Alright, a play on words here (as usual for me) but I’m really talking about a woman I know named Andy Capelluto who is a former interior designer turned staging coach extraordinaire. We met a few years ago when I took a class of hers about staging properties for real estate listings.
I’ll admit that I went to the class not only for the clock hours but also to do some R&D. You know, rip off and duplicate. I wanted to see her ideas and get access to her contacts for certain kinds of work or rentals that I might need in my own staging work for clients. What she didn’t know till after the class was that, back in the early days of my career, I’d worked in retail – specifically, 3 years as a manager of a retail furniture business (3 locations and 1 warehouse) where we had to merchandise room vignettes on a daily basis. Plus, in my current real estate business I’ve been providing staging services as part of my regular services program and have so for several years. At the time I attended this class I was upping the ante of the kind of staging I would supply and Andy’s class was a good forum to get those ideas and tips. We ended up hitting it off very well and we have stayed in touch since that class.
A few months ago Andy contacted me to say that she was partnering up with firm called Realty U, based in California. They have taken her class content and turn it into an online clock-hour course and designation called AHS or Accredited Home-Staging Specialist. This is going to make Barb Schwartz, the real estate agent turned staging entrepreneur, work harder for her money. She’s had a monopoly on this kind of training material for some time within real estate circles so Andy is taking on a big player, and one who has been making a lot of money on her 2-day courses. Barb started out as an agent and turned into a staging coach/instructor – Andy did the reverse by going designer first and then seeing the potential in the real estate market for her craft.
The fun bit for me is this, I now have this designation from Andy’s school and I’ll be supplying some photos to their program to use on the company website showing the power of staging. It will be fun to have some of my work highlighted on a “national” site and to have it promoted among other real estate professionals.
Do I worry that I’ll have some folks critique and criticize my work? Maybe a little. But the bigger plus is that it will get people looking, talking, and working harder to do a great job for their real estate clients. Professionalism is something I’ve promoted the past 5 years I’ve been in the business and this is one more way an agent can do that. We see hundreds, if not thousands, of homes each year and we know what looks good and what doesn’t. We should be able to bring that expertise into a client’s home to help them make the best of their home and how it is seen as a product – which is what it is when it goes up for sale.
Do you think staged homes are “worth it”? Give me your feedback if you think it’s junk or if it’s a great idea. To what lengths would you go to stage a home?
In a future post I’ll provide some of my classic before and after photos for you to judge and compare…
