Do you need to sell your house right now when non-essential businesses may be closed, and social distancing may make it impossible to show your for-sale home in person? Don’t worry! There are ways to make it happen!
Is Your Home Selling Team Available to Help?
When you are selling, you generally rely on a team of people to help including your realtor, your home stager and photographer. You may also need people to clean, paint or do basic repairs, maintenance or remodeling. Based on the federal, state and local guidelines and mandates for your area, this may be difficult to have some of these people help you in person right now. You will need to follow the rules for your area and your own conscience as to what will be safe for you, your family and the people that are helping you.
Realtors
In some states that have stay at home orders, real estate services are considered an essential service and Realtors may be able to conduct real estate business, but other states do not consider real estate to be an essential service, limiting real estate activities to actions that may be accomplished remotely. Even where real estate services are “essential”, many Realtors may still be working remotely whenever possible and even doing virtual home tours with potential home buyers.
Construction, Maintenance and Painting Services
Construction, including but not limited to: “Skilled trades such as electrician, plumbers…” may be considered essential services in some states and not others. These companies may include painting. Some of these businesses may or may not be operating for services you need and if they are, you need to decide for yourself if you want to assume the risk of having people in your home working.
Home Stagers
In person home staging is not likely considered an essential service in any state with shelter in place restrictions right now.
Professional Photography
Professional photography is also unlikely to be considered an essential service. Your realtor may be able to take photos for you, although it is unlikely to be the same quality as you would get from a professional real estate photographer.
Think Out of the Box
Think out of the box. if your Realtor can do virtual home tours with potential buyers, this is a great option. To be effective you need beautiful photos that highlight your home’s best features. The best way to get those is to have your home staged. What if you can’t get a home stager right now?
Home Staging Options
Virtual Home Staging Consultation
You have several options. If you are living in the home while it is on the market, you can do a virtual home staging consultation. This usually involves answering some questions by phone or in a questionnaire, sending some photos and then doing a video conference with your stager. They will tell you everything you need to do inside and out to stage your home so you can get great photos. You can even take them on a virtual tour of the home on Facetime, Zoom or Skype for the consultation as if they were right there with you in person. Then you can take the information and do the staging yourself. Your stager may offer a follow-up look at your after photos and final advice after you are done.
Virtual Staging
If your home will be vacant while on the market, consider virtual staging. Virtual staging takes your well-lit professional photos and puts furniture and accessories in the photo so the buyer gets a sense of scale and can see how furniture could fit, be arranged and get a feeling for the home. In a virtual tour the realtor could show both the vacant and virtually staged photos to buyers. It’s hard to get buyers to fall in love with a bunch of pictures of empty rooms!
Do You Need Help?
I offer both virtual home staging consultations and virtual staging services and am happy to help you, wherever you live. Best of luck with your home sale!
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It’s a challenging time to be selling and you have provided great insight into how to make it easier. The idea of a virtual staging consultation is ideal
Thanks so much Lisa!
Great advice, Mary Ann during such a difficult season!
Thanks Janet! I hope it is helpful to people that might be getting discouraged about selling:)
Great tips here. I ‘ve never thought of virtual staging before!
Thanks Jeanne:) I don’t think a lot of people know what it is or that it is a great option available to them, especially right now.
Such good advice!
Thanks Christina!
This is great, Mary Ann. I’m sure many people will find your tips extremely useful.
Thank you! I hope people don’t get too discouraged right now and realize they can still sell, even during these trying times. Sometimes you are just not in a position to wait…but it will all be OK.
Virtual staging is such a great option to get top dollar. People just can’t visualize how the space can look and function.
Thanks Carla! Yes, it looks great, can be cheaper than in person staging and is definitely a safer way to go right now! Thanks for reading.
Great post Mary Ann, with a husband who is a realtor, I am living this every day. So many of your ideas are helpful and it’s a great post on the topic, that’s for sure! Wishing you the best.
Thank you Amy! That is great to know! I wish him all the best during this difficult time and hope he is staying safe! I am happy to help if he needs it.
Great tips!! I know someone who just decided to sell one of their homes in order to hang onto their store. Good to know how many options there are to home staging. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks Deborah! Hope everything works out for them and glad if this is helpful:) There is always a way if you just think outside the box.
My parents are getting an offer today on their home!!! It must be so exciting for you when your clients get offers.
That’s wonderful! Yes, as a home stager as well as a designer, I am always watching and waiting for that offer to come in and it is exciting when it happens!
Hi Mary Ann: This is such a timely post! With a brother who has been a real estate agent for 30+ years and a nephew who is now in the business with him, I can imagine how much your ideas might help them. I am going to share your post with them so they know that virtual staging is available.
Thanks for thinking *outside the box* or…. as Apple’s famous tagline says, you are on the forefront of how to #ThinkDifferent to help realtors during this difficult time.
Thank you Leslie! That would be wonderful if you share and I hope it is helpful for them:). These days we all have to #ThinkDifferent. It will all work out!
Great info at this time!
Thanks so much Ilse, I hope it helps people!