The Reality of a Staged Tri-Cities Washington Home
As portions of the United States have seen a slowing in the real estate market, sellers and the real estate agents that represent them have turned to less traditional ways to make a home more attractive for sale. These methods have ranged from things like offering health club memberships with a sale to more measured methods like staging services.
The Reality of Home Staging
While many real estate agents have resisted the idea of investing in a staging 
service, the benefit can be seen in the increased traffic staging services can create and the quality of interest they can drum up. A common response to a lack of interest in a property is a price drop. If an investment in staging services can avoid that price drop, the money spent is more than worth it.
By making sure that the property shows as best as it can, a real estate agent is giving the home the best possible chance to be sold for full price after a short time on the market. If a prospective buyer that is otherwise impressed with the location and school district is underwhelmed by the condition of the property, the sale will never materialize.
If that same interested buyer can be thoroughly impressed by the staging of the property, a sale is of course more likely and while a real estate agent will get a commission, either way, it is in the best interest of the seller to see the highest price possible in the shortest time from possible.
If your real estate agent will not even discuss the possibility of staging services, you should either push harder in your discussions or find a new realtor. As real estate markets slow down, real estate agents must adapt and use all of the tools available. For many properties, that can mean the relatively simple addition of a staging service to the marketing plan for a home.
Pros and Cons of Home Staging
The misconception that staging services are expensive is the one thing keeping many real estate agents from pursuing it as a possible selling tool. However, should a price drop be avoided, that cost is made up for and every day that a home sits on the market is a day not spent building equity in a new home.
Staging can also be done quite efficiently. In most cases, a home can be properly staged in a matter of hours, not a matter of days, and will fit seamlessly into the flow of a marketing plan. Those that specialize in staging are well aware of the time pressures of selling a property and have experience operating within a selling framework.
Of course, there are drawbacks to staging and it would be unfair to paint it as a silver bullet to the selling process. There is a cost involved, a lack of control over how the home is portrayed, and the possibility that the way the home shows is not the barrier to getting a buyer interested.
Showing a home is an important part of the selling process but it is not the only part of the selling process. Investing in staging might not help a home that suffers from a price well above what the market dictates, for example. Staging should be evaluated on a case-by-case basis with the aid of a real estate agent in order to make sure that it is the right step for your particular property. It will always help your home show better but if that is not the problem, that money might be best spent elsewhere.
Staging is certainly not the perfect solution to a slow real estate market, but it does present itself as another option for a real estate agent to motivate buyers with attractive homes. Work with your real estate agent on exploring staging as a possibility and while it may not be perfect for every situation, it is certainly worth exploring.