Home Staging

Custom staging a development takes 10-12 weeks as 8 weeks are needed for custom manufacturing. It usually takes 2-4 weeks to finalise the final design and final budget. In our experience bringing an interior designer/home stager into the project as early as possible just for a few hours of consulting first before plans are submitted for approval makes a world of difference. A fresh perspective on the layout helps to identify any issues and designers can also give input on trendy colours and material palettes which could help in the marketing of the development.

We no longer provide rental show house furniture but this can cost anywhere from a minimum of R15 000 for an apartment to R25 000 for a house for 4-6 weeks. When it comes to custom staging where the furniture is sold with the property (usually by developers) the cost can vary depending on the price point of the development, target market and the size of the unit. Here is a portfolio of some of our past projects and costs to give an idea. If you have a furnished property and need help with styling your rooms and adding a few pieces you can work on our hourly rate of R950 per hour with a minimum fee of 3 hours.

80% of buyers view homes online first. Empty properties don’t show size or layout and therefore attract less people as the buyer needs to do more work to figure out the space. In the convenience of searching online with hundreds of other properties just a click away, you need to make the buyers job easy and get their attention fast. Anytime a buyer needs to make a concession when buying a property they can simply choose to walk away from the deal or lower their offer. Home staging is about proactively dealing with issues prior to showing your home so that when someone sees it for the first time they get a better first impression and automatically value your home in a different category. Most buyers would prefer to move into a space without major issues that they need to address. This doesn’t mean it is worth it to make your house the best on the street by pouring in hundreds of thousands of rands to renovate in the short term. But this does mean cosmetic fixes and adding a bit of charm and something loveable to the space and showing buyers the potential in its current state. If you wouldn’t wear your pyjamas to a job interview then it makes sense not to try sell without staging.

When we first started staging in 2014 we offered rental furniture to developers as the quick turnaround and lower initial cost seemed like the better option, but over the years we identified a number of issues with this model that led to us discontinuing this service. We now recommend custom staging show units for the following strategic reasons:

1. There is a zero staging cost or third party insurance risk to the developer and they have the potential to add a revenue stream by selling the fully furnished units themselves. This also differentiates them in the market by adding an additional service offering which appeals to investor buyers.
2. New developments often look quite similar to buyers making it harder for them to commit to buying as the similar choices become overwhelming. When they are staged using generic rental staging furniture that is also used by multiple other developers repeatedly then this problem is intensified. Developments take longer to sell than single homes so staged photo’s from other developers from months before could appear online/in papers at the same time that your development is staged with the same rental furniture. Buyers are not given a compelling reason to fall in love with or remember a specific development when they look so similar and so they stay in search and comparison mode delaying purchase and decision making.
3. A custom staged show unit can be designed for the specific target market for the development resulting in a better buyer response and faster sales as it shows them exactly what they want to see. A custom designed interior with new custom furniture will also be on trend and have mass market appeal vs more of a niche look that one store would have or a dated look that old reused staging furniture would have. In order for rental stagers to make money they need to pay off their furniture over time which means it is used for years before being refreshed.
4. Units staged either by developers going to 1 furniture store themselves or one store approaching a developer often ends up looking like a furniture showroom which isn’t fresh or aspirational and it often looks empty as nothing is the correct scale or custom designed. Our custom designs make the most of the space and make the unit feel more premium as everything fits edge to edge and we can allow for more seating in the lounge and dining room. Our units are designed to look like real loved homes which always sell faster. When buyers see something unique they are more urgent about the sale as there is the feeling of missing out on something really special but when they see interiors that look like what they have seen at Coricraft or @Home for years they are left bored.
5. Our interiors showcase styles not often seen in South Africa and encourage buyers to hang around for longer on show days as each room provides lots of treasures to explore. Buyers spend 40 minutes in staged homes vs 5 minutes in empty homes and the better they are staged the longer the look around. We work tirelessly on making our interiors special, custom producing our own art and sourcing unusual accessories from multiple cities to make sure the look is exciting and delights people viewing the show units. We specifically create ‘Instagrammable’ interiors filled with unique items and custom furniture that get buyers attention online and make property ads more likeable and shareable on social media.

Home staging is based on the simple principle that elevating a home above others in the same price range, comes down to first impressions.When I stage a property, whether furnished and adding accessories or unfurnished and custom designing from scratch, it’s all about helping buyers to fall in love with your property as quickly as possible. This means removing all the things that could bother them/get them to delay making a decision about buying a home and adding things that match their vision of how they would like to live (to be neat, entertain more, create wonderful memories, live in a beautiful space). If you are the only one in your area approaching the sale of your property strategically then your chances of selling are increased because you are giving people what they are looking for.