When selling your NYC home, it is imperative that the ambiance appeals to the masses. For many New Yorkers, they’re living in their home while trying to sell it. Others move out and leave the home empty.
However, there are also sellers who pay to professionally stage their homes, which can make the difference between your home selling quickly in a sea of inventory or sitting on the market for months and months on end.
Depending on the size of your home, staging in New York City can range from a few thousand dollars for a studio that needs minor touch-ups and furniture, to over $70,000 in a massive home that needs “the works”:
- Wallpaper
- Refinished floors
- Hefty amounts of luxe furniture and decor
How you style your home and enjoy it while living there should feel different than it does when you go to sell it. Everyone has their specific needs and personal design taste. But that wall of family photos, art collage in your child’s bedroom, and area for your doggie pee pad in the laundry room may not be what speaks to a buyer trying to imagine their life in your home.
When it’s time to sell, it may be the right time for the butterfly wallpaper to come down in your daughter’s room and time to convert the teenie tiny nursery back into the walk-in closet it was designed to be (yes, this last part may sound familiar if you’ve been tuning in to watch Triplemint’s Tyler Whitman on Bravo’s Million Dollar Listing New York).
When it comes to listing your home, it’s necessary to neutralize and be #basic. When necessary, Million Dollar Listing’s Tyler Whitman and The Whitman Team enlist Quadra to help sellers stage their homes. And girl, does professional staging make a difference!
Don’t believe staging can make a huge difference? Check out a few Before and After photos of The Whitman Team’s two-bedroom, two-bathroom listing at 252 Seventh Ave #PHJ in the Chelsea Mercantile:
Living Room
Master Bedroom
Dining
For those who are still living in their home while trying to sell, here are 4 quick tips from The Whitman Team to get your home ready for market:
1. Remove any and all clutter – No one wants to see how many items you can stuff into your closet or how many holiday cards you’ve amassed on your fridge over the past year. This also means removing items that can be thought of as “dirty” like trash cans, sponges, and dish rags. If you have excessive amounts of “stuff”, you may want to consider renting a storage unit while your home is listed.
2. Highlight the light – This may mean taking down your beloved dark purple velvet drapes and replacing them with something lighter in color or nothing at all. Use mirrors to reflect light and create more space.
3. Touch-up the scuffs – Fresh paint and inexpensive wallpaper can be an affordable way to impress a buyer where you may currently have tired walls and chipped kitchen cabinetry.
4. Think like a buyer – At open houses, where will the buyers gravitate toward? Do they turn left into the living room right away? Do they head right toward the bedroom wing? There should be a path for them and nothing should be in the way to distract.
Interested in staging or selling your home in New York City? Contact The Whitman Team!
