Is staging worth it?
One of real estate's age old questions is if staging is worth it? And I get it! Staging can be a significant investment. The answer to the question is that it truly varies: varies by marketplace and also the type of home.
In a seller’s market
In a strong seller’s market there is so much demand for a property that full-service staging is usually not necessary. But, because Chicagoland buyers have trended toward move-in ready homes for the past several years, we many times like to use a little virtual staging in the professional photographs of a property. This way buyers can quickly and easily see the potential of a particular room or two. When we do virtual staging, we always print out the photos and bring with us to showings (we attend every showing!), so that buyers can see the potential while in the home.
The good news for Busby Group clients is that virtual staging is not only complimentary, but we also use our own in-house stager for fast turnarounds and highly custom layouts. To help complete a room, Busby Group also owns a curated repertoire of small staging items that we know look great and appeal to buyers.
In a buyer’s market
A slower market may call for full staging depending on the property. We look at potential buyer objections, and decide if staging may help. For example, if we think buyers will have trouble visualizing a dining area, we may stage a dining table and chairs. We also have other tools at our fingertips including floor plan drawing and our professional organizer partnerships.
With floor plans, sometimes we will have specific furniture drawn in to scale so that buyers can see that a queen bed and night stands would fit for example. Or, we may call our professional organizer partner to stop by for a few hours of organizing and editing. Many times they use furniture from around the home, but set up in a way that emphasizes features like size, functionality and utility.
Property dependent
There are also specific types of properties that call for some sort of staging, regardless of the market. If a property is vacant, we may want to stage it in some way for example. Or sometimes we may want to virtually stage the kitchen cabinet color, or show another way to use a room.
The good and bad part of staging is that there is no “one size fits all” answer. We look at each property through the lens of the current marketplace and decide what makes sense. Please contact us with any questions regarding staging!
