Home Stagers Meet - RESA International Conference – January, 2010

San Antonio, Texas August 27, 2009

Dan Eason, president of EnergizedSeller.com, announced today that he would be representing his company at the first International Conference of the Real Estate Staging Association (RESA) in January 2010.

EnergizedSeller.com is a free online resource that provides home selling tips and home staging tips to home sellers, real estate agents, home stagers and home improvement professionals.

“The RESA conference will be a great time to meet the professional home stagers who participate on our site and who are truly dedicated to helping sellers increase the value of their homes,” Eason said.

RESA is a worldwide member-governed trade association for professional real estate stagers. Real Estate Staging is the process of preparing a home for sale to create immediate buyer interest.

The RESA International Conference will focus on providing all home stagers, regardless of designation, training or background, with personal and professional development opportunities.

“RESA has been very welcoming to EnergizedSeller.com,” Eason said. “They recognize the value we bring to the home selling and staging industries. I'm looking forward to the conference and the opportunity to meet so many industry professionals.”

“We feel Energized Seller is an extremely valuable resource for consumers in addition to home stagers and Realtors", Shell Brodnax, President and CEO of RESA, said.

The Real Estate Staging Association Conference, “What Happens In Vegas May Stay In Vegas - But What You Learn Goes Home With You!” will take place in Las Vegas, Nevada on January 24 - 26, 2010.

For more information visit

http://energizedseller.com/

www.RESAConference.com

Home Staging Tips – Ten excellent Home Staging Tips and Tricks to sell your Home

Home Staging Tips 1 - Go through the home and clear off all the horizontal surfaces like kitchen and bathroom countertops. Counters need to be clear and clean. When cleaning a kitchen countertop, make sure to remove any types of appliances or cutting boards from it before you attempt to clean it.

Home Staging Tips 2 - Cleaning bathrooms is a standard part of every house cleaning service, but it doesn't have to seem like a chore. Proper cleaning of a bathroom is crucial for the health as well as the longevity of the bathroom fixtures. Make bathrooms seem like a breeze.

Home Staging Tips 3 - A home should smell good. Making your home smell good can done by keeping it clean, leaving out a bowl of vinegar to absorb nasty odors and simmering a mixture of apple cider, sliced lemon and cinnamon sticks over the stove. Keep homes smell lovely with advice from a professional home stager or home cleaner.

Home Staging Tips 4 - Make your Home ageless. Make your home a more comfortable place to live. Keep everything fresh, up to date and well maintained.

Home Staging Tips 5 - Lighting is one of the most important ways to set the mood in a home, whether it is for sale or rent. Make sure that the level of light in each room is appropriate for the function of that room. As a rule of thumb, bathrooms, closets and kitchens should have even, bright light while bedrooms, dining rooms and dens should have softer, ambient lighting.

Home Staging Tips 6 – Go for Home Inspection. Hiring home inspectors has advantages for both home buyers and home sellers. Home sellers that hire a home inspector can be proactive about making the repairs necessary to help their homes sell more quickly. Home buyers can feel confident that the home they buy is not in need of any major or minor structural work.

Home Staging Tips 7 - When it comes to walls, color is popular. The problem is that the next buyer might not like the same colors. Paint is a relatively inexpensive way to make a house look clean and fresh. And if you are going to repaint prior to selling, stick with neutrals. And remember that white reflects the light best and makes rooms look their largest.

Home Staging Tips 8 – Beautify your walls with Art, if necessary. Paintings and picture frames are great additions to walls, but there are other options as well. Eliminate wall damage when hanging pictures or other decor.

Home Staging Tips 9 – Get the carpet shampooed to get out any stains or smells. If that does not work, replace it. And consider, if you can, wood or laminates as an alternative.

Home Staging Tips 10 - Remove all personal and religious items when showing the house. Potential buyers need to imagine the house as their own and emotionally move in regardless of their ethnic background.

GinaMcNew -Bathroom Tips

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Home Staging Tips - 12 Bathroom Staging Tips by Gina McNew, a Home Staging Professional from, Atlanta, Georgia. Get More Home Staging Advice from Gina McNew and other Home Staging Professionals, on http://energizedseller.com/.

Home Selling Tips – Tips on Landscaping

Landscaping can be a smart investment; the first impressions of a buyer can often make or break a sale, and the exterior of your home is the first thing everyone sees. For a small investment of time and money, you can use landscaping to make your house stand out and be noticed. The following are some Home Selling Tips about of landscaping you should consider before putting your house on the market: 

Home Selling Tips 1 - Plan before you buy. Sketch your landscape design on paper before you start planting and building. Knowing exactly what you need and where you're going to put it helps avoid wasting money. 

Home Selling Tips 2 - Begin by coordinating the colors of your flowering foliage. Think about your selling season and plan for flowering plants that perform well during that time. Also give thought to the desired atmosphere and use plants to support that concept. 

Home Selling Tips 3 - If you have no dedicated walkway to the front door, add a simple pathway. A wandering pathway to the front door psychologically feels better than a straight-shot walkway. If you have a plain, straight concrete walkway, create undulating flower beds on either side to encourage a relaxed, friendly feeling. 

Home Selling Tips 4 - Adding a water feature also enhances the ambiance, because moving water relaxes the body and mind and refreshes the spirit. 

Home Selling Tips 5 - Cutting fresh edges where grass meets mulch makes the lawn look well kept. A move as simple as curving the edge of your flower beds could increase the value of your home by one percent. Also, if your foundation plants are overgrown, widening the beds by two feet will make the shrubs seem smaller. 

Home Selling Tips 6 - Choose a highly visible area for your planting; near the front of the house or next to a front path or stair is usually a good choice. Landscaping should match the style of the house. 

Home Selling Tips 7 - It is important that you start out with good soil and maintain the ideal growing conditions for your grass type. Generally, this starts with having your soil tested. Testing the soil will ensure that you are fertilizing correctly and help you understand which grass is best for your area. 

Home Selling Tips 8 - Fences provides privacy, but select a style, such as lattice, that lets air circulate while blocking the view. Dress it up with an apple tree or pyracantha trained in a decorative design on a wire grid. 

Home Selling Tips 9 - Brick paving and lion sculptures add to the semiformal look, which is made less rigid by splashes of annual flowers. 

Home Selling Tips 10 - Talk to the professional Home Stagers or other Landscaping Professionals. You may not need to hire a landscape architect or designer to develop your whole project, but somewhat little for an hour long consultation is well worth the money if it saves you from costly mistakes later.

Home Staging Tips – Tips to get top price for your House

Home Staging Tips 1 – Nothing beats a spacious and clean house. And until that is done, nothing else will have the same impact. So walk around your property and decide what can be given away, sold or put away in storage. Keep only the essentials. 

Home Staging Tips 2 - Walk around and pay attention to anything that is not in good working condition – chipped paint, cracks on walls or ceilings, doors which do not open or close properly, missing or broken handles, missing lights, running faucets, etc. Get it fixed. 

Home Staging Tips 3 - Painting is the cheapest way to enhance a room. In the least, paint main rooms such as, entrance, living room, dining room, kitchen, master bedroom, in fresh, neutral colors, if needed. Home Stagers can help you with the choice of colors. 

Home Staging Tips 4 - You need to put away anything that reflects your personal life and taste in an obvious way and make it look like a real estate property to sell. Finally, if you have your favorite collections, put most of them away, keep only a few best items on display. 

Home Staging Tips 5 – Do not forget the outside. The visitors will notice the way the house looks from the curb and their perception of your property will start there. 

Home Staging Tips 6 – Place your furniture in each room so that you have very obvious focal points that show off the best selling features of your home. 

Home Staging Tips 7 - Spend money on new light fixtures in brushed nickel or stainless steel. There are many low cost lighting stores to select from. Leave on certain lights during the day. During showings, turn on all lights and lamps. 

Home Staging Tips 8 - In the bathroom, remove any unnecessary items from countertops, tubs, shower stalls and commode tops. Keep only your most needed cosmetics, brushes, perfumes, etc., in one small group on the counter. Coordinate towels to one or two colors only. 

Home Staging Tips 9 - Create an atmosphere in your home so that it appeals to a wide range of potential home buyers. Be sure to put your own likes and dislikes aside. 

 Home Staging Tips 10 - Open up the window treatments let the sun show off your clean, organized, and well staged home. 

Home Staging - What is Home Staging

Home Staging also referred to as House Fluffing, can be defined as the task of window dressing a real estate property to maximize its real estate home value. Home Staging, or the process of preparing a home prior to putting it up for sale, has become an organized, thriving business. Home Staging can not only enable a home to fetch a significantly better price, but can also drastically reduce the listing time of the home on the market. 

A well presented property looks more appetizing and could sell for as much as more than properties that is poorly presented. Home Staging allows a home to be sold significantly faster than homes that are not staged. Some believe Home Staging is an art, while others say it is a science. In fact, it is a mix of both. Home Staging sure helps if you have an artistic bent of mind and an aptitude for making homes look more attractive. 

Home Staging is the process that sellers need to go through so that their home is appealing to the broadest possible number of prospective buyers. The best place to start Home Staging is on the outside of the home so that buyers will want to come in. Home Staging is the art of decorating a home to sell quickly and for top dollar. Home Staging is the most proven way to get the highest selling price for a property. 

Most Realtors and homeowners are familiar with the concept of Home Staging. But often, when people think of home staging, they tend to think of high dollar vacant homes filled to the brim with designer furniture. In fact, Home Staging is simply the process of preparing a home for sale, vacant or occupied, high dollar or not. The goal of any good home staging is to help a house stand out from the competition so it will sell as quickly as possible and for the best possible price. 

Remember, when you are preparing your house to sell, you want to make the right first impression. That is where Home Staging comes in. Home Staging involves preparing a home for sale through cleaning, de cluttering, updating the decor, and making repairs. You can hire professional home stagers. Or, at great savings to you, you can do the home staging yourself. 

Home Staging is appropriate pre sale property presentation where techniques are used to present the property at its most desirable to the potential buyer whilst keeping costs to a minimum. However, Home Staging is not decorating, according to real estate professionals. It is more like depersonalizing a home so that prospective buyers can imagine themselves in it. 

Home Stagers – Benefits of Staging Homes by Home Stagers

House Staging is a psychological art. Good Home Stagers will be savvy to the psychological desires of humans, will understand the cultural preferences of the likely buyer, and can transform an undesirable piece of real estate into one that is more desirable. Home Stagers can see your house as buyers will, and Home Stagers will set the scene so that buyers can imagine living there. Home Stagers are likely to simplify or streamline the furniture in a room for better traffic flow and to enhance its spaciousness. Home Stagers may neutralize a too personal color scheme or add touches of color or accessories where needed. 

Home Stagers work as part of the professional real estate team to develop a comprehensive marketing strategy. So, it is ideal to introduce the Home Stagers prior to listing and definitely before scheduling the open house. The goal of the Home Stagers is to showcase the architectural features of a home so buyers can envisions themselves living there from the moment they open the door. Home Stagers work essentially with furniture and accessories the owner already has yet custom furnishings can also be incorporated as needed. 

Realtors work with the good Home Stagers, when working with the average population the Realtor must be careful to ensure that the professional that they choose to work with has much more knowledge then simply decorating a home. Realtors should screen any Home Stagers that they refer business to for interpersonal decorum so that the seller is not insulted, cultural norms so that the property appeals to the desired buying population, and psychological knowledge to know what has mass appeal versus secular appeal. If a real estate agent is successful in their screening of professionals and successful in convincing their client to enlist the services of these Home Stagers then one can be pretty much assured of getting a higher price for the property and having the property on the market for a shorter period of time. 

Home Stagers believe no seller should sell their home before staging it and provide some interesting facts and statistics to back up their claims. House Staging is not decorating or interior design. Though some of the same design principals are used, the objectives are actually the opposite. Designers are personalizing a space while Home Stagers are depersonalizing and neutralizing to help a home appeal to any buyer. Buyers considering staging their home should consider consulting with the Professional Home Stagers who can guide them with the proper techniques to help their home look its best for a sale. 

There are Home Stagers, however, who will go above and beyond what most homeowners think of when they go to sell their house. While decorating is geared toward the owner, House Staging is aimed first and foremost at pleasing the biggest possible number of buyers. For a fee, these Home Stagers will come into your home and use your existing items. Or, bring in items that add that special touch to complete a room and make your house as attractive as possible. House Staging costs often include moving around, removing or adding furniture and adding tasteful artwork or other decoration to make your home really shine.

EnergizedSeller Announces Seven-Point Stimulus Package for Home Sellers

SAN ANTONIO, TEXAS--EnergizedSeller.com, the community website filled with information on Selling a House and Staging Homes, has announced a seven-point stimulus package for home sellers who want to get their home sold quickly and for the best possible price. 

“Home Sellers need to beg, borrow or steal--okay, not steal, but certainly beg or borrow--that extra $500 or $4,000 that they need to create their own home-sale stimulus package to get their home sold faster," says EnergizedSeller.com President Dan Eason. "The home seller's stimulus package--unlike the federal government’s--pays for itself." 

Selling a House can be extremely challenging today due to market conditions that haven't been seen since the late 1980s. That's why home sellers are flocking to the EnergizedSeller.com social networking website to learn how they can increase their home value. 

“Sellers are realizing they have to work harder to make their home stand out and look better since there are so many other homes on the market,” Eason says. 

Sellers can stimulate the sale of their home by investing in the most valuable asset most of them own. 

“We don’t know what return we’ll get from the national stimulus package, but with a proper home selling stimulus, they'll get a return that will be more than their initial investment. And once their home is sold, this stimulus shouldn’t leave any new debts," Eason says. 

The cost of preparing a home for sale is typically much less than the average price reduction that's offered on homes that aren't prepared. Sellers should do whatever they can to make cost-effective improvements to their home. An investment of $500 to $4,000 can stimulate the sale of their home, help get the home sold more quickly and help protect against price reductions. 

Here are EnergizedSeller.com's top seven home selling tips for home sellers who want to stimulate the sale of their home: 

1. Hire a Good Realtor. The national median home price dropped 15 percent in 2008 (National Association of Realtors) and the median days on the market increased to 100 days in January (Altos Research).  A home seller needs to gain every advantage they can in today’s market, and finding a good Realtor that comes highly recommended is important when marketing a home.  

2. Hire a Home Stager. A recent study by HomeGain showed that staging a home for a sale generates a return on investment of 343%. The average cost, depending on the market and needs, is $403 to $584 and can be as little as $150.  

3. Clean and De-clutter. Cleaning a home isn't much fun, but a clean home is crucial to a fast sale. A recent EnergizedSeller.com survey found that Realtors around the country picked cleaning as the top task they wanted home sellers to focus on.  Additionally, HomeGain found that an investment in cleaning and de-cluttering generates a staggering 578% return.  Cost: $0 to $500. 

4. Rent a Storage Unit. Savvy sellers remove extra furniture and household items to make their home seem larger. The return on investment is the perceived value of extra square footage. Cost: $100 to $500. 

5. Hire a Handyman. Sellers who paint, repair, install and do whatever else is necessary to make their home move-in-ready will get a great return on their investment. Cost: $200 to $2,000. 

6. Improve Curb Appeal.  For the second year in a row the Remodeling Cost vs. Value Report (www.costvsvalue.com) showed that exterior remodeling projects return the most money as a percentage of cost. Cost: $200+ 

7. Utilize Free Home Selling Tips. There are a lot of free web sites with good home selling tips.  For example, EnergizedSeller.com offers advice on more than 40 different topics related to Selling a House and Staging A Home. Sellers who are implement as many of these suggestions as possible can get tremendous returns. 

About EnergizedSeller. EnergizedSeller, www.energizedseller.com, is a social networking community website for home sellers, Realtors, home stagers, home improvement contractors and other professionals who are involved in home sales. The website addresses the tremendous need that home sellers have for common sense information that will help them get their home ready for sale. The website offers practical advice and specific answers to home sellers' questions on how to improve their home to maximize their home property value and sell it as quickly as possible.