Nicole Solari, a broker in Northern California with The Solari Group, wrote a funny, interesting article recently that I wanted to share below. This version has been slightly edited for length, and includes my own commentary at the end. Enjoy!
Most of us are reasonably familiar with the litany of woes sellers and buyers typically experience. One of my agents, however, is getting an all-too-real refresher course in the twists and turns of selling a personal residence when it’s fully staged.
We accidentally created a manual on exactly how to pull of something spectacularly awful as living in a staged home while it’s actively being shown. So, if you find yourself advising sellers how they should cope with living in a staged house while it’s actively being shown, suggest these 10 survival skills to them:
Leave for the first few days the listing is active.
The best way to cope with living in a staged house is to put off doing it for as long as possible. Not everyone can afford this expense, but, at a minimum, a nice long weekend away seems to be worth the cost!
Stop thinking of staying in a staged house as living. It’s not. It’s camping.
Have realistic expectations to make the temporary inconvenience more bearable. Think of the extended stay as a camping trip, so it will be more tolerable. It’s a relatively accurate description of the “lifestyle” anyway.
Establish sensible advance-notice periods to insert in the showing instructions.
The agent needs to guide the discussion regarding how much advance notice sellers need to prep the property and vanish with kids and pets in tow. Giving two hours notice before a showing seems reasonable to most buyers and agents, and most often give more.
Don’t do anything that spatters, like cooking. Or eating.
Sellers shouldn’t use the oven. They shouldn’t microwave anything potentially explosive. And, they most certainly shouldn’t fry anything unless they’re prepared to wash down the stove and everything surrounding it immediately after use. When dining in, the menu should be limited to salads (as long as dressing spatters are rigorously prevented), sandwiches and other things that aren’t messy, such as takeout. Ideally, they’d just eat at restaurants or directly over the kitchen sink.
Shower at the gym, and have a hairdresser on speed dial.
Sellers want to be clean and buyers want to see a flawless home. Having a shower in showing condition means cleaning and its surrounding glass relentlessly and hand drying it every time it’s used. However, the gym shower is much more simple!
Keep necessities in easily hidden bags or covered containers in every spot necessary.
Although I would never look under the bed, my seller assures me, if I did, I would find the bathrooms scale, a box of makeup, a bag containing soap, toothpaste, and floss, dog toys, a bag of allergy medications, and a set of pajamas. All I can say is thank goodness (and our stagers!) for bed skirts.
Give in to an obsessive need to clean, tidy and touch-up paint.
There’s nothing like having to get a property ready to show multiple times to focus a seller’s attention on minute details, and that’s good because buyers see everything. Suggest sellers keep cleaning supplies, garden gloves and tools, trim and wall paint, and brushes together in an easily accessible – but hidden – spot.
Protect the stager’s furnishings against every weird mishap conceivable.
If a seller soils or damages a rug, piece of furniture, lamp or perfect accessory, the loss to the stager is more profound than most sellers realize. The cost to replace an item is often significant, plus it can be difficult to locate a replica of the spoiled item, especially if it’s a unique size or style. It pays to protect them! So, sellers should plan to live like monks. They should try not to walk on the rugs or eat or drink near anything that’s not theirs.
Do NOT change the dog’s diet or routine.
Even with the best coping skills, sellers are stressed. And their pets (as well as kids) are double so. Nothing is as it usually is. And sellers’ little ones are involuntary conscripts in this process. So, sellers need to keep as much of their routine intact as humanly possible. And, whatever they do, urge them NOT to try a new dog food while they’re living on someone else’s rugs!
Hire a cleaning service.
The constant wiping, cleaning, and tidying soon gets to every seller. If they can afford it, hiring a professional cleaning service to come in on a regular basis is respite care for stressed-out sellers. You’d be amazed at what a memorable and welcome gift that can be.
It might seem a little overboard, but their are agents out there that will suggest all these things. I am more of a middle of the road. Get the house looking stellar, take professional pictures and then keep it as tidy as possible. Having a caddy that goes under the sink with all your shower and morning routine items is just fine. Many people go away the first weekend of an Open House and if you have kids, that adds a whole different dimension of keeping a place tidy. Just picking up the toys and putting them in a basket may just suffice.
