Six Steps for Staging a Living Room

3/14/2019

The living room is one of the most important rooms in every home. It often serves a variety of purposes, from quiet time to game night to guest room. When staging your living room, the trick is to create a clean and comfortable atmosphere that inspires buyers to envision living their best lives within.

While a simple tidying up job may be enough to make you comfortable in your living room, you'll need to go a lot further to appeal to the maximum number of potential buyers. Take a look below at the following six steps for staging your living room.

1) Declutter and clean
We've said it before, and we'll keep saying it: clutter and dirt are your number one enemies when it comes to staging your home for sale. And while you may not see your special keepsakes as clutter, potential buyers will. When staging the living room, it's crucial to clear off shelves, take family pictures off the walls, and remove the stack of magazines from the coffee table. You may end up using a personal item or two to accessorize the room later in the staging process, but it's best to clear it all out first so you can dust, vacuum, and clean every nook and cranny.

2) Balance and pare down excess furniture
When potential buyers walk into your living room, you want them to feel a sense of spaciousness. The more furniture you have crowded into the room, the more claustrophobic it will feel. If you have a bunch of end tables and ottomans, a craft table, or children's furniture, remove them and pare the living room furniture down to the essentials: couch, coffee table, and maybe a couple of chairs. Keep it simple. It might look a touch bare at first, particularly if you've been living with a lot of stuff, but as you continue through the room staging process, you'll begin to see the appeal.

3) Revive the floors
Once you've minimized the amount of furniture in the room, the floors will become more visible. Having ample amounts of floor space helps to create that feeling of spaciousness that buyers love, but dingy flooring is a turn-off. If vacuuming, steam-cleaning, or polishing the floors doesn't quite do the trick, you may want to consider going a step further. For scuffed wood floors, sanding and re-staining can up the wow factor significantly. And for a carpeted living room, brand new carpet can make a huge difference even on a minimal budget.

4) Paint the walls
Neutral paint colors are another important aspect of a well-staged living room. Although your personal style may be bold and colorful, you have to remember that you're not staging for yourself or even for a select group of people who appreciate your style. You're staging your home to appeal to as many people as possible, and that's what you get with neutral paint colors. Even if your living room already has a neutral color on the walls, a fresh coat can help your home feel new, clean, and inviting.

5) Accessorize with purpose
A well staged home plays up its best features. Buyers love built-in shelves and entertainment centers, fireplaces, and large windows. Purposeful accessorizing can help you draw attention to these features. Create a minimal display on built-in shelves using framed art, a small plant, a wooden bowl, and maybe one or two high quality hardback coffee table books. Accentuate large windows by keeping window treatments simple and arranging the furniture to take in the views. Hang a large mirror or painting over the fireplace mantel, and create a furniture layout that makes the fireplace a focal point. Remember: when buyers are focused on the great features in a room, they're more likely to overlook the flaws.

6) Pay special attention to lighting
When it comes to selling your home, the more natural light you have, the more it will appeal to buyers. This is doubly true in the living room. Clean the windows inside and out to make the most of the natural light available. In a smaller living room, hang a mirror so that it reflects more natural light around the room, and keep window treatments clean and simple. Mood lighting is important, too, but make sure all floor lamps or tabletop lamps are modern and minimal.