Before & After Photos That Show the Effects of Staging

Today I have some before and after photos that really illustrate how much better your home can look with some simple staging and easy fixes.

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It's officially fall and the holidays are right around the corner, so I wanted to show you some things you can do to increase your home’s resale value. 

Let's take a look at some before and after photos to see how important it is to concentrate on two areas that most people don't think about that can get spooky–your basement and garage. You want your home to look like a model home that no one has ever lived in, so you don't want any cobwebs creating a creepy feeling!

Let's start with a living room example. In the video above, you can see the difference that 15 minutes of decluttering can make in making this living room more marketable online.

In the next photo, you can see another 'before' photo of a messy living room. We removed everything but the desk from the room, painted it our secret color and painted the woodwork white. How much more beautiful is that room now? Now, this room will attract buyers; it wouldn’t have before. 

Next, take a look at this small galley kitchen's 'before' photo. We simply moved everything in the kitchen to the dining room table and now we can actually see this kitchen and its real size. We took it a step further by painting the cabinets the same color and adding hardware, and it looks like a brand new kitchen! This house sold one day after coming on the market! 

Our next example is another kitchen. The whole kitchen was messy and cluttered and the cabinetry was outdated, so we painted them a nice color called 'mocha,' added hardware, and painted the trim white. Brown trim does not sell in today's market!

In the next example, you can see a basement before it was staged. We got rid of everything in the room but the foosball table and changed the walls from a bold red to a neutral color. This shows just how important it is to clean out your basement, closets, and garage. So let's take a look at a garage in the next example. They actually used this 'before' photo on the MLS before we took the listing over. We cleaned out the garage and painted it, and buyers loved it! 

In this next basement 'before' photo, you can see an awful basement that was moldy, dark, and dreary. We cleaned up the floors and brightened the walls with some paint, and you can easily see how much better it looks. Our final example shows how much better a basement looks after replacing outdated dark wood doors with some white six-panel doors.

These are the things that will cause a home to sell. The houses that I showed you today were all on the market for around 150 days, but after some of my creative marketing, I sold these homes for the same price.

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A little bit of marketing went a long way with these homes.

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Our next home seller seminar is coming up in January if you're interested in learning about the best ways to maximize your home sale. Click here for more information.

In the meantime if you have any questions about buying or selling a home, give me a call or send me an email. I look forward to helping you!

Philadelphia Market Update for October 2016

There is a lot of confusion in the market lately due to misinformation about real estate market numbers. Today I’d like to clear this up for you.

Buying a home? Click here to perform a full home search 

Selling a home? Click here for a FREE Home Price Evaluation 

Call me at (215) 576-8666 for a FREE home buying or selling consultation

There is a lot of confusion in the market right now, so I’d like to alleviate some that confusion for you today. If you’ve kept up with the market around the country, you may have read headlines from major media sources like “California Home Sales Come Tumbling Down to Earth” and “California Home Sales Gaining Momentum,” which only adds to the confusion.

To paint a clearer picture for you, I’m going to show you what’s really taking place in our market with facts and data.

When talking about the market on the whole, many people will only look at the years that really took off, usually between 2003 to 2005, when sales were extremely high. If you look at the numbers from the years before that, however, you’ll see that those numbers are much closer to the kinds of numbers that we’re seeing today. Many people wonder when the next big peak or valley is going to happen in our market because of the most recent crash.

If we look at data from a little further back, though, we see that from 1990 to 1999, home sales steadily increased almost every year. Why did this happen? It’s because populations naturally increase. The most recent crash occurred because these numbers shot up much too quickly.

Interestingly enough, if you look at the graph above that removes the numbers from 2000-2013, you’ll see that home sales today are sitting almost exactly where they were in 1999, before the bubble and the crash. This means that we’re almost exactly where we should be!

Is affordability a challenge in the current real estate market? Let’s look at the housing affordability index. This index measures whether or not a typical family earns enough income to qualify for a mortgage loan.

In the graph above, you’ll see that the higher the score is, the easier it is to buy a home. When people say that home affordability is down right now, they’re right if we compare it from 2009 to 2015. However, from 2009-2012, we were faced with a whole bunch of foreclosures and short sales, which also lowered the value of other homes around them, resulting in homes being sold at a major discount. So, of course prices were lower then and people were able to buy more! Since home prices are coming back today, the housing affordability index is shrinking.

If we go back all the way from 1990 to 2000, we’ll see that today’s affordability index is higher in number. The index may not be as high as it was in 2009 or 2015, but the homes that were sold during those times were sold at major discounts. If we compare the numbers from this year to the previous decade, you’ll see that we’re doing just fine when compared to earlier years.

This means that right now we’re in a very healthy market. With interest rates as low as they are, a family with a household income of less than $45,000 can afford to buy a median-priced home. Isn’t that amazing?

If we look at inventory of homes on the market, we see that we have much less inventory this year than we did last year, and this is reflected in the low numbers for foot traffic. I don’t necessarily that there are fewer buyers on the market looking for homes; there are simply fewer houses to look at! When more homes are listed, the market will balance itself out.

What does all of this mean to you if you’re thinking about selling your home? Now is a great time to list your home on the market because there are many buyers out there who are looking to buy homes.

This is an even better time to buy a home since interest rates are still under 4%. It’s also important not to let a low credit score deter you for applying for a mortgage; over 50% of buyers with credit scores between 500 and 750 closed mortgages this year. Don’t put yourself on the sideline because of your credit score.

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Now is the perfect time to buy or sell a home.

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Also, don’t forget about our next Home Selling Sharks Seminar on October 22nd at the Hilton Garden Inn at Port Washington. Register for your seat here today!

If you have any questions about buying or selling homes in our market, don’t hesitate to reach out to me by phone or email. I’d be happy to help you!