Interview with Jachele Pfeifle, REALTOR®
How do you stage your home for a quick sale?
When you're taking and staging a house, the first thing you need to do is declutter the house. Make sure all the knick-knacks and personal items are taken down, because you want to have the next person come in and see it as their home. When you're taking and looking at staging a house, personal pictures, stuff that means a lot to you, places that you've been, you want to remove all of those and take and bring in a fresh color, usually neutrals are really great on the walls, pops of color to accentuate the room and to really accent the house. You want counters to be cleared off, you want all kitchen items to be stored somewhere else so that way people can see a clean line and envision themselves living in that home. They say the first thing to do when you are staging a home is to go in and declutter the house of all your personal items.
Is decluttering something that I would have to do myself or can I hire a pro to do that? Can you as my REALTOR® do that for me?
You can hire somebody, or you could do it yourself, or here at Dream Property Team, we can always help you do that as well. For the day of staging, we would go in and shift around the house, because it's still your home while you're living there, but we would take and shift around some of the stuff. We'll bring in some throw pillows, bedding, pictures, really stuff that draws people's eyes to the home itself versus it being your home. We would clear all the counters out, accent some of the spaces, especially if you have beautiful granite counters, we want to accentuate those counters. If you have a huge, large master bedroom, we want to make it look as open and airy as possible. We'll bring in the white down comforters, or bedding, or pillows, or blankets to really give it that warm, inviting feel.
What happens if my home is empty?
If your house is empty, then it's like a clean slate, so it's easy to go off of. If your house is empty, we'll come in, look at the house, and then over the course of a day or two, we will stage the house in its entirety. We're not necessarily going to do all the rooms, but we will add pops of color to all the rooms, we will add pictures, we will take and give the house a dimension and a feeling of belonging, that way when somebody walks in they can picture their couch here, and their bed there, and their family pictures over the fireplace. We really create a sense that this is your next home, not just a house.
What is soft staging?
Soft staging is when you only partially stage a house, it's not a full stage. Soft staging typically is going to be just pictures, throw pillows, minimal staging.
Do homes sell better with furniture or with staging? How does it improve the case for me to sell my home?
Staging has proved to increase profit up to 18 percent. 18 percent of people are more likely to go see a staged home than an un-staged home. If you look at builders, the number 1 selling build they have is a staged home. So they'll sell more of that specific brand than an un-staged home. As a REALTOR® and a professional in this environment, I say no matter what, even if houses are flying off the rack, you still want to stage a home. You want to take and increase that profit even more and make sure that it's accessible for everybody, everybody can envision themselves in it. It also shows care of ownership and care of construction.
When a house is staged, people are going to walk into it and they're going to feel like they're at home. When they walk into a vacant house, at times it's hard to tell the size of a room, the size of the kitchen, is my family going to fit here? Is my table going to fit here? When they're trying to envision what their next home is going to look like, it gives them some perspective. And that's fantastic, because homebuying is so personal that when you add those staged touches, they take and they walk in and they're able to say, absolutely, my couch would fit great here, wow, that's a queen size bed, I know my king size will fit. The family room has got the couch; the kitchen, I can see the chairs lined up right now. As they walk in, it's not just a house, but it's becoming a home, and the staging really helps them start to imagine that process of this is my home, this is mine and I can make it mine.
We've spoken mostly about the inside of the home, do you stage the outside of the home as well?
On the outside you want it to have a clean appearance, and we have been known for going and mowing people's lawns and trimming trees. Do you want the curb appeal? Absolutely. There are times where we have recommended that people repaint, just so it has that clean line. You don't want to take and have something that's going to bring down the value of your house, that really is an easy and cheap solution. If touch-up paint is needed, that's a cheap solution versus somebody not bidding on your house because it needs work. The exterior is just as important as the interior, just to have the clean lines and that cleanliness. When you see something in the store, it's marketed so that you want to take that item home right away. A home is the same way. We want to make sure that we market it to everybody to get the highest dollar amount for you. So that when people see it, they want to go see it in person, we want the pictures to match the quality of the house. When people go up, our biggest compliment is, wow, the pictures really look like what the house looks like. If it's got an overgrown yard, or chipping paint, or anything else, there's going to be an entire population of people that will not go see it because they don't feel that it's going to meet their guidelines. And whatever their guidelines are, having the exterior match the interior is very important.
Is there anything that we've missed that you would want your potential customers to know about the importance of staging? Or what you do specifically for your customers that maybe other REALTORS® don't.
Part of our commission is to include that staging aspect, because we feel that it's important for all of our clients, whether it's their first time, or their investment property, or their second home, to get that highest value. We want to take and really go into a house and make it feel like it could be anybody's home, while still being respectful that it's still your house. For us, staging is as much a part of selling the house as taking and listing it on the market. The more people that we're able to take and get to look at it online and to click through all the pictures, the more likely they are to come see your house in-person. The more people that see your house in-person, the more likely it is to get an offer, if not multiple offers.
We really take pride in our staging and the work that we put into it. We stage each house individually, based on the house. So not every house is going to be staged the same, because it's not all the same. Not every house is going to have the same qualities, and we really want to take and emphasize those qualities. If it has an amazing walk-in shower, we want it to feel like a spa. If it has an amazing kitchen, we want every chef to go in there and say, wow, I can entertain here. We really want to take and make the house as glamorous as it can be.
When you're taking and having a wedding, most people don't just say we're going to have a wedding and throw it together in a week, they want it planned and coordinated so that way it's the best day possible. That's the same with the house, we want the house to have its best day possible on that listing. We want it to look its best, we want it to smell its best, we want it to feel its best. If somebody walks in and they're like, this is fantastic, but there's a smell, or there's chipping paint, or there's something that might be wrong, they're going to see that. We want to make sure, as REALTORS®, and for our clients, that we are delivering the very best service that we can to get them that highest dollar amount, because that dollar amount is going to move you on to your next home. We also want the buyers to come in and see what you have loved about the home, not your memories, but where the memories were made, because that's where their next memories are going to be made. For us it's an all-encompassing part, and whether we're doing a partial stage or a full stage, we're going to take and be with you every step of the way to make sure that it has that look of the new build or the custom home so that people can really go in and feel like they're walking into their next dream home.
On the hunt for an investment property in Colorado Springs or the surrounding areas, contact Jachele Pfeifle of the Dream Property Team here.