Kim Burhart is ready to sell her home in Brentwood’s Governors Club and downsize, but she admits to briefly having had second thoughts after watching her Realtor stage the house.
“I told her I don’t want to move anymore,” Burhart said.
Her Realtor, Kim Day Shacklock, staged every room of the 4,500-square-foot house, a technique that combines decorating skills with psychology in order to make a home more appealing to buyers.
Staging was relatively uncommon in the Nashville region until a few years ago, when the recession heightened competition in the real estate market. These days, many Realtors, including Shacklock, stage every home they list for sale.
“Staging is not decorating. Staging is about preparing a house so a buyer can walk in and imagine themselves living there,” said Shacklock, a Realtor with Bob Parks Realty.
When working with clients like Kim Burhart and her husband, Matt, Shacklock said, she depersonalizes and declutters, removing personal knickknacks and photos so potential buyers won’t feel as if they are intruding in someone else’s space. She also adds artwork, colorful pillows, furnishings and plants.
The results are worth the effort, according to the International Association of Home Staging Professionals. The group’s website, stagedhomes.com, says 95 percent of staged houses sell in 11 days and bring 17 percent more than unstaged homes.
In Middle Tennessee, staged homes typically sell for about 10 percent more than unstaged houses, Shacklock said. That’s less than the national average but still an impressive number, she said.
Even in a hot real estate market, where everyone has heard stories about houses selling so fast that they are never listed on the Multiple Listing Service, staging helps a home compete for attention, said Debra Beagle, a Realtor with the Ashton Group of Re/Max Elite.
“You have to be the prettiest girl at the dance if you want them to pick you,” she said.
Beagle has helped some clients avoid trouble, like the one who painted every room in purple, red and other vivid colors.
“The interior looked like a Crayola box,” she said. “I said, ‘We have to paint.’ That’s all it took, and the house sold.”
The benefits of staging begin long before a buyer walks in the door, said Barbara Webb, a Realtor with Vision Realty Partners in Mt. Juliet.
At least nine out of 10 shoppers begin their home search online on websites such as HomeFinder, the Nashville MLS, Trulia and Zillow. Photos of a staged home are more likely to catch a buyer’s eye, she said.
“Milliseconds. It’s click, click, click, click. That’s how much time you have,” said Webb, who, in addition to working as a Realtor, operates Barbara Webb Home Staging Design and stages homes for other real estate agents. She started the company four years ago.
“Now more than ever, it’s very important,” she said.
Shacklock agreed that making a good impression on the web is crucial.
“That’s where the first showing happens,” she said. “People have hundreds of homes to look at. Do you really want to take that chance” and not stage?
Sellers need to remember that their home is competing with every other house on the market, said home stager Angela Ewing. Her staging and design company, Prix de Solde, has been staging homes for 18 years.
“With all the competition in the market, with all the new builds, what can you do to get a leg up? If you’re not staging, you’re at a disadvantage,” Ewing said.
Kim Burhart, who loves the way staging made her home look, expects buyers to love it, too.
“Staging made our home more visually appealing, so someone coming in could see it as their own,” she said.
Reach Bill Lewis at 615-262-5862 or at wlewis77229@comcast.net.