Greenbook: A Local Guide to Chesapeake Living -Issue 11 | Page 26

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HOME LIVING
Should You Stage
Your Home?
Photos courtesy of
Annapolis Staging and Design
The local market is hot. Homes are selling in hours and days,
not weeks and months. If you’ve been showing your property for
some time, and it isn’t selling, it might be time to reach out to a
professional Stager.
A
n affordable way to create vignettes that high-
light the best features of your home to potential
buyers, Staging is an essential tool in the real es-
tate process. In fact, staging can play a vital role in how
many visitors view your home, how long it sits on the
real estate market, and the closing price.
Marilyn Hendley is a successful real estate agent in Anne
Arundel and Howard counties. She frequently relies
on Stagers and says the extra money spent on staging
works to her clients’ advantage. “When a home is empty,
when it is cluttered or when the key selling areas—kitch-
en, dining room, living room, master bedroom—aren’t
attractive, marketing a home can be difficult. Homebuy-
ers these days almost always rely on newspaper, maga-
zines and online research as their first step in looking for
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GREENBOOK | SUMMER 2017
a home. If the photos and videos of a property don’t have
instant visual appeal, browsers will move right on to the
next home on the list.”
Carolyn Kibby, a former Anne Arundel County art in-
structor and American Airline hostess, met Laura Gin-
drod, a Family Life Specialist at John Hopkins, when
they both had school-aged children at Indian Creek
School. The duo owns Annapolis Staging and Design.
They say that staging might be the difference between
selling your home (or not) and between getting the price
you hope for and a price you have to settle for. “The fact
is that while staging is a cost, reducing the selling price
of your home to attract a contract is going to cost you
much more," Kibby said.