MLS Photos

Staging put simply is merchandising your home for sale, like you would any product you want to sell well. It's all about how you display your property. Neutral colors...simple furniture and minimal accessories allows your buyer to envision the house as their home.

Stats: When you list your property with a Realtor, they list the home on MLS. This is where people go to preview homes that they will want to tour or make offers on.

When you put only 1 photo on MLS, you will get an average of 5 views and 1.37 leads.

When you put 21 or more photos you will get an average of over 77 views and 11+ leads.

It is important to make these photos talk! Staged photos will have the biggest ROI (Return On Investment) Clearly, the listings that added 20+ photos generated nearly 10 times the number of leads and over 15 times the number of views.

This is a list of stats about how many days the market (DOM) correlating to how many pictures are shown on MLS: 1 photo = 70 DOM

6 photos = 40 DOM

16-19 photos = 36 DOM

20 photos max=32 DOM

Price as a percentage of the Original Price also showed a direct correlation.

1 Photo = 91.2% of Original Price

6 or more = 95% of Original Price

According to these findings, a $600,000 home, sporting only one photo, could sell for as much as 3.8% LESS or a loss of over $22,000, just because there was only one photo accompanying the listing. More amazing is the fact that only 12% of agents posted the maximum 20 photos.

**Source Point2 (point2.com) & *Source FSBO Blog 5/2008

New Year Wishes

I want to wish everyone a Happy and Prosperous New Year. I know in our own businesses (my staging business and my husband's landscape business), it has sure slowed down. Chris, my husband has always said he wanted to take a 3 or 4 month sabatical. He said last night, he realized he has been on one for the last 3 months...he just wish he knew beforehand so he could have enjoyed it a little more! Hind sight is 20/20 I guess.

Actually, this slow down has come at a good time in some ways for us. At least I have Chris around to help me as we prepare to move to Idaho. The bad thing is that there is no income right now...and that is never good.

I am very much looking forward to getting to Idaho and getting busy again. I know that staging is being used more now than ever. In this economy, where it is a buyer's market, sellers are using all the tools they can to make their house sell faster and hopefully for the asking price they are wanting. I can't wait to get there and be part of the real estate market.

Well...Happy New Year again and I hope the coming year improves for you and you have a healthy year!

Photos of things I like

I got a camera a couple of years ago as a birthday gift from my husband. I have really enjoyed using it once in awhile (I wish more) to take photographs of the places I like to visit. Here are a few of them:

A couple of second grade jokes

If you know anything about us, you know our family is a bunch of Disney Freaks. So, I have been collecting Disney related jokes. Here are a few of my favorites!

Q. Why don't Tiger have any friends?
A. Because he's always playing with Pooh!

Q. How did Tiger get his head stuck in the toilet?
A. Because he was looking for Pooh!

Q: Why doesn't Cinderella play soccer?
A: Because she always runs away from the ball (and she has a pumpkin for a coach)!

Overheard while on a Jungle Cruise boat:
Boat Capitan: While we are waiting to dock, are there any questions?
Guest: Yea. What kind of Mickey Mouse operation is this?

Joke outdated by digital photography:
What did Snow White say after she dropped off her film to be developed?
(sing) Some day my PRINTS will come.


I know...they are corny, but cute!

New Staging Jobs

I got to stage two out of four new homes this week. The 4 homes are on the same property, two of each type. These are fun because they are brand new, but challenging in a lot of ways. First, there are no window treatments! The builder is leaving them up to the new owners and there was no money in the budget for it. The other thing is that the outside landscaping isn't done yet and the sewer line is still being installed, so there is an unbelievable amount of dust everywhere. Everytime you walk across the hard wood floors, you leave footprints!

Landscaping is suppose to go in this week and then there will be a Broker's Tour to start off the upcoming open houses.

To view these homes, please visit Sunset View Homes.

Sharing My Hobby

I wanted to show you all what I have been learning as a new hobby! It is so much fun to learn something new...and to have your cake and eat it too...what could be better?

Our new Idaho home

We decided to rent for a year before we decide whether to buy in Idaho. We just want to make sure the kids adjust and can stand having 4 seasons! We found a 5 bedroom with a bonus room, 3 bath home in a little town called Star. Star is about 7 miles out of Nampa.

We have a barn out back with a coral. We are going to turn our city kids into country kids. We plan on getting a steer, a lamb and egg laying chickens! This should be entertaining!

Moving To Idaho

We decided to rent for a year before we decide whether to buy in Idaho. We just want to make sure the kids adjust and can stand having 4 seasons! We found a 5 bedroom with a bonus room, 3 bath home in a little town called Star. Star is about 7 miles out of Nampa.

We have a barn out back with a coral. We are going to turn our city kids into country kids. We plan on getting a steer, a lamb and egg laying chickens! This should be entertaining!