I made a comment in another post that bachelors are my favorite clients. I think I want to clarify that. While the men are my favorite clients because they are so sweetly clueless, and so very appreciative of what I can do for them, their homes are definitely not my favorite projects! The staging my daughter and I did this Saturday was a perfect example of why I feel this way.
The agent paid for two hours of staging. Although it was better than nothing, it was like putting a band-aid on a 
broken leg. The homeowner was a 25 year old welder, and he shares the home with a buddy who works for a plumbing company. Here are just a few of the highlights this home had to offer:
- Have you ever seen a coffee table painted with flames and exhaust pipes for legs? Well, now I have.
- Everything on the walls was booze related, from neon signs to mirrors.
- Literally, the only light source in the downstairs was a beer lamp.
- We had the company of a Doberman named Sergeant, who just minutes before we arrived (this is according to the owner) got into some mud and ran through the home leaving paw-prints everywhere.
- The dining room table was massive (perhaps a good playing field for beer pong) but the only chairs were two bar stools.
- Every window in the house had closed blinds or shutters (for good reason)
- The kitchen had the wickedest knife collection I have ever seen, stuck to a strip of magnet on the wall.
- Even the kitchen had an electric Molson sign on the wall.
- Though most of the downstairs was painted tans and burgundy, the half bath was blood red! And yes, this was off a burgundy hallway. I wish you could have seen my daughter's face when she stepped in and turned the light on (no window either!) We half expected to see a chalk outline on the floor.
- We finally got enough nerve to go upstairs (the owner was home but out in the yard building a massive cage for Sergeant, so he wouldn't eat buyers) and the master bedroom was so stereotypical, we had to laugh. King sized bed with no headboard, black satin sheets, and a snack tray as a nightstand, complete with candles and lotions from someplace called slumberparty.com! The walls were painted dark gray, and the closet doors were mirrored, so everything was multiplied! Three more booze signs on the walls, a weight bench covered in dirty clothes, and the dog's crate completed the decor.
- We were not permitted in the roommate's bedroom, because "he had black walls, and he's painting them". But, we did see a paint tray in the third bedroom with very dark brown paint (big improvement), and I really don't think we wanted to see that room anyway!
We spent our two hours opening blinds, moving furniture, taking down all the booze art, clearing off the counters, and making notes to the homeowner suggesting things like repaint the half bath! And then we experienced something you only see on the staging and redesign TV shows...we found really nice artwork hidden in the basement, including a very cool wall clock, which I offered to buy after the home sells.
So, we covered all the screws with our new found treasures, threw the tennis ball one last time to Sergeant, and headed home. I think my daughter enjoyed the afternoon (did I mention that these guys were cute?) and I felt pretty good about what we accomplished, though I did feel a need to shower when I got home.
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