When you are selling your home on the North Shore, “staging” it to appeal to buyers is the best way to sell it quickly and get the best possible price. Staging can include everything from simply decluttering and rearranging your furniture, to painting and actual remodeling projects. For vacant homes, we sometimes hire a staging company to bring in furniture and decorative items to help give the home the best look. Unfortunately, this isn’t always feasible. This is where virtual staging can make an impact.
What is Virtual Staging?
It is using technology to do what you can’t do in real life. We take professional photos of the property and then we can paint the walls, change the color of your cabinets, add furniture, make the grass green or the sky blue, and much more. If a house is vacant, or if you have renters that aren’t cooperating, virtual staging can be very helpful. Also, if you can’t afford to replace the old and faded carpeting, we can still show prospective buyers what the rooms would look like after they do it.
1. Online Shoppers
Because of the growth of technology, a home’s first showing is usually online as buyers search through various homes on the market to make their short list. Buyers click through a carousel of photos to visualize the home as their own. By having a set of nicely-staged, professional photos, your home will stand out online.
2. Add Design Details
Buyers like to see homes where they could immediately envision themselves living. Having updated furniture, welcoming rugs or plush pillows can help them do so. Virtual staging is an excellent, cost-effective way to add these little touches before listing your home online.
3. Digitally Declutter
Decluttering is definitely an important part of preparing your home for sale. If you can’t actually declutter your home, virtual staging can help you remove pieces that you might not have space to store. Whether you’re looking to get rid of something as large as a couch or a smaller item, virtual staging can take care of that.
4. Quick and Inexpensive
Actually staging your home can be very expensive. Purchasing trendy furniture and large rugs and re-painting cabinets and walls can take time and money. Virtual staging is less expensive than the alternatives, like replacing carpeting, and only takes a couple of days, depending on the technology you use.
Of course, we don’t want to disappoint buyers when they come to see the home in real life – so we will disclose that some photos have been virtually staged and in many cases we will show the before and after photos. Here are some examples of virtual staging that my team has done in the past couple of years:
This living room would have been expensive to physically stage, so it's a great example of how virtual staging is a great, affordable tool.
One trend right now is painted kitchen cabinets, and often they’re painted white to brighten the kitchen. If you want to achieve the painted look but don’t want to put the money and energy into actually painting the cabinets, virtual staging can help. Check out this virtual staging example:
Adding furniture to an otherwise-empty great room is an excellent way to show off the possibilities of the space.
Overall, virtual staging can help you save time and money. You can help potential buyers envision how the home could look. Investing in virtual staging is a great way to show off your North Shore home in the best light possible. Give me a call today, and I can help you get started.
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