Staging your home for sale is a smart move that often results in a quicker sale for a higher sale price.

The purpose of home staging is to present your home in its best possible light, to accentuate the positive features your home has to offer and to downplay (never conceal) the home’s flaws or disadvantages. It’s worth the time, energy, and money you will spend whether you stage your home on your own or hire a home stager.

When you put your house on the market, it is time to stop thinking of it as your home and shift your mindset to that of a savvy salesperson. Make the product look good. Make your buyer envision living there.

To help your buyers become emotionally attached to your home (remember emotion is what sells, logic merely justifies) you will need to remove yourself from the home. By this I mean you will strip the home of the personal touches like family photos, collections, religious items, most artwork, and other mementos.

You’ll also put away much of the clutter that is a part of daily life like stacks of mail, shoe baskets by the door, etc. You need to depersonalize the house so that a new buyer can mentally “move in” and become attached. I know that depersonalizing can be sad, but just think of it as the first baby step towards moving. These items have to be packed anyway, right?