Yes, Stagers love a large budget—rental furniture and accessories selected just for that house but….There are clients who need our help and have no budget for staging and we can still improve the looks of their house with a change in furniture placement, clutter control and more lighting. Personally, I love that challenge and this house in Sussex County, NJ provided that.
The room to the right was called the Living
Room. It was the first room you walked into. The REA hired House Dressing to come see what could be done—I suggested we change the name and purpose of this room to the entryway because there was another living space and this room had neither the space nor the furniture to be considered a Living Room. The agent, her colleague and I went to work—we took the hutch apart, took the shot glass collection off the mirror and started moving furniture. The agents cleaned and dusted as we went.
We moved onto the Family Room—a nice large room but you missed the fireplace and it felt gloomy.
We threw open the windows and rolled up the shades and tackled the clutter and congestion in this room. The furniture placement made it difficult to move through the room and didn’t show off how large a space it really is.
The homeowner had been resistant to bringing in a stager—a relative is a REA and told her it was an unnecessary expense. When we arrived she left to run an errand—she returned an hour later and was amazed to see the changes we had made.
Although her agent had hired me, the homeowner decided to pay me. The open house the next day had more interest than there had been in the previous year of having the house on the market.
Could I have done more with a bigger budget?
Of course, but in these times homeowners are often in distress and money is tight. Luckily for this house, the listing agent “gets it” and is willing to team with House Dressing to give the house its best chance on the market.
Even with a small budget Stagers can still make a house shine and help the homeowner move on to the next phase of their lives.
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