Staging to Sell

Home staging strategies needed to succeed in a down market Whether a buyer, seller, or real estate agent, the home selling and purchasing process is fraught with potholes that can usually be overcome. But in this weakened housing market, everyone involved in the selling process must increase their efforts. In order to sell homes at top dollar, houses must be "prepared for sales." That’s where Staging comes in. The real estate mantra is no longer location, location, location. It is now Staging, Staging, Staging! It’s all about presentation. In Staging to Sell, Barb Schwarz, The Creator of Home Staging®, offers her winning tactics, secrets, and strategies for selling a home at top dollar during these challenging times. In addition to offering specific tips on how to Stage a home, Schwarz, a sought-after speaker and Real Estate broker who has Staged and sold over 5,000 homes, provides readers, sellers, Realtors® and Stagers, with useful advice on correctly pricing properties, marketing properties so that they sell, addressing objections early on, having the seller handle the Staging before the house is viewed, and much more. Written with today’s turbulent real estate market in mind, Staging to Sell contains the information readers need to get their homes Sold in the market quickly for top dollar.

Preface ix Acknowledgments xvii CHAPTER 1 Get Set, Go! 1 CHAPTER 2 The Let-Me-Tell-You-How-I-Work Approach 11 CHAPTER 3 Step 1: Meeting Together the First Time 25 CHAPTER 4 The Career Book: The Key to Your Credibility 39 CHAPTER 5 Prospecting and Uses of the Career Book 55 CHAPTER 6 Step 2: The Exclusive Detailed Report 71 CHAPTER 7 The Marketing Portfolio 83 CHAPTER 8 Recipe for a Sale: Pricing the Property Right 105 CHAPTER 9 The Pricing-Your-Home Triangle 117 CHAPTER 10 Staging the Property: The Outside Story 131 CHAPTER 11 Staging the Property: The Inside Story 147 CHAPTER 12 Staging Completion 195 CHAPTER 13 Stage Your Life and Work, Too! 205 CHAPTER 14 Your Journey Toward Success 213 CHAPTER 15 The S Factor: Staging Success Stories from ASPs and Their Sellers in the Field 221 Appendix: Barb’s Real Estate Words and Tools That Will 249 Work for You! A Brief History of Staging and the Stage Trademark 261 Index 265