When it comes to selling a home in Toronto, every detail counts. As inventory grows, home staging has become an invaluable tool for homeowners looking to make a lasting impression on potential buyers.

That said, home staging is more than arranging furniture; it’s a strategic process that enhances a property’s appeal, helping it sell faster and often at a higher price. In this article, we’ll cover what home staging is, why it’s essential, some data on its return on investment (ROI), and why hiring a professional stager is a worthwhile investment.

What Is Home Staging And Why Does It Matter?

Not everyone is familiar with the ins and outs of staging – and that’s okay. Before we dive into why it’s so important to hire a staging professional when you sell your home, let’s first touch on what staging actually is and why it’s so important.

In the most simple terms, staging is the process of refining your home’s appearance in order to increase its appeal and eventually, set the stage for great offers.

Because every home is different, staging looks different for everyone. However, it usually involves first decluttering and depersonalizing the space, then decorating and arranging the home to make it look great – this step could include removing or adding furniture, painting walls, and adding decor to create a cohesive look.

Staging isn’t just about personal taste, it’s also about psychology. A staged home makes it easier for buyers to imagine the home as theirs, not just as someone else’s property. By strategically highlighting your home’s best features, you make it easier for buyers to see the full potential of each room. This focus on strengths maximizes perceived value, creating an emotional connection that could lead to higher offers and faster sales.

Staging Tells a Story

A comprehensive story from the front door to the back helps put buyers at ease and creates trust in the home. If it’s a family home, that story needs to be told from beginning to end. Having a disco ball in the family room, a crazy large sound system in the kitchen and a crib in the spare bedroom is going to confuse people. Great staging focuses on the highest and best use of the home and reinforces that story throughout.

Great staging naturally guides buyers through the energy flow and walkways of a home – showcasing the space’s best usage. Only about one in ten buyers can fully picture the potential of an unfurnished room. If you don’t show people where the TV can go whilst still putting a large couch and coffee table and dining table, they can be left wondering how they will set things up. This gives them a mental job they just aren’t qualified to do, instead of putting them at ease as they walk through.

Curious about how the right prep can add value to your home sale? Explore these other blogs from our site.

• Do’s & Dont’s of Renovating to Sell
• Renovating a Semi-Detached? Have Some Consideration For Your Neighbours
• Staging: The Importance of Artwork

Sounds Easy – Why Can’t I Do It Myself?

On paper, staging sounds pretty straightforward. However, it’s a lot more complex in practice. Rather than taking a cookie-cutter approach, effective staging ensures your home appeals to the right type of buyer – without overtly alienating anyone outside of that target audience. It’s a delicate balance.

You may love how your home looks right now, but that doesn’t mean buyers will feel the same way. With that in mind, most professional stagers have a curated inventory of high-quality furniture and decor elements, which can make a significant difference in how a home appears. They can replace or supplement existing furnishings to create a consistent, appealing look that resonates with buyers.

Another reason why you should leave staging to the professionals: physical labour.
On top of being incredibly nuanced, staging is simply a lot of work – and hard work at that! Rather than something you can casually accomplish on a Saturday afternoon, proper staging is more like an entire move in itself.

Think you’ll just be tucking away old furnishings in the garage or basement? You’ll actually be loading bigger items (couches, beds, dressers, etc.) into a proper moving van and taking them to a storage facility. It’s a huge process. When you hire an experienced team of staging professionals they’ll be able to get the job done in record time without asking you to lift a finger.

Numbers Don’t Lie

Professional home staging isn’t mandatory by any means, but the value is undeniable. Sure, working with a professional will require an upfront investment, but the payoff is well worth it.

According to the Home Staging Institute, homes that are staged sell 73% faster than those that are not staged. On top of helping you sell sooner, staging can also give your final sale price a boost. The more buyers who become impressed with your home, the more likely you are to receive competing offers – which can drive up your home’s price.

As a top-performing real estate team that provides professional, full-service home staging in Toronto, we approach all home improvements with a 4-to-1 rule. In other words, we want to add $4 of value for every $1 spent – and that’s exactly what we do.

Along with staging, we take a comprehensive approach to pre-market preparations. Leveraging our specialized renovations, property, and project management background, we’ll help you 4X your investment at a minimum.

Looking for situation-specific home selling advice? Check out these other blog posts!

• Should You Sell Your Home During a Divorce?
• How to Sell a Home for a Family Member in Ontario
• How to Have Your Home on the Market in One Month

Mutch’s First-Class Staging Service

When it comes to accomplishing a great home sale, staging is really just the beginning. Getting your home ready to list could also involve cleaning out and organizing several years’ worth of belongings, making renovations, searching for the right agent, and more.

That said, selling your home doesn’t need to be overwhelming. We’ve created a solution that allows sellers to fully automate the process of selling simply by working with us, Mutch Property Group.

As a full-service real estate team, we manage every aspect of your sale to help you get the greatest return possible – including staging. You can even hand us the keys to your home and go on vacation, we can have your home listed (and potentially sold) by the time you get back.

Searching for a full-service real estate team to manage your home sale? Call us at 416-903-3695 or send us an email at team@mutchpropertygroup.com.