This week I have had no staging jobs. As far as I am concerned that is good news. The past year has been a blur of never ending, 24/7 work setting up my business, getting financing, establishing business credit , procuring inventory and finally staging and destaging. Along with the actual work staging has come the marketing with sales presentations to realtors, classes, emails and phone calls.
In my 'downtime' this week I have written several articles on staging to submit to publications, contacted a local paper about a feature on staging, worked on creating real estate home shows, cruised the local MLS to find houses , both occupied and vacant, that have been on the market for over 90 days and have not sold, redone a couple of pages on my website, and drafted an outline for a book on the business aspects of staging."
Predictions for the year to come:
What I concluded was this-----there is a lot of work to be done with staging, that is to say, the market is there and it is ready. In the year to come with economic conditions ,as they are ,that the value of staging will make it mainstream, matter of routine, indispensible aspect of real estate sales.
1. Realtors will seek out stagers as the key marketing tool in their every day practice.
2. Real Estate firms will add stagers as a routine part of their firm's offerings to clients along with other preferred providers. Some (who don't already have a stager in pocket) will hire in-house stagers.
3. Those of us in the field will take on apprentices, or assistants, because increased demand for staging services
4. Furniture rental companies will have to negotiate rental prices with successful stagers to keep their business as will other suppliers of staging accessories and home decorator supplies
5. A greater number of stagers will fall by the way because they didn't have the business basics to support their creative talent and a basic knowledge of how to operate within the current economic reality
6. It will take anyone getting into the staging biz at least a year to get it up and going, maybe 2 years if they have staying power( the ability to keep pushing forward and not let the rejection prevail) and little business guidance
7. The legal aspects of staging contracts will become clearer and more standard and the terms LICENSED, BONDED AND INSURED will be standard
8. Insurers will know what to do with stagers and how to cover them will be more routine
9. Board certifications will come about as need for standardization increases to keep the desired level of quality and professionalism where most think it should be
10. Those of us now on the cutting edge of this great new profession and industry will be the 'gurus' the 'wizened old ones'
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