Finding the Perfect Color for Your Walls…

Selecting a paint color for your walls can be a daunting task. With all of the options in the color spectrum, how will you ever be able to choose the right one? We hope to give you some helpful hints to make the decision easier.  

Neutrals with pops of color

Painting for Staging your home:

 When staging, the goal is to sell your home and so it is wise to appeal to the masses. This is why neutrals are so often utilized in staged homes. They are unobtrusive, practical, and easy to live with. It is important to point out that off-white or shades of white should not be considered in the neutral category. It can come across as cold or sterile, which is not what you want a possible buyer to feel when they enter your home. (Note – White can be pulled off if you are furnishing in shades of white or doing a theme with white). We recommend that you lean towards warmer neutrals. If you fear that your home will be too boring with all of these quiet shades, keep in mind that you can incorporate statement colors with accessories and artwork.

 

 

 

Our new office reflects our rust, brown and blue logo colors

 Painting for Interior Design:

 When selecting paint for your interiors, consider your favorite colors and shades. If you are having difficulty figuring out this color, take a peek inside your closet and see what colors you wear the most as well as what colors are repeated in your accessories. Do you like warm or cool colors? What is your favorite gemstone? Do prefer a calming interior or one that makes a bold statement to reflect your personality? Surround yourself with colors that evoke happiness for you.

If you are determined to paint a vibrant or bold color, they are often most successful in powder rooms, dining rooms, or as an accent wall. Accent walls are grounding and are commonly applied on a wall with a couch, bed, or large piece of furniture against it.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Staging and Designing your home with Paint Colors

 A trip to your local home improvement store can be overwhelming. Who knew there were so many shades of beige? Be aware that your eyes can be tricked by the paint chips. What may seem like a cheerful color to you on a small square may be incredibly bright on an entire wall. Choose wisely and do not select just one. Most home improvement stores allow you to get small samples of paint (approximately $3-$5 each), which is highly recommended before you purchase three buckets of paint that you may not be pleased with after you get home.

Further Tips

• Keep in mind that it is a good rule to have colors flow naturally from room to room. Otherwise, too many disjointed colors create an atmosphere that is jumpy.
• Paint just a portion of your wall or a large piece of poster board and tape it to the surface. This way, you are able to see the color on a larger scale and be able to better imagine what it will look like on the entire surface before doing all of the work.
• Observe how it looks through different times of the day and with whatever extra lighting you will use.

  Still feel confused about what color to select?  Triangle Home Staging and Design  is happy to aid you with your staging and interior design needs. You can contact us either by e-mail or phone:

 Info@TriangleStaging.com 0r 919.324.2225.  Please visit us at www.TriangleStaging.com and see what is happening on our Facebook Fan Page

 

Make a “SOLD” Statement with Curb Appeal

A good dose of curb appeal can certainly make a statement when selling your home.  Even if you have Professionally Staged the inside of your home, you need to invite buyers in to get them to appreciate your hard work.  Fall is the perfect time to add a pop of color to the exterior of your house without spending a lot of money and retailers have made it much easier to do it yourself.  Here are some quick and effective tips to boosting your curb appeal.

 Start with a Clean Slate – Before you start decorating make sure your exterior has been power washed.  Give your front door a fresh coat of paint and polish or replace the hardware and kick plate. Make sure you keep your lawn, flowerbeds and walkways clear of fall leaves and debris.

Just say “NO” to the Ghosts, Ghouls and Scarecrows – We don’t want to scare potential buyers away.  The objective of Home Staging is to provide broad appeal to a wide range of buyers. 

Fall is the perfect time for a wreath – If you do nothing else, consider a wreath.  Check discount retailers like Home Goods, TJ Maxx and Target that offer a wide selection.  You can also make your own by purchasing a Grape Vine wreath from Michaels and adding your own Hydrangeas, berries and a simple, but colorful bow.

Look to nature for influences.  Pumpkins, gourds, squash and corn are great and inexpensive accents.  Control those temptations to go overboard by adding just a few touches of Fall décor.

Use larger pieces and fewer of them.  You should be able to see the decorations from the road.  An exception would be to use a collection of squash in a large urn or planter.

Remember the rule of threes – Create a vignette of three large pumpkins or potted mums.

 Fill your empty planters with color – A large urn or planter can be filled with real branches and berries.  You can add a few fall stems for additional color if needed, but keep as close to the real things as possible.

Update your furniture – Add some Color to your outdoor living space with pillows in Fall tones of burgundy, burnt orange, brown and green.

Adding some Fall color to your home will help send that welcome message to buyers and invite them inside to see more.  If you have any more questions, please feel free to contact your Raleigh Designer

Raleigh’s Professional Home Staging Team, Triangle Staging & Design can assist you will all your home staging, re-design or design needs.   Specializing in new construction, vacant or occupied, we have the experience, expertise and resources to showcase your Raleigh home.   Visit our website at http://www.TriangleStaging.com

Should we paint before selling our Raleigh Home?

 Should we paint this room?  What color do you recommend? 

 

 

For a light and comfortable feel, choose a palette of three or four hues (warm colors) and select a hue value on the lighter end of the paint deck. You can now paint those colors anywhere in your house and they will blend together creating a more open and cohesive feel.

For a dramatic look, try painting the rooms all the same hue, perhaps a soft warm gray, and then add explosions of color throughout with artwork or accessories A big modern art piece on the living room

 wall or bright pillows on the sofa. 

 

As long as you have enough light in the room, both natural and artificial, you can have a darker hue on the walls and still create a warm comfortable feeling. If you have very limited natural light, try a light creamy beige with a hint of yellow on your walls to add a little sunshine.

Checkout a great website with suggestions for colors:MyPerfectColor.com

 

or contact us at www.RaleighStager.com  for a color consultation

 

Happy Painting! 

 

Senior Tranistion and Home Staging Seminar, Cary NC

Home Buying and Selling Seminar at Carolina Preserve

You’re invited to a Home Buying and Selling Seminar
Saturday, March 21st, from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. at Carolina Preserve’s Bradford Hall.

Whether you have a home to sell or you’re looking to buy a new home, this seminar will help you take the next step.

Get your home ready to sell! Are you ready to buy a home, but still have one to sell? Home Stager Michele Kurelich will teach you how to de-clutter your home and decorate it to sell.

What’s it worth? Agents from Keller Williams will provide you with a comparative market analysis for your current home. Learn what homes in your neighborhood are selling for and find a competitive listing price for your home.

Make your money work for you. Speak with mortgage experts to learn about mortgage options and how to finance your new home.

Buying tomorrow’s home in today’s market. Tour tomorrow’s home today with Carolina Preserve sales counselors and find the perfect home for your lifestyle.

Have you seen my 401k? Get tips from wealth consultants on retirement investment and savings. Learn your investment management options in today’s marketplace.

For more information on the Home Buying and Selling Seminar, please call 919-460-7170.

Sincerely,

The Carolina Preserve Sales Team

Home Staging Experts to Participate in Home Buyers Fair at Streets of Southpoint

Press Release: Home Staging Experts to Participate in Home Buyers Fair at Streets of Southpoint

Free Home Staging to Sell Seminar at Printer’s Alley

Hosted by Printer’s Alley in Raleigh, NC and given by Michele Kurelich and Janine Varney of Triangle Staging & Design, a free seminar on Home Staging to sell and Staging to Live.

Free Seminar – Staging to Sell, Editing to Live  

 PRINTER’S ALLEY ~ Raleigh, NC

Saturday, February 21 – 9:30am 5910-111 Duraleigh Road
*spaces limited, please call your local store by
Friday, February 13 to register
Raleigh
Presented by Michele Kurelich & Janine Varney of TSD
http://www.printers-alley.com/StoreEvents.cfm

Triangle Staging & Design was created by Michele Kurelich of Lasting Impressions and Janine Vareny of Well Dressed homes to create a superior Staging and Desgin team in the Triangle area.

Raleigh’s Professional Home Staging Team, Triangle Staging & Design can assist you will all your home staging, re-design or design needs.   Specializing in new construction, vacant or occupied, we have the experience, expertise and resources to showcase your Raleigh home.   Visit our website at http://www.TriangleStagingandDesign.com

Decluttering is only the first Step to Staging your Home

If you are trying to sell your home,  you have probably already heard about home staging.   Many believe that home staging is the process of de-cluttering and cleaning.   Truthfully, cleaning & de-cluttering is only the first step to staging your home right.  You can easily de-clutter your own home, but you have to know when enough is enough.  It is very common for Homeowners to go to far when neutralizing the decor.  It is very important to strike a balance in every room.  See some tips from our earlier post Get Ready, Get Set, Get Sold . 

Professional Home Stagers are fast & efficient when it comes to de-cluttering,  but once that is done then the REAL fun (work) begins.  We look at the house as a whole and each room should have a defined purpose.  An experienced Professional Home Stager considers furniture placement, scale, balance, color schemes, light, views and traffic flow while enhancing selling features of the home, while making it picture perfect.  A good Home Stager will be creative, working with what you already have to create optimal appeal for home buyers. 

For example, take a look at the two rooms below: 

 

We were able to open up the rooms and make them appear larger.  Before, it was difficult to distinquish the living room from the family room.   We were able to clearly define the rooms using what the homeowner already had.  By moving the sofas around we were able to make the formal living room appear twice as large.  Now when you enter and the family room you can see the view out to the pool, which was previously hidden by the sofa.

In the next example, the room was over crowded blocking the flow through the room.  A rug from the bonus room lightened the space and was a better scale for the room.

To sell your home faster and get Top Dollar Home Staging can make the difference, but don’t stop at de-cluttering,  that is really where the true work and creativity begins.  Buyers are savvy and first impressions are everything, so make sure you get it right before the first buyer comes knocking. We are creative in using the homeowners existing furnishings and accessories, or with the help of our accessory and furniture rental program we artfully achieve a designer look. Visit www.RaleighStager.com  or www.TriangleStaging.com for more details.

Raleigh’s 2008 Parade of Homes is here.

The 43rd annual Parade of Homes for Wake County in Raleigh, NC is just around the corner.  It is a great time and opportunity to look at new trends, get ideas or find the right builder for you.  The Parade of Home dates are:  October 4-5, October 10-12, and October 17-19, 2008.  All the homes will be open from 12 pm – 5 pm.  For more information go to The Home Builders Associsation website or get your parade book when it comes out.

Our Company Lasting Impressions Staging & Design with the help from our new partnership with Well Dressed Homes (more on our new partnership to come) will help showcase several homes this year.  Please be sure to stop in and tour these homes.

 504 Transylvania, Raleigh NC, we had the pleasure on working on this project from the very beginning.

Copper Leaf Lot 6 and Lot 64, Cary, NC

The Registry at Bailey’s Farm, Raleigh, NC 

Highcroft in Cary, NC

Fallon Park, Raleigh,  NC

Bay Bridge Park, Raleigh NC

Weycroft, Cary, NC

Kitts Creek, Cary, NC

Look for us under our new name Triangle Staging & Design

Which Home Improvements offer the best return for your money?

August is a time of planning.  Kids are back to school and summer is winding down.  Many Homeowners start thinking about projects to do around the house.  Whether you are planning to sell your home this fall or just want to make improvements for you to enjoy it’s a good idea to pick those projects that will get you the best return on the money you spend. Deciding where to focus your time can be difficult and it’s best to consider your options:

1. Exterior:  Fall is the best time of the year to focus on your landscape plan.  Now is the time to focus on Curb Appeal.  Are your trees and shrubs so over grown that you can not see you home?  Foundation plantings frame the home.  If they are so mature and overgrown, trimming them down or thinning them out and adding some smaller plantings is a good idea.  Define your foundation with mulch beds, which also help frame your house and be sure to add color when planting this Fall.

2. Interior:  The cold days of winter are around the corner and you will be spending a lot of time inside.  Walk through your home objectively and ask yourself “Could my home use some updating”.  It is easy when we live in a home to not pay attention to the floral wall paper that went out of style 5 years ago.  Consider Painting to add a modern, but yet cozy feel to your home.  A new paint color it the most inexpensive way to update a room.  Which room to update?  Always start with the Kitchen and Baths and work out from there.  Even changing your kitchen hardware can make a huge difference.  If it’s not in the budget to change a lighting fixture, a can of spray paint can do the trick.

If you don’t know where to start and would like additional ideas, we would be happy to provide you a plan of how to update your entire home with simple inexpensive ideas that you can do yourself.  Visit us at www.RaleighStager.com for a consultation

In Home Gain’s Prepare-to-Sell study, real estate agents said that it is the small improvements that pay the biggest dividends when a home is sold. The following is a summary of the results of Home Gain’s 2007 national survey, based on the ten areas of home improvement identified by real estate agents in Home Gain’s original survey in 2003.

Project	Typical Cost	Price Increase	Return on Investment*	% of Agents Recommending
Lighten & brighten	$233 – 370	$1,178 – 1,566	355%	97%
Clean and de-clutter	$190 – 318	$1,505 – 1,937	578%	97%
Landscape front/back yards	$378 – 546	$1,718 – 2,158	319%	97%
Stage home for sale	$403 – 584	$1,938 – 2,431	343%	91%
Repair electrical or plumbing	$436 – 621	$1,205 – 1,590	164%	93%
Repair damaged flooring	$628 – 878	$1,633 – 2,061	145%	94%
Update kitchen & bathrooms	$1,404 – 1,828	$3,216 – 3,934	121%	87%
Replace or shampoo carpeting	$562 – 808	$1,532 – 1,950	154%	98%
Paint exterior walls	$663 – 938	$1,757 – 2,205	147%	88%
Paint interior walls	$651 – 920	$1,741 – 2,179	150%	97%

Home Gain surveyed over 2,000 real estate agents in each of the U.S. regions. All agents might not necessarily agree on the same pre-sale strategy. See”% of agents recommending“column above. Differences of opinions may vary based on the climate of the market, region of the country or condition of the home in question. The percentage of agents that agree on the positive impact of a particular pre-sale activity is summarized here.

Staging Your Raleigh Home, Don’t miss your best opportunity to Sell!

Your best window of opportunity to sell your home is within the first few weeks of listing it on the MLS. That is when Home Buyer’s interest is at it’s best and Real Estate Agents are previewing new properties for their Clients. A common theme that I have heard lately from sellers, “we are going wait and see what happens before we make any improvements or consider home staging”. Postponing necessary improvements or Staging your property you could miss the best, and maybe only opportunity, for a full price contract. Days on the market can directly correlate with what a buyer is willing to offer. As a seller you have to consider the carrying costs of the property as well. Considering Home Staging upfront can help alleviate longer carrying costs and ensure that you get top dollar for your investment.

1. Frist Impressions:
You don’t get a second chance to make a First Impression with your Buyer. Once they have seen your property and it does not spark an interest, they will mark it off the list of possibles and move on to the next listing.

2. Property Presentation
Staging your Raleigh Home before it hits the market will get you the best possible Internet photos. Since 73% of home buyers look on the Internet before viewing a property it is important to capture your property in the best light. We are Professional Home Stagers who can create photo ready rooms in a matter of hours. We can even provide the pictures for your Real Estate Agent to Use with the listing.

3. Increase your showings:
Agents will show a professionally staged property over one that has not been staged. Agents know buyers will be more inclined make an offer on a home that is in show condition. More showings means selling faster and at a better price.

4. Longer DOM, leads to lower offers:
Studies show that the longer your home stays on the market the lower the selling price will actually be. Staging your home is much less than your first price reduction.

Positioning your property with Home Staging, your “largest investment” from the beginning will ensure a greater return, faster than the wait and see approach. Home staging does not have to cost a lot of money. For as little as $250.00 the price of a staging consultation, and some sweat equity on your part, you can make an impact on your home. If you don’t have the time to make the neccessary changes we can help you, organize, pre-pack, de-clutter and stage your home ranging from $450 to $800 depending on the property. Contact us at http://www.raleighstager.com