The holidays are an emotionally charged time of the year, where memories are made and good times are had with friends and family. You can take advantage of these moments by staging your home with some holiday spirit.
The key to staging a home festively is to remember that less is more. Do not go overboard and fill every open space with tinsel and garland. Choose a few areas, and focus on a festive theme with your staging. The goal is to have potential buyers stop and picture themselves celebrating the holidays in this house. And to do that, you need to set a scene and evoke emotion.
If you are staging the home early in the holiday season – perhaps after Thanksgiving it’s not too early to get in the holiday spirit. You can set a scene in the living room of a family decorating the tree. Set up a tree in the corner, but remember it shouldn’t be an overwhelmingly large tree, have boxes of decorations sitting on the table, and the tree half decorated. Play festive music in the background and use the smell of fresh pine to fill the air.
Closer to the holidays, you can create scenes in the kitchen of a family home by decorating a gingerbread house. Use a bowl of icing and small candies with an assembled or partially assembled gingerbread house. Buyers walking through this room will be able to smell the freshly baked gingerbread and imagine themselves baking and decorating with their own children next holiday season.
Even as you get quite close to the holiday season, you can change your staging to capture the mood of Christmas. Showcase a fireplace by hanging stockings from the mantel. Fill them with small toys and candy and place a plate with a half eaten cookie and an empty glass of milk on the hearth to show that Santa has already been there.
Setting the scene of what the festive season will be like for potential buyers, allows them to imagine themselves and their families celebrating their own holidays in the home. They are able to picture their children coming down Christmas morning to filled stockings, and presents under the tree or sitting down to a turkey dinner in the elegant dining room. Once they feel are able to picture their family in the home, you have made the sale! So turn on the carols, light the Yule log in the fireplace and start decorating the halls!
Karen Schaefer is owner and writer of http://www.simpleappeal.com which is a home staging site & we provide information regarding home staging, real estate tips, stage your home and many more property staging.