Property staging is an art and it can take a long time to find a style and system that works effectively in your area or market. We’ve talked a lot about things to do when property staging, the right colours to choose, the key focus points to address in your staging as well as how property staging in Melbourne is proving to be effective. 

What we’ve not really discussed is things to avoid in property staging; what not to do. Most property staging will have some positive impact on the sales potential of your home or property but its impact is often limited by consistent errors or mistakes. That’s not to say that property staging isn’t difficult or that certain styles won’t work better with certain markets; we’ve discussed key considerations for property staging before. However, if those enquiries aren’t coming in, it’s important to know where you might be going wrong in order to correct it.

Below, we have highlighted some of the things you should avoid during property staging to improve your chances of providing a quick sale and maximising your enquiries. This includes notes on the right type of art to use, improving your selection of colour and making more effective use of house plants.

Overshadowing the property with art

Artwork is a popular tool for property stagers as it allows you to depersonalise the property while providing an interesting visual point that can work in tandem with your other design choices. However, therein lies the crux of the problem. Quite often, people think that the art needs to be a star in the show and in most cases, it should barely be a supporting cast. Your art choices should mainly go unnoticed as to put it bluntly, you aren’t selling a gallery ticket; you are selling a property. 

Having a property with lots of nice pictures is missing the point of property staging. You are looking to accentuate the positives of your property while diminishing the problems and the main thing in potential buyers’ heads should be the property and visualising themselves living there. Anything that takes away from that really isn’t necessary and can often make the job of the estate agent harder. Keep art simple and effective, floral patterns and plants are popular choices as they are nice but rarely visually striking or impactful.

Making your property too bland

The first tip you are most likely to get for property staging is depersonalise. Ensure that the property doesn’t feel ‘lived in’ as it’s difficult for buyers to envision themselves in the property and it makes that first impression one of walking into someone else’s home. This is a good tip and one that you must ensure to keep in mind when designing your layout and arrangement. 

However, it’s important to not go too far and make your property feel samesy and tonally bland. The goal should be to create something that feels neutral but still pops and makes use of the natural elements and qualities of the property. Going with a minimalist colour palette or furniture elements runs the risk of making the property look fake and tired. It’s something that is difficult to place but if it is in the heads of your buyers, they’ll be far less likely to put a bid in. So go neutral but make use of different lighting and colour choices to avoid the property feeling too familiar. 

Not making use of light

In the toolbox of property stagers, light is one of the most effective ways to add a little spark and welcoming energy to the property. Natural light is incredibly important and should be used wherever possible to create a spacious and encouraging feel to the property. For open plan properties, this might be the most important thing to note. Natural lighting massively showcases the main selling point of the open space. If you can’t ensure natural lighting in certain areas, make good use of table and corner lamps to help layer the lighting throughout the room. Light Bulb choices are often discussed and argued but daylight bulbs are a particularly strong choice as they don’t make too much visual noise.

It’s staging, not interior design

One all too common staging mistake is to try to capture modern trends and styling choices into your designs in order to capture a specific aesthetic. Interior designing and property staging are two different things and trying to do both at the same time is asking for disaster. While incorporating modern aspects for the market isn’t necessarily a bad idea (making more use of outdoor design tropes has proven effective for millennials and younger property buyers), it often overcomplicates the project and leaves the property feeling trapped into a specific look, making it feel quite personalised and reducing the chance of a buyer being able to see themselves in your home.

That’s not to say that it’s always bad, your client or yourself might have a very particular buyer in mind. However, in that case, it’s likely that the property already has a lot of those elements and you are just accentuating them. Your job isn’t to reshape the property towards a particular look, you’ll be taking most of the staging away anyway. Transitional style is the safest bet to ensure a neutral look that doesn’t pigeonhole the property and reduce the chance of scaring away customers.

There are just a few things to avoid while property staging that should help you provide a better performance as well as generate quicker sales. Remember that property staging is not an exact science and what works for us might not work for you and vice versa. Markets can be considerably different and styles and popular choices can differ wildly so experiment to see what works best for you but keep these basics in mind.