Charming, loving family homes are very personalized - and often very hard to sell. In our continuing series on home staging, we explain why that is and what you should do about it to capture top value for your home. Check it out!Video Transcript
yeah we gotta make sure we’re recording these sometimes that happens folks yeah we just we do uh some of our best episodes one of our best episodes we’re not recorded and then he comes upstairs oh my god by the way uh we weren’t recording yeah hello hello you’re seeing a little behind the scenes behind the scenes stuff she’s the pickle lady that’s right i am her partner in crime and uh we are here in prescott arizona real estate agents uh extraordinaire correct yeah i am diane this is randall grove we are happy to uh help you guys out when you come visit if you’re looking for a home happy to help you list if you’re ready to do that yeah so we’re doing we’re we’re doing seller tips we have a series of seller tips and we wanted to focus on staging yeah uh and staging tips when you’re trying to sell your home as i’ve said before uh professional staging is not that big a deal here in prescott there’s not a lot of that going on there’s some yeah not a lot of that for the most part the sellers themselves or their agents are responsible for staging the home but just because no one’s paying money to have it professionally done does not mean it is not important it is vitally so it is and it’s necessary absolutely so this little staging tip is all about depersonalization depersonalization yes when people come in they don’t want to see i have pictures i know uh pictures of your family your children your daughters your wedding you and your wedding dress this that and the other i am so guilty of this yes i consider my daughters my own works of art yes so i’ve got beautiful portraits of them when they were four beautiful portraits of them when they were 18 it goes on and on and on i am the biggest one guilty of this but when i go to sell it’s all coming down when we go over to someone’s house uh just you know socially and their house isn’t personalized it’s kind of creepy yeah i don’t like you go in you don’t see any pictures of them or i think that’s with their children it’s like this person must be in witness protection yeah something i’m a little suspicious a little suspicious so we like homes that are warm and personalized and that the personal touch with all the pictures there’s nothing to say there’s anything wrong with decorating decorating your home in a personalized way it’s just when it comes time to sell that can get involved some of that needs to come down not all of it you keep a cute little picture tucked here and there yeah that still gives the warmth of hey this is a nice family home yeah we’ve had a good time here we’ve got good memories it gives good juju yeah but if it’s too too much of it yeah then people can’t see past my family moving in here this is where i could hang my portraits yes this is where i could hang my grandchildren’s pictures yes so if you’re covered with all of your stuff and it’s too much of it they can’t see past it and they can’t see themselves we want them to get an emotional connection to your home i’ve got to live here my family would be so happy here so a couple of points there first of all uh the reason why you do this is that uh the reason why stage in general is that people do not make rational decisions in buying a home they make emotional decisions they do and buying a home and you may say oh they can look past all my stuff where they could you know they could go home and photoshop it all out you know or they could you know do it in their own minds but what we’re telling you is they don’t in practice they don’t that’s not how they make decisions uh most people unlike investors most people most buyers will make an emotional gut decision in connecting with a home and if your personalized stuff doesn’t connect with them it’s going to get in the way of that process and they’re not going to connect with your home and they’re not going to want to move forward that’s true the other thing to kind of de-personalize is besides you know family photos or you know is anything that of religious nature that’s if you are overtly you know if you’ve got a lot of religious or even i hate to say it patriotic yes um which i don’t agree with but um yeah i mean we have religious stuff in our home we have oh you know that’s how we personalize our home right some people it could be that they are not religious correct it could be that they have a religion that is different than yours right and it’s not like they say oh you know i would say i’m jewish and all these crosses are around or vice versa and they say well you know i don’t i don’t like all these crosses i don’t like this house they won’t even be able to articulate it correct they just won’t connect with the house they won’t even be able to explain why there was something about the house that just didn’t feel right right you know and that’s what we’re trying to avoid absolutely i mean i have all of that i love it all i have buddhas i have catholic things i have dude jewish thing yeah i like to cover my bases i have it all i i want to make sure i got i have crystals you name it yeah i have a very eclectic home yeah i will say it’s very clever but that may not connect with a lot of people and it won’t they may be like what does she have some weird stuff weird stuff that was a weird house and i’ll be the first one to open it it is so i agree you know so when i do go to sell i will remove some of those items just because again we want it to be a clean slate yeah that people can see you know their special things coming in their special photos right uh portraits and things like that a quick rule of thumb when it comes to family pictures so if you go to a place like say michael’s and you buy picture frames most of the picture frames will have pictures in them yep you know showing you you know this is where you would put your family but they’re kind of sort of generic looking family photos if you don’t have a lot of family photos and it just looks like a family there’s nothing particularly different like it it could be the picture that they put in the frames at michael’s and sell the to sell the frame if that’s the case then it’s probably not so personalized that you need to get rid of it but if it’s you know like uh halloween costumes or something just kind of strange that you wouldn’t see at michael’s then you probably need to yeah yeah that is just keep it light keep it simple keep it not too crazy like my house and you’ll do just fine but the most important thing out of all of this is when your agent is nicely suggesting hey you know you might want to remove this you might don’t not argue but don’t get defensive don’t be insulted it’s not meant in that way at all it’s just having done this thousands of times and helping people find their place and the feedback we get back we know what your house will be tagged about it’ll be like oh gosh did you see that that was terrible and so just listen to us ahead of time and save yourself a lot of heartache yeah and it may not be fun to hear and it may be i’m not really comfortable i understand i mean i get tagged myself so it’s a it’s a pain but we’re telling you it will put money in your pocket it will put money in your pocket and it will save you uh you know have the house sold pretty quickly so it’s all in your best interest too personal absolutely in your best interest so depersonalize depersonalize depersonalize and when someone suggested like we suggested to you just take it with a good heart and say okay thanks all right good points here if you look for more good points you might want to go to pickle411.com yep that is our information center everything there is free highly entertaining and insightful yep it’s one awards no it hasn’t won awards not yet we’re waiting for an award i feel like it’s coming yeah the pickle i just have a pickle or something it’s coming yeah we feel it i think it’s coming i feel it yeah all right and if you’re watching this we want to wish you a happy new year happy new year to you because uh 2022 i think it’s just going to be amazing for everybody we’re going to turn this around turn this ship around and everybody’s going to be the ship chip oh i thought you said something else no okay no you could turn that other thing around too well yeah i’m done with that yeah it has been pretty good yeah so i would agree but we’re going to turn that ship around 2022 is going to be amazing yep i just feel it it’s going to be a good start for all of us so here’s to a happy healthy and prosperous 2022 and give us a call to sell your home and we’ll give you some more tips in person that’s right all right take care bye
