Presentation of a house for sale seems like a no-brainer to many that are involved in the industry. Yet there are still houses out there on the market that have not had one whit of attention paid to cleanliness and clutter. Here piggy piggy!
This begs the question: Are the Sellers Ignorant or just Plain Arrogant?
Do they REALLY not know all about how to present their house for sale?
Ignorance - which in this case is not bliss. It's "blah! - or Blechh"
And does the listing agent really not know what to tell them about keeping their house picked up and make it presentable to buyers?
Or are they just thumbing their nose at the process of attracting a buyer? Arrogance - an attitude that few can afford to have in a market where the competition is stiff, and prices are decreasing.
I had this question posed to me yesterday - by someone that has their house on the market. This seller toured other listings to check out the competition and was shocked at what they saw in a house - same price range, smaller square footage.
They shared there was a half-eaten granola bar left on the kitchen floor. The bathroom shower was so disgusting they said she would not want to shower in there - ever! Every room was dirty - the grout, the window tracks, the counters, the flooring. You get the picture.
They toured it at an Open House - with the listing agent touring the buyers through the pig sty.
Their house, meanwhile, is neat and tidy, it is ready for any buyer to walk into and picture themselves living there. It has been depersonalized and prepared for sale.
In this day and age of media exposure, articles, television shows, professional home stagers in EVERY market in the US . . . HOW is it possible that these people still don't have a clue?
And it is not just about the Sellers - the REALTOR needs to wise up and get tough on the client. Letting them leave their house a mess, is a mistake. If the REALTOR truly wants to SELL the house - and not just show a pig-sty to the public, then there needs to be a truthful conversation with the sellers.
If the Sellers don't care about keeping up appearances - that means they are not motivated to sell - and that Realtor is just wasting time and dollars marketing a property that is a turn-off to anyone that walks through the door.
And the public that is out there shopping - trust me, they would rather buy a house that has been well maintained and cared for than one that looks like it has been neglected. The only ones that want a house like that - they will low-ball the price and hope that the sellers that don't care about presenting a nice product to the market won't care about their equity and price either.
Arrogance - a costly mistake. Ignorance - let's educate the sellers and get them to clean up their act!
Jennie, great food for thought, as always! I'd like to think it isn't arrogance. Maybe just a bit of laziness or a desire to follow the path of least resistance. Another possibility akin to ignorance is selective blindness. They can see other home's issues quite clearly, but not their own.
I say lazy. I talk till I'm blue in the face about how you need to keep it clean. I give baskets, pointers on how to do it but that percentage of the market don't get it. Prepare yourself to take less.
AMEN sister!
Stacey
For years, real estate agents have been instructed to be 'listing agents' - get the listings, and eventually they will sell as the price is reduced.
Sellers put their trust in their agent and do what they are advised to do. Only by informing real estate agents will staging become accepted as a necessary thing to do.
Sellers are neither arrogant or ignorant - they are looking for direction.
My 2 cents.
Akanke
Jennie, I can tell you here in Central FL it seems to be a matter of ignorance. WE all watch the TV staging and decorating shows, but apparently the general public here does not. I'm always having to explain what home staging is, even to the lady who called and asked me if I did "karaoke".
I think sellers have a hard time really "seeing" their home as others see it..They have usually lived in it for
years and don't understand the concept of when you put your house on the "market", it becomes a "commodity"..
it is not a home anymore, it is a product they are selling on the market, and they have to start thinking in terms of
marketing that product to get the highest return. I try to be very gentle with my clients and always try to find
some compliment to give their property, and then I let them know that its time to look at it not as their "home"
but their"house"...and that they are buying or moving into their next "home" in which they can have dirty socks
on the floor and dishes in the sink!
I have to agree ..I think that they are lazy and just think that buyers would love their homes as they are. I went to do a stage at a lake home yesterday and it was so dirty and messy I could barely get thru the home...and we had a buyer stop by that afternoon...That home will never sell in the condition that it is in...
Thanks for all your comments - Sellers that in today's market with as much info that is available in the media, from Realtors, and Stagers - that CHOOSE to just present a pig sty to the public are really missing the boat. They can be lazy or arrogant - and whatever is going on they are definiitely NOT motivated to sell! - Jennie
My experience with homeowners is that it is ignorance. With many consultations as I point out the disgusting dark dirt tracks around the perimeter of each room and hallway with carpeting they are shocked.
I had one client whose bathroom smelled like urine. I finally tracked it down after tossing everything out of the room. The toilet seat...in every crevase and hinge had caked...and I mean caked on urine.
I told the client she had to relpace the seat. She wanted to clean it...then said it was clean after looking at it. I had to make her get down on her knees and look closer. She still just wanted to clean it.
I stood my ground. There was no way she'd ever get it clean...I saw her idea of 'clean' everywhere.
I have had to hold client's hands walking them through rooms they'd cleaned following my detailed list (ex. window tracks, windows etc.). One client...same one with the toilet seat...I showed her the dead fly from the previous week. She told me she'd cleaned the window track the day before.
I pointed out the fly...and dirt. I don't think so. This girl was oblivious.
When I was younger, I could have been this client. As a child I never had to clean up after myself or help out around the house. I can live with clutter everywhere and not see it. I think there are a lot out there like that.
It is so much easier for many to see others clutter and dirt.
Reading this makes me want to puke. I'm serious. At what point do you tell the owners to hire a cleaning lady or they are wasting money by staging a dirty house.
I have no problem with doing a little dusting while I'm there but cleaning someones urine soaked seat makes me ill.
Maybe the fee should be raised so a professional cleaning services can come in before staging
KARAOKE - that's a good one! Maybe if we offered that we'd get more clients willing to have their homes staged! How about "free beer and pizza with every staging!".
When I do a consult, I often take pictures of the house (if the house is bad, I like to get the worst pictures). Then when I get home, I email the pictures to the homeowner reiterating what we already talked about and a big thank you for calling me.A lot of times, when you live in it, you get used to it and seeing the pictures can be eye-opening. Of course, if you can't see the urine-crusted toilet seat, I don't think there's much hope for you!
Gretchen
www.creativespaceserie.com
Wow, this post has hit a really sore spot which has been rankling me lately! I was chatting about this to my partner the other day because I was cruising through some of the "by sale by owner" sites and was HORRIFIED by some of the pictures. There was one listing where it was faded pink roses/mint green walls decor with mirrors in every room and boxes and mounds of clutter obscuring every corner of the room! I went so far as to email the seller and offer our de-cluttering services and while that might have offended them, all I could think was someone needs to give these people a jolt so that the house gets cleaned up so it can be presented properly!
I personally believe that sellers just don't view their homes the way we do. I think that they believe their decor style and clutter levels are normal and that buyers will overlook everything and see the potential in their homes. Okay, maybe eventually that will happen. The question is, how many price reductions will it take before you get to that point??
In terms of cleaning however - we require and it's part of our contract that prior to staging the property needs to be cleaned professionally. It's not even a question. I learned that lesson the hard way when we showed up to stage a house which had been on the market for several months (the Realtor called us in and footed the bill) and the home owner had gotten extremely lazy about keeping the place up. She had "forgotten" to clean before we arrived and so we ended up spending the bulk of our time cleaning her house instead of staging it!