Feature Friday: Staged Colorado Springs Home

Happy Friday!  I am so excited to go on a date to Tucanos with the hubsters tonight!  I hope you get to do something fun.

Can you stage to sell a very nice million dollar home with a huge budget?  All. Day. Long.  Can you stage to sell a middle America 1970's split level with a bad paint job and old carpet with a very tiny budget?  Not so easy... but YES!

Today I'm featuring the house that we staged at my home staging training in Colorado Springs.  Here are my girls.  I'm the one in the dress with the black stripey things at the waste.  Karen, the APSD founder, is the gorgeous blonde to the left -- LOVE her!

I don't have a picture of the actual house, but this is a very similar house with a better paint job.  Imagine it.

Here we are again (I'm the one in the super awesome pants -- no offense anyone else).  We were trying to think of things to do to make the curb appeal better.  Just so you know, we ended up rearranging some pots and we would have done everything mentioned in this post about curb appeal if we had the time.

We were given a few storage containers of decor items to use for the entire house.  There were also 3 or 4 chairs, 3 ottomans, 1 love seat, a coffee table and a small side table.  There were 0 beds, 0 kitchen tables, 0 couches, and 0 things to hang on walls.  Our job was to figure out how to make it look great with a few items.  The point:  you CAN stage on any budget!  

This is the living room before (with all of the stuff out for us to choose from).

And after -- seriously, that was almost all the furniture except for 2 more chairs.

The other side of the living room -- a ledge overlooking the door between the levels.

Here I am with my new friend and fellow APSD home staging certified trainer from Canada, Kristy, trying to figure out what to do to stage the inside.  My hair was on like day 4 of no washing.  Don't judge.  It was a long and busy week.

This is the master bedroom.  Here's a tip for you.  If you are staging and don't have the furniture you need (ie beds), do not make a pretend one by putting a blanket and pillows on the floor like a made bed.  Go with another scene.

This is the basement.  I don't have the before picture but let me tell you.  This looks SOOO much better.  This is the last chair we had.

The kitchen before.

And after

And a baby room (okay I guess we had another chair, but you get the point, right?).  The picture is taken from the door and the duck is positioned as though it is leaving the room with the baby ducks following behind.

The great part about this is that the home went under contract in 4 days!  FOUR days!!!  I don't know the exact statistic, but the national average of days on market is around 6 months.  That's like 5 months on the market and 1 month with an accepted offer.  So, we shaved 4 months and 26 days off of that.  Not bad, huh?  That's a lot of $$$ in mortgage payments.

I got permission to post the letter to the APSD home stagers from Karen about this house.

Well, here is a second congratulations to all the new APSD CT2, Certified Trainers, that participated in the staging on Saturday.  I just opened an email from the owner and she said they they have an accepted offer!  Only 4 days since you all did such an incredible job of staging this home!!!

This home, as you all know, has a special place in my heart since I personally know the owners and they asked for my help.  The husband has been diagnosed with terminal cancer and they are both in a fight for his life.  When I received a call to help, because the property had been sitting vacant for the past 4 months, I took a drive over to see why it wasn't transacting. Needless to say, the curb appeal was non-existant and the inside was vacant and non-inviting. 

Pete and I hired a crew, and we had them do some more extensive cleaning, clean-up, lawn care and home touch-ups.  While it was not perfect, it was a huge improvement.  Next, it was time to stage.  Our newly certified APSD home stager trainers were coming in for their hand's on stager pro training so I decided it was the perfect project.  We could all train, learn and work together to help the owners, my friends.

This team literally transformed the house.  They correctly defined the buyer and staged specifically to speak to them...and it worked!  4 days later, I received an email from the owner telling me they have accepted an offer.

So, to all of you involved...congratulations! And, from the bottom of my heart, thank you.  Staging can change lives and today, you helped to change 2 of them!

All my best,

Karen Schaefer

Founder, APSD

Now I'm going to tell you all again how much fun home staging is.  Seriously, if you like decorating at all, this is great.  But it's not just that.  Karen actually focuses on teaching us how to market our home staging businesses so that we are successful.  And now I get to teach people how to do it!  Yay!  My focus is DIY decor but everyone has their own thing.  Kristy in Canada is rockin it with tons of consultations (that are NOT free) and up-sales.  

If home staging is something you're interested in, get your free CD here.  What could it hurt?  If, after you get it, you want to invest in your home staging education, awesome.  If not, you got a free CD with great information!  And if you do sign up, I can train you, which is an added bonus for all of us! :)


You can email me anytime if you have questions about a career in home staging at kelli nielson @ yahoo.com (no spaces).  Have a great weekend!  Tune in Sunday for a special breast cancer awareness post.

Linking up at the great Linky parties found at the bottom of the blog.  They are where I find most of my inspiration!  Check them out!

plus

Coastal Charm - Nifty Thrifty Tuesday

Savvy Southern Style - Wow Us Wednesday

Bunny Jeans Decor and More - The Bunny Hop

My Repurposed Life - Catch as Catch Can Party

2805 - Potpourri Friday

Debbiedoos - Newbie Party

Serenity Now

Remodelaholic