can never get those crucial first weeks as a fresh listing back again. Savvy sellers will always get the biggest bang for their staging investment by properly preparing the home BEFORE they list their house.

Sellers often tell me they want to “test the waters” first and if they don’t sell, then they will call me for a Stage to Sell! Strategy Session. But this is a very costly decision by the seller. By the time they realize their “test the waters” strategy isn’t going to work, they have usually have had to drop their price once or twice by many thousands of dollars.

You only get one chance to be a fresh listing on the market. Be smart and invest wisely with both your time and your money in order to assure that you take full advantage of your house’s big debut.
 
 

 

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Looking to sell your house successfully?  Feels Like Home Interiors helps you maximize your home's potential.   For more information, contact us at mary@feelslikehomeinteriors.com.

Real Estate Staging Association Releases 2009 Staging Stats

The Real Estate Staging Association's (RESA) 2009 Home Staging Statistics Report

126 vacant and occupied homes previously on the market sat on average 263 days unsold--this is about 9 months! Those same homes were professionally staged and sold in an average of 60 days ~ 78% less time on the market after staging!

284 vacant and occupied homes that were staged before they went on the market ~ sold in just 40.5 days on average with staging--significantly quicker than the 9 months plus average for unstaged properties.

Professional Home Staging continues to be one of the smartest investments a savvy home seller can make!

Download the complete RESA report here.

Pittsburgh PA Home Selling Strategy—Start Now to Sell Well

Every year, more savvy home sellers are seeing the value in properly preparing their homes for a sale, yet just about as many are still confused about when is the ideal time to start getting their home ready for a successful sale. If you hope to be a seller who sells quickly and for the best possible price, then “the sooner the better!” should be your home preparation mantra.

If you are fortunate enough to know that you may be moving in the next year or even in the next two years, there are many tasks that you should start on now that will help you be ready when listing day arrives and at the same time keep the prep process manageable. You may think this seems ridiculously early to be getting ready to sell, but it is not.

The process of getting the home you are living in expertly prepared for success on the market takes a good bit of planning and time. While it can be accomplished with Herculean effort in a shorter period when need be, the best scenario is to be able to break the preparation process down into manageable steps and slowly work away at the steps. Decluttering, depersonalizing, painting, updating, rearranging, sprucing up of curb appeal/outdoor spaces, and other tasks take time to be done well. Making your the most desirable one in your price range is what will bring in quick and strong offers.

So how do you know where to start and what needs to be done? You’ve likely been living in this home for a while now, and it can be difficult to figure out what will be the best way to appeal to the broadest range of buyers. You will benefit hugely by getting expert advice on how to most effectively and efficiently spend your time and budget on getting your home ready for a successful sale. This is why now, several months or even a year or more before you plan to be on the market, is the ideal time to call a professional home stager and set up a strategy session to figure out your game plan for preparing your home to sell well.

Bang for your Buck—Savvy Sellers are Smart Investors

A home staging consultation or strategy session costs only a few hundred dollars and then many smart sellers invest a bit more and bring their stager back in to help with the finishing touches shortly before their house hits the market. And the statistics show that if it is staged before listing, your home will likely sell for 7% to 11% more than it would if you had not staged it to sell.

Let’s crunch the numbers. Let’s say your house would list and sell (eventually) for $300,000 without staging. But being the savvy seller you are, you invest $1000 in a staging consultation and then some finishing touch staging and a $1000 in materials to update your house. Now you sell your home in a short time for between $321,000 and $333,000. So you invested $2000 and some time and elbow grease in preparing your home to sell. And now you walk away with between $21,000 and $33,000 more in equity—a 1050% to 1650% return for your $2000 investment! Not to mention a quick and painless sale.

“Good fortune is what happens when opportunity meets with planning.”
~Thomas Edison

Plan and prepare now to ensure your good fortune when you sell your house!

Top 10 Reasons Home Staging Pays Off for Savvy Pittsburgh PA Realtors--#7: Staging Brings You Referral Business

Your “ideal” new listing client—one that is excited to list with you because you have been highly recommended to them by someone whose opinion they value and trust.

What is one great source of these “dream” listing clients? Home Staging can generate this “ideal” referral business for you.

Here are three key ways:

· If you are assisting your current listing clients in getting professional home staging help as they prepare their home for the market, these clients will likely be delighted with both your efforts and their resulting quick sale for a good price. These clients will be happily passing your name onto their friends and family.

· People looking at listings are often ones who will soon be selling their home. If your listings are well-staged, these potential listing clients will be impressed with how well your listings show and be more likely to seek you out when they need a listing agent.

· Stagers who know you value staging and the presentation of your properties will recommend you. As staging has become more common in the preparation process, homeowners are using a home stager before they contact a realtor. And these savvy sellers often ask their home stager to recommend a good realtor who will do an excellent job of marketing their property. The stagers you have a strong working relationship with will refer their clients to you.

So clearly, making a professional home stager part of your strategy for preparing and marketing your properties can ultimately bring you referred business. And many of these referred listings will be your “dream” clients—ones that understand the value of preparing their homes before they hit the MLS.

Our Latest Staging Transformation

MLS Photos--Shoot For Quantity AND Quality

According to a July 2008 study by Point2 Technologies, online home shoppers turn away from listings with no or few photos and spend their time viewing the listings with the most MLS photos.

This study found that listings with no photos had the worst results, getting only a .02 percent of the detailed listing views that the 21 or more photo listings received. The study also indicated that listings with 21 or more pictures received 55 times the number of page views, 27 times the amount of interest and 898 the number of leads as a listing with no pictures.

According to Carey Tufts, Director of Marketing for Point2 Technologies, “Once again the data indicates that online home shoppers want rich content, specifically in the form of more photos, otherwise they tend to move on to the next listing. Especially in today’s market, home sellers and their agents do not have to take this risk. The data sends a powerful message. With more than 80 percent of home buyers continuing to do their research online, agents must attach more photos to their listings for them to stand out and attract more potential buyers.”

While this study makes a strong case for listing agents to increase the number of photos they use with their listings in order to attract interest, it does not address the importance of the quality of all these photos. Clearly, online interest is not enough; sellers need that interest to result in showings and offers. While more photos may bring an increase in views from an online shopper, quality of the staging of the home and the photos themselves will lead to showings and ultimately, offers.

So definitely put more photos with your listings, but make sure the photos do an excellent job of captivating a potential buyer's further interest and helping them make an emotional connection to the home. This means each photo must show an area that is well-staged highlighting the space’s function, flow, and features. And each picture should be taken from the ideal vantage point with the best lighting and then properly finished using a good photo editing program such as www.picnik.com/ .

When it comes to MLS photos helping you get to SOLD, both quantity AND quality will be crucial in generating showings and offers. What's a great way to ensure your photos will have the best impact on prospective home buyers? Enlist the services of a Professional Home Stager to help you get your home show-ready before it hits on the market. The investment in home staging will result in a home that shows well both online and in person.

See the graph below for the detailed results of the Point2 Technologies Study. Click here to read the complete study.

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A savvy seller or realtor looking for expert assistance getting a property ready to show to its best potential? Please visit the Feels Like Home Interiors website or call Mary at (724) 884-7148 to find out more about how she can make a difference for your home or listings.

Bright Idea -- Go Dimmer!

Want an easy, affordable way to improve the lighting in your home? Go dimmer!

Yes, I know you need to have enough lighting from various sources in order to proper illuminate your space. But the sources and quantity of lighting are only part of the answer to creating a warm and inviting atmosphere in your home. Lighting that is too harsh can be a problem just as much as not enough light. Being able to control the light adds greatly to the mood you can set in a space.

A simple dimmer switch costs less than $15 and can be easily installed in just a few minutes using some basic tools. Check out this video from about.com for a short tutorial on how you can install dimmer switches yourself. Make sure you choose the right dimmer for your needs because they vary based on the number of switches you have connected to the light source you want to control.

Take control of the lighting in your home with the simple, affordable addition of dimmer switches throughout your home. Whether you're having a romantic dinner for two, hosting a dinner party, relaxing by the fire, or playing a board game with the kids, you will enjoy being able to adjust the level of light in order to create the mood best suited to your activity. Once you go "dimmer", you'll never go back!

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Mary Fasnacht of Feels Like Home Interiors helps home owners in Washington County, PA and the surrounding Pittsburgh area with their home staging and interior redesign needs. Her Stage to Sell services help sellers prepare their homes to make the best possible impression in today's challenging market. Her Stage to Stay services offer home owners an easy, affordable way to refresh and revitalize their homes. Please visit her website or call her at (724) 884-7148 to find out more about how she can make a difference for your home or listings.

"You had me at hello"--Will Your Home Get the 8.2 Second Look?

Did you know that according to a recent study when a man gazes at a woman for 8.2 seconds or more the first time he sees her, he rates that woman as highly attractive--raising the odds of love at first sight? And on the other end of the spectrum, if the man's gaze lasts for 4.5 seconds or less, it means that the man is not interested in that woman and indicates he did not consider her good-looking enough.

Think a similar theory holds true for prospective buyers checking out your house? Absolutely! Whether it's 10 seconds, 13 seconds or 22 seconds, real estate experts agree you have a very short time to captivate potential buyers and entice them to keep looking. Before the rise of the internet as the primary first search avenue for home buyers, you could focus on your curb appeal to get a prospective buyer in the door. But now that more than 85% of prospective buyers start their home search online, curb appeal is only one part of the complete package you need to sell your house for best price and in the shortest time possible.

The "attractiveness" of your home must be clearly evident in the photos and virtual tour that constitute most buyers' first look at your home if you want to make sure it isn't their last. In a matter of less than 30 seconds, a prospective buyer can view each room of your home and decide whether your home makes the cut or not. If the buyer is looking at your listing, it most likely already meets their basic criteria (location, price, number of bedrooms and bathrooms, etc.). But those characteristics alone will not be enough to ensure your property makes their "must see!" list. Your home will need to make an emotional connection with your prospective buyer, allowing them to see how they can live comfortably and happily in your home.

So what's the most effective way to ensure you're making the most of your home's potential appeal? Investing in professional staging will help you significantly increase the "attractiveness" factor of your property. By helping you highlight your home's best features, maximize the flow through the space, depict each area's function clearly, and evoke a good connection emotionally, a professional stager's assistance will turn your home into a showplace that will captivate your potential buyers both online and in person.

So will your home rate the "8.2 second look"? Make the most of your home's brief opportunity to make that first impression--love at first sight. And that will give you the best chance for a lasting relationship--an accepted offer from a buyer thrilled to be making your house their home. Stage your home to its best potential and your buyer will be thrilled to say, "Oh, yes, you had me at hello!"

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Mary Fasnacht of Feels Like Home Interiors helps home sellers in Washington County, PA and the surrounding Pittsburgh area prepare their homes to make the best possible impression in today's challenging market. Please visit her website or call her at (724) 884-7148 to find out more about how she can make a difference for your home or listings .

To read more about this new male/female attractiveness study go to the March 25, 2009 article by Elena Gorgan, Life and Style editor for Softpedia.