Making the House Pretty: Hiring a Home Stager Means Hiding Some of The Unmentionables

Before Karen Thornton, owner of Visionary Staging, came to stage my house, I had had some warning.  I was told she helps a home seller create a fantasy world, one in which the people in the home for sale do not clean, diet, or get dirty.  As such, when I decluttered my house I took pains to store or hide any cleaning supplies, garbage cans, personal hygiene products, etc.  I also took down and stored personal photos, photo albums, kids’ art, and anything that indicated the presence of actual people.  I wanted the house to look like a Pottery Barn photo shoot.  The best I could do on my own resembled a 10-year-old, yellowed and wrinkled copy of an Ikea catalog, but it was a start.

Karen started her visit by introducing her overall philosophy:  “You’ve done a great job over the years turning your house into a home,” she said.  “Now it’s time to turn your home into a house.  For sale.” The two, I learned, are very different things.

From the front lawn to the back wall, one end of the house to the other, even the inside of the kitchen cabinets, Karen swept her eagle eyes over every view and listed her instructions within nanoseconds.  I was pleased when she complimented the open spaces and color choices in our rooms, but I knew my arrangements were not perfect.  She walked through our house for about an hour and a half, telling me what to do with my stuff as I scribbled furiously to keep up with her.  As one might expect, Karen’s list included rearrangement of furniture, storage of pieces that don’t fit, addition of artwork to bring the eye across a room, etc.  But what I found most fascinating was the philosophy itself.

It’s not just about making the house look pretty.  “Everywhere they look in your house, I want the buyer to see a happy successful couple.  You’re on your way up.  You’ve grown out of this house, you need more space.  If they buy and live in this house, they too can be happy and successful.”  Creating more space in a room creates the illusion that we live here comfortably, that we fit in this house, that it’s not too crowded and there’s plenty of room.  Adding a splash of a coordinating color to the opposite side of a room draws the eye across, making it look bigger.  The right placement of sofas and chairs around a fireplace suggests a cozy chat or reading nook.  Art hung the right way gives a room a more vertical feel to make the ceiling seem higher.  Karen pointed out all the very minor changes I could make to use my own furniture and accessories to best showcase my house.

These concepts may be taken for granted in design, architecture, or real estate circles, but I have never once thought about them.  I simply buy and put stuff in my house because it looks nice, it’s comfortable, or it’s cheap enough that if the kids destroy it, I won’t care.  After moving our living room furniture around and relocating the kids’ toys to a previously unused space, however, I feel like a blindfold has been removed from my eyes.  I gleefully launched myself into the long list of tasks that Karen left behind, so quickly that I forgot to take pictures of what it looked like “before.”  This is a small tragedy because I can’t show you the remarkable transformation that these small changes created.

Karen has been staging homes for 18 years – long before the industry was even called staging, mostly hired by agents who are having difficulty selling a property.  She specializes in occupied homes which present the challenge of a homeowner’s resistance, so she plays “bad cop” to the agent’s “good cop.”  Quite often Karen’s work is the difference between a property selling quickly or staying on the market for a long time.  The seller may have to live uncomfortably for a while, putting most of their belongings in storage or moving that comfy couch away from the TV, but as she puts it, “would you rather live uncomfortably for a week and sell your house or comfortably for six months while nobody’s making an offer?”

Karen’s manner as she sweeps through a home is professional and authoritative.  Some of her instructions are repeated several times, like “nothing on top!” as she clears off a table or chest surface, and “That piece goes away.  Just away,” when disapproving a battered old accessory or piece of furniture.  Typically, her initial consultation lasts about two hours, and the homeowner then implements her suggestions and emails photos, at which point Karen will send back further notes and changes.  That process costs about $500.  Depending on the size of the property, her team will also come in and do everything from rearranging furniture to clearing out junk and repainting walls.  She also has a warehouse of furniture and accessories to utilize in the event that appropriate pieces don’t already exist in the home.  Custom jobs like this are priced accordingly, and can take as little as one day.

I ran around clearing out clutter before she came the same way I clean the house before the cleaning person comes to clean.  I didn’t want to be the worst house Karen’s ever had to deal with.  To put me at ease, she shared some stories of past clients, like the woman who was very attached to the tens of bottles of shampoo that crowded her master bathroom.  “I don’t know which one I want to use on any given day,” the woman whined when Karen suggested she get rid of those bottles to better show off the space.  On the other end of the spectrum was the couple whose immaculate Hollywood home delighted Karen at every turn.  “This is great,” she thought, “I have nothing to do here!”  Until she found the master bedroom closet, which was stacked floor to ceiling with carefully arranged private materials.  After she recovered from the shock, Karen gave them what I now understand to be one of her signature instructions.  “Gentlemen,” she said.  “This needs to go away.”

Not that she is saying that anything is wrong with these materials, but a house needs to be presented as a blank canvas in which anyone can imagine themselves making a home.  To that end, any religious icons, team or school memorabilia, or evidence of political affiliation should be stored away, too.  You don’t want a UCLA grad who otherwise loves your home to change her mind because of the shrine to USC in your family room.

In the days since Karen’s visit to my house, I’ve looked at everything in it with a new perspective.  The pile of packed boxes in the garage has grown, and our home has taken on a sleeker, less crowded look.  Far from being less of a home, it feels more inviting, more comfortable, and more….well, more everything good. And just as I had feared, the staging transformation makes me not want to leave anymore.  But at least I’m more confident that prospective buyers might be as pleased with our house as I am.