I'm selling my home and I was wondering if anyone had any tips or suggestions on the right kinds of furniture or accessories for getting a house ready to sell. Any help would be appreciated.
I watched an episode of Sell this House recently where they were trying to sell Chastity Bono's house (you know, Sonny and Cher). It was empty because she had already moved to her new place. It had an odd shaped living space and because it was in the Hollywood area, they rented artwork from a local dealer. To bring the old glam back, they had this enormous picture of Marilyn Monroe and it looked great and worked for that particular area and clientele. I didn't care for the furniture they used for the other rooms, but renting artwork had never occurred to me and it made all the difference.
Posts: 182 | Location: North San Diego, CA | Registered: Mar 27, 2007
Yeah, renting or buying artwork (if you can find a good deal on it) may not be a bad idea. I checked out that art collectors site in the post above, I could see hanging a few of their pieces in our living room, maybe even our bedroom.
As far as furniture goes, we tried to remove at least one piece from each room to make it look more spacious. In our bedroom we had lots of mismatched stuff, so we scaled it down to two dressers and one table that matched. We only added furniture in two instances...we added a small table to the kitchen to show it off as "eat in" and we added a chair to our living room to give it more seating (didn't want folks coming through to think to themselves that they could only seat 3 people).
Posts: 416 | Location: Northeast | Registered: Jan 22, 2007
You don't mention if you still have your furniture in your house or not. Do you? If so, I think HopeToSell's advice is dead on. We always have more furniture in the rooms than what is optimum for showing for selling (okay - well I do anyway...). The biggest thing - get all the person stuff out, and all the clutter - the little cool things that you love (it would take me a year to get rid of all my person things...). Make sure your kitchen cabinets are clear on top, and neat inside. I think these are probably more important than having any specific kind of art of furnishings. The house needs to look bright, big and really, really clean....
Posts: 3715 | Location: Northern Virginia, USA | Registered: May 29, 2003
my assumption is going to be that the house is in good repair - no defects or big repairs that need to be made. Decluttering is important - put away the personal stuff. I like watching "Sell this House" because they can make that ugly carpet look good by changing the paint color.....
When we sold the new house we built last year, we had a minimal amount of furniture in the house. The agent thought I had staged the house, but in reality, the furinture was there for us as we had planned to use it as a weekend home. Once the house was listed for sale, I did stage the island with place settings but that was all I did.
All that was in the house was a sofa and chair (living room) and a bed and dresser (guest room). We had two bar stools at the island as well.
Cathy
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Grandchildren are God's gift to you for not killing your own!
We don't stop playing because we grow old...we grow old because we stop playing
Posts: 6661 | Location: Hidden Valley Lake California USA | Registered: Oct 10, 2004
Personally, I've always liked empty houses. Unless a house is exceptionally decorated it is a turn off to me. I'd rather see one empty & immaculate than someone's not so great furnishings. We've almost always sold ours vacant, too.
I've seen five or six houses in open houses and private showings that have all been on the market for over 8 months, which is long for around here. All of them have one thing in common: they were totally empty. I really think most people have a lot of trouble visualizing what goes in a room without some kind of frame of reference. I think I do better at that than most, but even I have trouble looking at an empty bedroom and figuring out if my bed and dresser will fit well in there.
I agree that I'd rather see an empty house than some of the nonempty houses I've seen!
...Renata
Posts: 8 | Location: Rochester NY | Registered: May 09, 2007
I am going crazy trying to find the episode of Designed to Sell which featured Chastity Bono's house. I'm actually curious about the art gallery that they borrowed art from. Does anyone have any information that might help me locate this? Thanks in advance!!
Well, I'm having no luck finding the episode. Does anyone know the name of the art gallery that was featured on this show? It was actually in the artist's home, as I recall. Or can anyone provide the link for this particular episode? I am getting nowhere ...
For anyone who wants art... check out your public library.
If you show your home empty, consider putting a note in each room (maybe on the door). This note should give the dimensions, the purpose of the room, and what furniture will fit. For example: Master bedroom, 16'x18' and will comfortably accommodate a king size bed, night stands, a 6 foot long dresser, and a chair. (Make sure that you are accurate!)
When I was housing hunting I always took a tape measure along, just in case I found something that I really liked. This gave me more information upfront before scheduling another viewing. I was always very happy when the dimensions were available (even with a furnished house) and I didn't have to measure!
Funny story - I went in a home a couple week ago. There was blue painter's tape all over the carpet.
I called the listing agent thinking somebody had been in there messing around.
The Realtor said that she had asked the seller to stage the home so folks could see placement of furniture. The seller replied to her that he would see what he could do...that he was on a budget...
... she went on to say... what he did was spent all day there outlining where his furniture had been situated..with blue tape. I just lost it there right on the spot! (lol)
mimi----when I looked at the video on the site I gave you... there were two paintings in chastity's house. One was a man in a stance (very large picture) the other was Mariyln Monroe in colors(andy worhol style)...which I have seen around alot. I'll go back and find it again and try to get you there. Which one did you like?
I didn't think they actually used the painting that I was curious about in Chastity's house, but maybe they did ... it was the black and white painting of a man in a suit. Maybe that's the man in the stance? I would have guessed it was a musician, and it reminded me of an old Elvis Costello album cover. I was hoping the artist had a web site where I could peruse his work. I know they said his name on the episode, but I simply cannot find the video on the site. I am looking for "Designed to Sell", Episode 79, but the site tells me it doesn't exist. When I look for "Sell this House," I can't find anything whatsoever. (I feel so dumb .... )
... she went on to say... what he did was spent all day there outlining where his furniture had been situated..with blue tape. I just lost it there right on the spot! (lol)
You couldn't make up this stuff, REL! I just lost it reading that story!
Peri - yeah ..too funny .. I lost it too. I've seen everything now in the latest staging techniques! (lol). Really though, that was kind of smart thinking --- had it not looked so bad.. after all.. the guy said he was on a budget! This biz is alot of fun..your have the personality for it...Peri.
To the video question.. the OP was asking-- it wasn't designed to sell --- it was "Sell this house". Maybe that why you are not finding it.
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