How to Stage Living Spaces When Selling Your Home

Potential homebuyers are looking for cozy living spaces where they can relax with family as well as entertain friends. Learn staging secrets that will make your living room, den or family room irresistible to buyers.

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February 24, 2021

By: Jacquelyn McGilvray

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Pare Down Furniture

The most important thing you can do to prepare your home for sale is to get rid of clutter. One of the major contributors to a cluttered look is having too much furniture. When professional stagers descend on a home being prepped for market, they often whisk away as much as half the furnishings so the house looks bigger. You want potential buyers to be able to move around each room without being blocked by furniture. Make sure they can easily access your home’s best features like the fireplace or built-in bookshelves, and make sure they can look out all the windows. Avoid a cluttered look by minimizing items on the coffee table and not piling so many pillows on the couch that nobody can sit on it.

See More Photos: Minimalist Living Room Designs We Love

Make It Neutral, But Not Boring

You’ve probably already heard one of the major rules of home staging is to keep everything neutral. Yes, you want to appeal to the most possible buyers with a palette everyone can agree on, but you also don’t want your house to be dull and boring. If your walls are a bold hue, paint them a middle-of-the-road, light color that will brighten the space. But that doesn’t mean you can’t use accent colors to infuse some personality. Try the 60-30-10 color rule. Sixty percent is the room’s main color – for staging, make that neutral – white, gray, beige, etc. The 30% is your secondary color, which should also be neutral and complement the main color. The 10% is your accent color – this is where you can use a vibrant hue or a soft pastel for a shot of style. In this space, white and gray are used as the primary and secondary colors, while the lilac pillows and chair along with the artwork are the accent. Perhaps let the season help you with your accent color. In cooler weather, add a cozy throw, faux fur or pillows in autumn-inspired earth tones. In spring and summer, accessorize with pastels, floral patterns and a few plants.

Learn More: Neutral Paint Shades Designers Love

From: Claire Paquin

Rethink Furniture Placement

There's a common belief that rooms will feel larger if all the furniture is pushed against the walls, but that isn't the case. Instead, furnish your space by floating furniture away from walls. Reposition sofas and chairs into cozy conversational groups, and place pieces so that the traffic flow in a room is obvious. Not only will this make the space more user-friendly, but it will open up the room and make it seem larger.

See More Photos: How to Arrange Your Living Room Furniture

From: Hendricks Churchill LLC

Depersonalize

Potential buyers want to be able to picture themselves in your home, and that’s hard to do if all they see are your personal items. Remove family photos, your kids’ artwork, framed diplomas and personal collections. Pack up these items to take to your new home and replace them with generic artwork.

Find More Ideas: Foolproof Paint Colors That Will Sell Your Home

From: Breeze Giannasio

Don't Leave Walls Blank

As previously stated, remove personal items and family portraits, but don’t leave the walls blank. Hang neutral artwork that will brighten the room and add a pop of color if needed. Avoid religious pieces, nudes and anything else that could be offensive to prospective buyers. Scale and proportion are important. Use pieces appropriate to the size of the wall and hang the artwork at eye level.

See More Photos: Top Living Room Color Palettes We're Loving Right Now

From: Marie Flanigan Interiors

Erase Signs of Pets

We totally understand how much you love your pets (we do too), but potential buyers may be turned off by pet odors or be allergic to fur and dander. Thoroughly clean the areas where your pets spend most of their time and add air fresheners. When potential buyers come calling, throw the pet beds, crates, toys, food dishes and litter boxes in your car then take Fido or Fluffy for a walk in the park.

Learn More: 10 Quick Tips for Eliminating Pet Odors

From: Faith Blakeney

Add Pleasant Aromas

A nice smell can have an immediate effect on the way we feel and think. Put your potential buyers in the right mood by making sure your home is filled with pleasant aromas. Let’s face it, we often don’t notice the subtle odors in our home that can come from things like our pets, mustiness that seeps in from the basement or even lingering odors from last night’s dinner. Place a diffuser in the entryway to help make a positive first impression. In living spaces, place a vase full of fragrant flowers like jasmine, lilac or roses. Or simply put plug-in air fresheners in inconspicuous places.

From: Kendall Simmons

Accentuate the Fireplace

A fireplace is a desirable selling feature, and a working fireplace is even more so. Play it up as much as possible by arranging the furniture so that the fireplace is the focal point. Don’t overcrowd the mantel with too many tchotchkes. Just one to three pieces of art — depending on the size — paired with a set of candlesticks or a plant should do the trick. Whatever you choose, make sure your styling has balance and symmetry. Clean the fireplace, inside and out. If the hearth and fireplace surround is covered in soot, scrub it off. Both brick and tile can be repainted if needed. Remove ashes and debris from the inside of the firebox and paint the interior with a fresh coat of fireplace paint. If possible, before a showing or open house, light the fireplace to add warmth and coziness. If not, at least stage it with wood and one or two fireplace accessories so potential buyers will know it is a working fireplace. If it’s not a working fireplace, don’t leave the firebox empty: add pillar candles or birch logs to give off a cozy vibe.

Learn More: How to Clean Your Fireplace

From: Judith Balis

Accessorize in Threes

Mixing the right accessories can make a room more inviting. When it comes to eye-pleasing accessorizing, odd numbers are preferable, especially three. Rather than lining up a trio of accessories in a row, imagine a triangle and place one object at each point. Scale is important, too, so in your group of three be sure to vary height and width, with the largest item at the back and the smallest in front. For maximum effect, group accessories by color, shape, texture or some other unifying elements.

From: Lexi Westergard

Highlight Built-Ins and Clear Clutter

Built-in cabinets and recessed niches are a great selling feature. Play up the display shelves by keeping the knickknacks to a minimum, and don’t just stuff everything inside the cabinets because people will open those up. Display a few books, accessories and a plant or two — avoid family photos and personal items. Consider painting the unit or adding subtle wallpaper to the back wall of the shelves to add depth and draw attention to it.

Find More Ideas: 45 Must-Know Tips for Styling Your Built-In Bookshelves

From: Duet Design Group

Amp Up the Lighting

One of the things that make staged homes look so warm and welcoming is great lighting. Increase the wattage in your lamps and fixtures. Aim for a total of 100 watts for every 50 square feet. Don't depend on just one or two light fixtures per room, either. Make sure you have three types of lighting: ambient (general or overhead like recessed lighting), task (table or floor lamps) and accent (lighting within a shelving unit or over a piece of artwork).

Learn More: Lighting a Room the Right Way

From: Andreas Charalambous

Go Minimal on Window Treatments

Remove or pare down window treatments to make the room as bright and sunny as possible. Buyers want living spaces with lots of natural light. Leaving the windows uncovered will help make the space feel airy and well connected to the outdoors. Also, a bold-colored or patterned window treatment can overwhelm the room’s decor and distract a potential buyer. Window blinds should be pulled all the way up and interior shutters set in the open position. If you must leave up curtains or drapes, use ones that are the same color as your walls so that the continuous hue will make the space look wider. To give the illusion of high ceilings, hang the curtains or drapes above the window. They should start at the ceiling and just barely brush the floor. Don’t let them gather or puddle on the floor. Also, don't forget to wash the windows — a pretty view shouldn't be ruined by dirty window panes.

Learn More: Do's + Don'ts of Designer-Worthy Window Treatments

From: Kristina Crestin

Clean or Replace Flooring

Having move-in-ready floors in a home is a huge plus to a potential buyer. For wall-to-wall carpeting, rent a steam cleaner or have carpets professionally cleaned. If there are stains on the carpet that can’t be removed, consider replacing it. In living areas, hardwood floors are more in demand than carpet. If you’re lucky you may have hardwood flooring underneath the carpet that you can just have refinished. If not, engineered wood flooring or luxury vinyl tile doesn’t take a lot of time to install and both come in several budget-friendly options. If you are replacing the carpet, good-quality padding underneath can go a long way in making a budget carpet feel plush. For existing hardwood floors, have stains, scratches and worn sections sanded and refinished. Use area rugs to help make your living area seem cozier. Area rugs are also a great way to delineate different sections of an open floor plan.

Learn More: Flooring Buyer's Guide

Use Mirrors to Expand the Space

For small spaces, consider adding a mirror or two to visually expand the room and make the space brighter. But, make sure the mirrors aren’t reflecting anything that you don’t want to draw attention to. Here, this duo of custom-made mirrors works to illuminate the space and emphasize the room’s height. Console tables in front of the mirrors prevent them from becoming too overpowering.

Get the How-To: The Easiest Way to Hang a Heavy Mirror

From: Chango and Co.

Minimize Decor During the Holidays

When selling your home during the holiday season, remember the less-is-more mantra of home staging. You don’t have to forgo the decorations but keep them to a cohesive minimum. Keep your holiday tree subtle with decorations that match your decor. For instance, if your living room is painted a soothing ocean-blue hue, skip the clashing red garland and opt for white snowflakes or a silver glass-ball wreath. If you’ve got an earthy color scheme, accent with rich tones like cranberries, forest greens and gold. Too many trimmings may distract buyers, but the right accessories can accentuate your home’s best features. For example, dangle mistletoe in an arched doorway, wrap a little garland around the staircase banister, display a menorah in a bay window and hang a couple of stockings from the fireplace mantel. Also, skip overtly religious displays because they may be off-putting to some buyers — you want to keep neutrality throughout. On your home’s exterior, forgo the large inflatables and instead, use simple string lighting to play up your home’s architecture or draw attention to the gorgeous fir tree in your front yard.