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The personal stories of one Realtor’s battles and triumphs in the highly-competitive Bay Area Real Estate Market, seeking to illuminate and humanize the very real ups-and-downs of homeownership.
Progress, not perfection, is the goal.
Last week, I joined a group of ladies for a Kokedama workshop at the Oconomowak Gardens in Alameda. (I didn’t know what Kokedama was either.)
Turns out, Kokedama is the Japanese art of growing plants (also known as poor man’s bonsai) in a ball constructed of soil and peat moss. Once the excess water has been squeezed out and the ball is relatively compact and round, you insert a plant of your choosing in the middle, tightly wrap the creation with moss, and then encircle it with twine to form a neat little package that can sit comfortably in a small bowl or vessel. Watering the plant simply requires submersion in water as the ball dries out. It was a nifty little outing and a fun way to spend the morning. (Thank you, ladies.)
‘Wabi-sabi’ and the art of imperfection
But what I liked best about the process, was that no one expected perfection and everybody’s efforts were entirely unique. In fact, the entire exercise seemed to embrace “wabi-sabi,” which is the Japanese aesthetic of finding beauty in impermanence, incompleteness, and imperfection.
Now that, I can relate to . . .Which isn’t to say that any job worth doing isn’t worth doing well (it absolutely is), but that at some point, we have to recognize that our efforts are good enough AND we’ve done enough. Or as my husband is fond of saying, “Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good.”
When we’re preparing properties for market, we’re often entering homes with varying degrees of deferred maintenance because let’s face it, life is messy, not to mention incredibly busy.
Consequently, many Homeowners tend to let things go: dripping faucets, leaking toilets, scratched floors, stained carpets, chipped paint, clogged gutters, and overgrown gardens (just to name a few) are part and parcel of living in a home for years, if not decades, while we tend to other pressing needs and more important priorities. (We get it.)
However, when it comes to selling your home, these long-ignored “To Dos” become VERY important to the potential Buyers, which is why we make every effort to correct or minimize them to the best of our abilities. (We have fantastic handymen, gardeners, stagers, window washers, etc.) The reality is that turn-key properties tend to sell much faster and for far more than those that require immediate and costly attention.
Still, while we often bring these properties incredibly far (with the help of many talented individuals and resources), we’re never going to reach perfection, if for no other reason than we are usually under tight-time restrictions, not to mention limited budget restraints.
Granted, no one likes spending money on a house they’re about to sell, so it’s useful to understand that you’re not needlessly “spending” money at your Realtor’s® request; you’re “investing” it wisely. If top dollar is the desired result (and it usually is), you’ll have to invest in the improvements to realize a greater gain on the return. That’s simply the long and short of it.
Don’t want to spend in order to reap more?
That’s your prerogative as long as you’re willing to accept LESS. It’s your house and you get to decide. However, depending from where you pull your numbers, staged homes sell 78-90% faster than their unstaged counterparts and for significantly more. Here are a few other findings if you need help justifying the expense:
- A 2021 report found that 85% of staged homes sold for 5% to 23% over the listing price.
- Twenty percent of Buyer’s Agents noted that staging a home resulted in a 1% to 5% increase in the dollar value offered by Buyers compared to equivalent homes that were not staged.
- Homes that were NOT staged spent an average of 184 days on the market before selling, while homes that were staged sold in just 23 days, based on findings from a 2021 report.
In other words, good staging makes economical sense (and cents)! Even so, if you DO decide to allow us to transform your property, understand that we’re not going to make it perfect, so please don’t walk into the home and point out the one drip in the woodwork the painters missed. This isn’t about selling a perfect house; it’s about creating a vision of what life could be like for the next owners. It’s a curated story, it’s a lovely fantasy, it’s a vision for the future – but it ain’t perfect – and neither are we. (We’re like Kokedama.)
But we’re also incredibly dedicated, hard working, and passionate about what we do. In a world where commissions are up for grabs and bottom feeders have jumped into the pool to “sell your house for less,” you certainly won’t find a team who can offer you more. (That I can guarantee you.)
P.S. In 20 years of helping Buyer secure homes, I’ve yet to sell the perfect property either – no matter the price point. In other words, stop looking for perfection; embrace “wabi-sabi.”
How can we help you?
Julie Gardner & Sarah Abel | Compass Realty
Not just Realtors, but consultants in all things house and home, we’re here to educate, explore, examine and refer . . . In short, you may count on us to take care of your home as if it were our own and anyone who knows us, knows we take pretty darn good care of our homes.
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Excellent and interesting article!