Home Transformations Staging and Redesign is a local small business owned by Amy Nelson, a Grove City native. After taking part of the 2020 Trade Show as a vendor, Amy decided to join the Chamber, and we are glad to welcome her business as a new Member!
What is a short description of what your businesses is and what it does?
Our business has two seemingly opposite, yet similar, focuses: Staging to Sell your home, and (re)Designing to Dwell in your home. Our slogan involves wanting to take both of these to “new levels”. We do this by offering a wide range of services to homeowners & real estate agents to help get your house sold for the most money possible! We do everything from DIY-Consultations to half and full staging days in occupied or smaller vacant homes. We also redesign current homes so that your spaces work for you and so that you love the home you’re in!
What’s the story behind your business?
Growing up in Grove City, I would spend hours on end creating houses for Barbie and Ken, years of drawing grid paper house plans with cut-to-scale furniture, and visiting model homes wherever we travelled. Staging and redesign have always been passions of mine!
I love houses. I’ve lived in a wide range of them all over the place: a self-built cabin, a solid log house, an old ranch house in south Texas, a log cabin in the middle of Alaska, and all sizes of houses in suburbia, USA. Each and every one was creatively redesigned to show my personality, or rearranged and “staged” with buyers’ needs in mind, to help it sell. Each home that I owned, I sold for a good profit, while living in and showing them as a single parent with children, pets, and planning a move across the country.
I’m a big fan of Realtor.com and Zillow.com, and my mind automatically changes up a room to make it more appealing to a buyer. So a year ago, I started an extensive training program for home staging and redesigning, with Audra Slinky of Home Staging Resource, since there were no staging companies in this area. Audra is known for being one of the best in the business, and this training program was the first and one of only two home staging training programs that have been truly “accredited” by a third-party trade association (RESA, Real Estate Staging Association). Being able to provide this service, this passion and talent of mine, to the people of this area is something I am very excited about!
I love working with people and houses, creatively solving problems, being resourceful and budget-minded, and learning new things. Add to that my professional-career and experience in elementary education, and it all fits together well!
Every house has a story to tell, and my job as a stager and redesigner is to accentuate the positive features of each home so that it either helps make money for the sellers, or increases the enjoy-ability factor for “dwellers”!
What are the services you provide?
IN STAGING:
Selling your home is a huge opportunity to maximize the profit that can be earned from your house. Yet, most people don’t know how to emphasize their home’s features to appeal to the most buyers.
We offer a wide range of affordable services to agents and homeowners. We begin with a 2-hour DIYer’s Consultation where we use a 9-step process to plan how to best prepare your home for the market while getting a maximum return on investment. We walk through each room with you and give customized suggestions framed within our written Seller’s Action Plan, so you can transform your house into one that buyers will fall in love with!
The more time we can spend in your home staging, the more you will benefit, so we also offer hands-on staging packages, as well as some smaller updates and shopping services. The Total-Transformation-“Total-T” is 6 hours in the home, and the “Mini-T” is 3 hours. We will do the styling work with occupied or smaller vacant homes, using your own items or our accessories, to make a beautiful space buyers will love and will pay more for!
IN REDESIGNING:
We also redesign areas in your current home so that your rooms work for you and your family. If you have a problem area or want to change things up, we can brainstorm and plan a budget-conscious space that your family will love using various design boards, or roll up our sleeves and do simple rearranging for you so that rooms work! Our packages run the gamut, from planning with a customized design board to shopping to working with you in the process.
What is something people would be surprised to know about your business?
People find two things surprising. One is that people often think that “staging” a home is bringing in all new furniture and accessories, but this isn’t the case. We can stage occupied homes as well, creatively using the owner’s items, but in a way that appeals to buyers and will make you say, “Wow! I should have done this a long time ago!”
Second, is if I asked you if you would like to make 10% more on the sale of your home, you would, of course, say yes. That’s what staging can do for you. Staging is an investment. Invest a little, get a lot in return. The National Association of Realtors has statistics that show that for each 1% of the value of your home you put into staging and preparation, you will get an average of 10% return on your investment, and up to 20% more than the competition.
If you could get 10% more on the sale of your home, how much more money in your pocket would that be?
- 10% on a $200,000 home is $20,000 more that you get to keep in your pocket!
- 10% of a $300,000 home is $30,000 more for you!
- 10% of a $400,000 home is $40,000 more!
And I’ll add in a third surprise, and that is that staged homes spend up to 90% less time on the market (RESA research). Just think how much that saves in monthly costs, stress, and putting everything else in your life on hold.
(More stats on why to stage on our website: https://www.hometransformationsstaging.com/why-staging)
How is your business responding to COVID-19?
This is a tough time for agents and sellers. Everything is in limbo. So to encourage and empower sellers during this time, I’m offering FREE 30-minute staging “kick-off” consultations by Zoom or FaceTime. We can outline a plan for you to start preparing to stage your occupied home so it’s ready for the market. You send me photos, and during our brief call, I will give you many tips on what you can do now to get the most money for your house and sell faster when we can sell and buy homes again. I want to help you turn this difficult time into something empowering.
For everyone not selling, I’m sure this quantity of time spent at home makes you want to “change things up a bit”! So I’m also offering free 30-minute redesign “kick-off” calls where we’ll do the same thing, and I’ll provide redesign ideas and suggestions to help start rearranging or redecorating your space. Most importantly, I want to encourage you during this strange time to feel good and inspired in your home!
In addition to these free 30-minute remote “kick-off” sessions, we can also do a regular 2-hour DIYer’s Consultation remotely, if sellers would like to have a full session. It would involve sending pictures ahead of time, and joining a meeting over Zoom. You would still end up with the same Seller’s Action Plan, the only difference being you “walking” your laptop through the house as we discuss your action steps.
How can the community support you now and going forward?
Please spread the word! Education is powerful, and I want staging to sell a home to become the expected norm. I am trying to get the word out about the value of staging to sell, whether your home is occupied or vacant, as well as the emotional value in redesigning a space at home that isn’t working for you. It is my sincere hope that I can make your house one that that buyers will love from the minute they walk in, or if you aren’t selling, that YOU will love living in!
Is there anything else you’d like to talk about?
Please visit our website: https://www.hometransformationsstaging.com. There is a giant before and after photo portfolio, as well as more information about why staging is so important, more details about all our services, testimonials, and a special page about realtor partnerships. Like us on Facebook @HomeTransformationsStaging, or call us at 724.302.HOME (4663).
Here’s to taking selling and dwelling to a new level!
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