Stage to Sell, Stage to Stay

Tweet

What do buyers want?

Not necessarily a brand-new bathroom. That came in close to last in an informal poll of 1,025 ForSaleByOwner.com site visitors in mid-2011.

Also low on their priority lists: fun and funky decorating, and showers big enough for two.

No, what buyers want is good design for daily use. That was the top priority for a healthy third of polltakers. Second was ‘a clean, fresh environment.’ Luxury finishes, like granite and travertine, came in third, the top choice for only 16% of respondents.

Thankfully for home sellers, a clean, functional bathroom that presents as fresh and inviting, trumps the trophy bathroom.

If you have white fixtures, consider adopting a favorite tactic developed by staging guru Barb Schwarz www.stagedhomes.com. She paints the walls a medium green, throwing the white fixtures into a sculptural relief. Here’s the difference that green made to one of her clients’ bathrooms. Scroll down to the prior blog post to see this bathroom in its unremarkable ‘before’.