For years I've helped other homeowners prepare for market.  Now it's time to stage my own home!

Homeowners work with me weeks, months, or even over the course of a couple years leading up to listing their home.  Sometimes they're looking for a honey-do list for when they're ready to sell.  Other times, they're up against a deadline and need to sell right away.  In each staging, there's a unique story, here's mine...

I've been invested in real estate since buying my first place, a duplex on a large lot with a detached, oversized garage soon after graduating from Colorado State.  I grew up with parents who built, bought, and sold homes on the regular and I had a degree in Interior Design and Construction Project Management under my belt so tackling the remodel of the duplex and converting the garage into a small bungalow for myself, came naturally.  With the help of my dad as general contractor, I was a new homeowner and landlord for the duplex at age 23. 

As life progressed, I got married, bought more real estate, moved across the state, lost some real estate during the Recession, and now, a decade later, own a couple of investment properties and our current home with my husband. 

When we moved into our home we didn't intend to live here as long as we have.  In fact, we started out just renting.  Our friends owned the house and we rented from them.  It's a big open ranch-style home that worked perfectly for our twin daughters to crawl around.  Plus, it has a large garage for my husband to house his vehicles and welding projects.  I guess life got comfortable and after three years of renting, we bought the house from our friends.  I remember talking about how much work moving was and if we were going to buy we might as well buy the house we were already living in.  Another three years went by and in our scouting for an out-of-town property, we finally found a house on acreage that fit the bill.  That means we will sell this house (it actually listed this week) and put our proceeds toward the new house.  It's exciting and stressful at the same time!

So, remember the investment real estate I mentioned?  Well, we still own it.  But we decided we no longer want to be landlords. So... we're not only selling the house we live in, but also a two-unit investment property. (more on this in a future post)

Here's the exterior before staging.  Actually, this was taken a few years ago before we repainted.  Technically, we've been 'staging' our home ever since we bought it in 2015.  Wow, it needed paint!!

My husband and I went through our house a month ago and made a final staging list of everything that needed to be done before we listed.  For the next four weeks we worked, and cleaned, and cleared, and de-cluttered, and got a storage unit, and bored our kids to death, and finally... we've got the finished product.  Best of all, we've already had a ton of showings!  The entire process has been especially eye-opening for me.  After all, I'm the professional home stager who helps homeowners just like me accomplish what I'm aiming to conquer - a house that's well presented and sells fast, for top-dollar. 

Here are exterior photos after staging. 

I'll share interior photos over the next couple weeks. 

Preparing for showings every day and keeping the house clean is a lot of work.  Fingers crossed, we'll have a contract soon!

If you want help knowing how to prepare your home for market, contact me for an online or in-person consultation.