23 Common Staging Mistakes Sellers Make

Staging a home isn’t an exact science — it’s more of an art, one that covers several rooms and flows throughout a home. The goal is to create a warm, welcoming space that will resonate with buyers. Here are the biggest mistakes you can make when staging your house for sale.

An unstaged room: 

Unless you’re in a very strong seller’s market, you should consider light staging.

• Wall-to-wall furniture: Most of our homes contain too many items for staging to work well.

• Closets stuffed full of items: Hiding stuff instead of eliminating it won’t work when buyers peek inside closets.

• Cluttered surfaces: Give your home the best chance of hooking a buyer by clearing surfaces of clutter.

• Closed doors: Closed doors can give buyers a sense that you’re hiding something (and they’re just going to open them, anyway).

• Shabby carpet: Tired carpeting and peeling linoleum aren’t a good look in any home.

• Toys and books in the corner: How many is “too many” books or toys? You need to eliminate as much as you can.

An (almost empty) staged room

Too little furniture is almost as bad as too much; a nearly empty room will look strange.

• Water stains on a wall corner: Ignoring critical improvements is just as bad as not staging at all.

• Patchy paint: Sprucing up your paint is easy and makes the room look pulled together; failing to do that is a mistake.

• Furniture too small for the room: You don’t have to fit your home’s scale exactly, but too-big or too-small items will make your rooms look off.

• Minimal/modernist décor: Clean, minimalist lines are all the rage, but these styles aren’t the most homelike.

• One aesthetic everywhere: Buyers who walk through might think this looks lovely, but they won’t see themselves living in it.

• Narrow, neutral color palettes: In rooms where everything is one color, nothing really stands out.

A staged room

• • Fake flowers: They’re easier to keep “alive,” but fake flowers and plants can make a house feel, well, fake.

  • Family pictures on the wall: Buyers won’t be able to see themselves in a house full of your personal items.

  • Collectible artwork: Museum showpieces can alienate buyers; best leave the collectible artwork stored away.

  • Bare floors: Carpets or rugs can help provide structure and flow to rooms; forgetting them can make rooms feel adrift in a sea of house.

  • Trying too hard: Over-staging makes sellers feel like they’re in a movie, not a real house.

A staged room

• • Cat litter box in the corner: Focusing only on sight means you’ll miss other ways that buyers are put off your house.

  • Gorgeous picture window — with bookshelf in front of it: Don’t block views or architectural features with your furniture.

Home exterior

• • Patchy lawn: Don’t ignore curb appeal — your buyers sure won’t.

  • Empty flower pots: When you miss an opportunity to add plants or flowers, you’re missing out on the chance for your house to feel vibrant and alive.