<p>So, we actually had 2 showings today – both to out of town buyers. (I had forgotten it’s a long weekend/start of school vacation – perhaps that’s why?) Then we had a realtor come through to “preview” it for a client. It’s all good – they house was already in “show” mode. I just hope H can keep up with the “being tidy” thing …</p>
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<p>I always think of neutral as beige but we had a stager look at the house we sold this summer and she had us do a light green in the master bedroom and one of the guest rooms. We already had taupe throughout the rest of the house except a fire-engine red dining room (was like that when I bought it). That we painted taupe. A lot of the what I call Mission Style colors could be considered neutral - burnt orange, brown, olive green. </p>
<p>Ironically the woman who bought our house didn’t like the colors. I saw her furniture and her color scheme was peachy.</p>
<p>monitors are not great places to view color. But I recently used this color for our living room
[url=<a href=“http://www.benjaminmoore.com/bmpsweb/portals/bmps.portal?_nfpb=true&_br=1&_pageLabel=fh_home&np=colors/2153-40]cork[/url”>http://www.benjaminmoore.com/bmpsweb/portals/bmps.portal?_nfpb=true&_br=1&_pageLabel=fh_home&np=colors/2153-40]cork[/url</a>]</p>
<p>This is one of the colors that I figured were for us and would have to be toned down for a sale. But something very close was chosen as an neutral on the staging show. Now I know that I don’t know much.</p>
<p>CBB, that’s basically three showings in one day. Not bad at all.</p>
<p>mafool, I think that qualifies as a neutral. It would go with a lot of decorating schemes. The problem with colors like red, blue, green (though some greens lean toward neutral), coral, rose, etc. is they only work with certain other colors and if a person already has a green couch, then red isn’t going to work for them but ‘cork’ probably would. Also, they tend to look out-dated unless the decorating scheme is done extremely well.</p>
<p>On the Sherwin Williams paint deck, I have the more neutral colors are the first 1/4 of the deck. They get progressively ‘un-neutral’ as you go through the deck.</p>
<p>Mafool…that is very close to the color of my living room. Looks good.</p>
<p>Novelisto…as I was throwing things away, I did find the marriage certificate.</p>
<p>That we kept.:)</p>
<p>Discussed the color thing with my husband who, uncharacteristically, watched the staging show with me. His take: whatever I decided to do 5 years ago is neutral/normal now. Cracks me up because I have no idea what I am doing and I live in a design backwater.</p>
<p>Houses started to go more neutral here about 10 years ago…which means the colors are probably on their way out! It seems color schemes go in ten year cycles.</p>
<p>I think ‘sage’ qualifies as a neutral. So does taupe, ‘greige’ (grayish beige), and pale peach (so pale that you can hardly tell it’s a color). Sometimes the designers on the home-shows do go for bolder colors but remember, they get to stick a ‘Designed To Sell’ sign in their front yard. People are more likely to like something if it is professionally-approved than if their neighbor does it. </p>
<p>The stat is that most people make up their mind if they like a house in the first 5 seconds. So one of the areas to consider painting is definitely the front door/foyer/entry way. Fresh hardware for the front door isn’t a big expense – as house-stuff goes – and can really help with the first impression. Decluttering this area by removing snow boots, mail, and really sorta everything except a table with a basket to catch keys to make it look as big and welcoming as possible. Plus it’s a nice place to leave brochures and realtor cards which otherwise congregate on the kitchen counters or the dining room table, ruining whatever look you’ve created in those rooms. Leave the light on!</p>
<p>The New York Times writes about staging: <a href=“http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/nyregion/22appraisal.html[/url]”>http://www.nytimes.com/2011/02/22/nyregion/22appraisal.html</a></p>
<p>^^^ I like this one:</p>
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<p>Wow.</p>
<p>^^^I’d think they’d be more likely to swoop a couple pairs into their capacious handbags…‘I can get into an 8 1/2…’</p>
<p>Well, I think it’s the case that if you have a Viking range, a Bosch dishwasher, and a SubZero fridge, buyers will feel that the house is very high end and will pay more than if you had plain vanilla GE or Kenmore appliances. So I can understand that if you’ve got a closet full of Louboutins, people are going to think your house is nicer than it is if you only have Naturalizers.</p>
<p>Well there’s a new business idea - staging closets with expensive clothing. You rent something very pricey to put in your closets!</p>
<p>Appliances might be a little tough to do :)</p>
<p>But there is that business that rents expensive handbags…</p>
<p>So, clearly no one will buying our house so they “can step into our shoes/life.”</p>
<p>Almost burned out our paper shredder this afternoon – many years worth of credit card statements, etc. But, we’re making progress. I Freecycled a big lateral file cabinet that had been sitting in our garage for 3 years – it felt great!</p>
<p>Wow, finally an excuse for someone importing fake Prada bags and Louboutin shoes, “These are not counterfeit goods, these are staging products!” :p</p>
<p>I’ll just note that I had no idea what Louboutin shoes were until I looked them up. I can no longer wear high heels, but god, I wish I could.</p>
<p>If you need ‘designer’ shoes for a staging, buy cheap stilettos and paint the soles red…voila! Louboutins!</p>
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<p>And here I was thinking I was the only one who had never heard of them…:)</p>
<p>…though I have seen them before. I can see now why they recommend these shoes in particular. The red soles are easy to spot, which I guess is the point…if you want everyone to know you are wearing expensive shoes that would be the way to do it. What an ingenious idea (the red soles)!</p>