"Your Job Sounds So Fun!" - The Reality of a Home Staging Career

If I have heard that once, I have heard it 100 times. "Your job sounds so fun!" and to be fair, I suppose from the outside looking in, it DOES seem like a "fun job." Most recently as I was boarding a plane the flight attendant spied my carry on that promotes my Staging business and exclaimed how fun my job must be . . .

What the public sees is the transformation of a house - room by room - where we use creativity and skill to enhance what the public sees when buying a house. What they don't see is all the work and planning that went in to that successful transformation.

Seems that most people believe that Home Staging is a "fun" job . . . probably ranking up there with Genie, magician, dolphin trainer, or some other "job" where a person appears to get to do something others perceive is lots of fun but don't really understand all the work behind the result. I haven't asked, but I think they believe that we just move a bunch of decor around and diddle with fabric or bedding, and tossing pillows is the most labor intensive thing we do.

To most, they probably figure we have an army of "workers" at our disposal, like those people on TV - that work for free, and make magic happen with their saws, lumber, and materials they just pull out of their magic trucks or vans. If there are Stagers that do this, it is a very, very small percentage. Most of us are the ones doing the work, moving the stuff, and lifting the furniture.

What they don't realize is that although Home Staging is "fun" it is also a lot of work. Home Staging itself is very physical too, or it can be. Home Stagers sweat. Home Stagers strain. Home Stagers can even stress out.

The reality of Staging is that it is not glamorous and the "fun" is not about the ease of what we do, but about the reward of a job well done. Most professional Home Stagers I know that actually work a business, and don't just preach about it, are in the trenches getting sweaty and schlepping stuff from point A to house B.

The days when I Stage, I show up in my "uniform" which is comfortable shorts and a tank top, sandals or tennis shoes, and my hair up in a clip. To be brutally honest, on days when I wake up and know I am Staging a vacant house, I don't bother with makeup, except maybe some lipstick, and - shocker here - don't even bother to style or comb my hair. Why bother - I am going to sweat - and I am not going to see a client so vanity goes out the window. I just stick my hair up in a scrunchy or hair clip - and off I go to "work." Where I live, the temps can reach over 110 degrees in the summer, and just loading up for a Staging project brings a workout. We don't "perspire." We sweat.

In the winter, we bundle up and deal with the cold temps and freezing weather - and hope that our projects "beat the rain" or other bad weather, but we've Staged during near hurricane winds, and with fog so thick we can hardly see to drive. God bless those Stagers that deal with hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, sleet, and any other weather related challenges. Like the mailman, come rain, wind, snow or shine, the show must go on!

I have been physically injured numerous times from Staging. I have broken toes, injured my foot, pulled muscles, gotten bruises, cut myself, gotten tennis-elbow from lifting furniture, and had a bungee cord snap back in my face, splitting my lip open. In that case, the show went on, and we Staged a house because we needed to get it done, with my lip bleeding for 9 hours. Good news is it was my lip - a few inches higher and it would have taken out my eye. I have had sore back, legs, arms and neck from Staging - and over the years have gotten smarter about how much physical labor I personally do, opting to hire movers and manual labor help whenever the budget allows. There are "tools" we can use to help minimize some of the physical strain - furniture lifters, movers, and such, but the bottom line is that we cannot escape the physical nature of Staging. Even if we are just pulling inventory and loading our truck, that is physical.

Home Staging is fun because we are helping others, we do get to see the transformation of a space happen relatively quickly, and we get the reward of accomplishment when the house sells faster than expected - compared to the marketed un-staged competition. But it's not "fun" in the sense that it's easy to do.

Working with clients and providing Staging reports is not physical, but it is mental. We may not sweat while preparing the Staging report (unless the homeowner does not have their air conditioning on), but the mental side of coming up with a plan of action on the spot, and then having the ability to convey that plan with compassion and kindness to a Seller that may or may not be ready to hear the suggestions, or be excited about moving, can be a challenge and be somewhat stressful. The emotional aspect is something we have to be prepared for each time we work with a client. We never know what response they are going to have to our plan, and much of the time we act in the role of compassionate counselor, encouraging them to make changes that will ultimately benefit them the most in the sale of their property.

The longer we engage in business, the more confidence we get, and the better prepared we feel going in to work with a client, but I don't believe we ever fully get over that feeling of pressure to perform Staging magic, using what a Seller has or bringing in some "WOW" factor, with the hopes that everything will turn out great. We have a vision, we work to carry that out to the best of our ability, factoring in what the seller has to work with, any limitations we may have, the necessary timeframe, and budget.

My last Staging report was done late one afternoon, and the next day we showed up to do hands-on Staging to finish it off, with the clock ticking from a Realtor that wanted to get the house on the MLS - ASAP! Of course, the Realtor was thrilled and the seller got a real kick out of seeing how we used her things, combined with some basic inventory - to get her house show ready. She even said, "You were not like those people on TV - you treated me very kindly and I appreciate that." Working with pressure is not something every person can handle, and yet professional Stagers do it every day.

My greatest satisfaction comes not just from seeing a room come together with my ideas that transfer from mind to reality, but from the reaction of a client that cannot believe how nice their house looks, and from a Realtor who is thrilled at a tranformation of their listing. And it comes from a part of me that feels great joy at using my talent and creativity in a way that helps someone else.

Ultimately, when I finish a Staging project, there is a part of me that just wants to high-five someone, or do a celebration dance. As I have shared with colleagues - having a "theme song" is important and keeping the actual Staging fun - by sharing it with other professional ASP Stagers is what make it fun for me as well. As I learned from my mentor, Barb Schwarz, "having a party with myself" is half the fun of Staging - and that happens when I do something unexpected with Staging, when my creativity comes out and we use something in a new way, or make something out of "nothing" in order to achieve a goal. I love that feeling.

However, the "work" behind Staging never ends. Any successful Stager will tell you that getting the business is always on our minds. We are managers, marketers, and workers. Besides the physical labor that leaves us sweaty and tired, there is the constant marketing that has to occur. We can never just sit back and "wait" for business but must constantly find ways to reach our target audience with our message of how we can help them achieve their goals of selling faster and at the best price.

As a markets change, we have to change our strategy for getting business, so we are also adjusting to economic trends that impact our business. Any successful Home Stager will attest to the reality behind reinvention, and carving out market niches to stay viable.

Yes, our "job is fun" but it is also a lot of work - mentally and physically. We have to have endurance to make it through the tougher times, we have to have optimism to keep our hope alive when the going gets tough, and we have to rejuvenate our creative spirit by continuing to find new ways to test our skills and transform houses and spaces that truly need our Staging touch.

So those of you out there looking from the outside at Home Staging - and believe it is one of those "fun" jobs - what it is really is a passion that we have turned into a career. Despite the physical, mental and even emotional work it takes, we love it because it feeds a part of our soul or spirit that nothing else meets.

THAT is the real "fun" behind Home Staging.

Home Staging Standards are Important

The Olympics are nearly over - and my familly and I have enjoyed watching all the competitors. We have cheered for winners and felt badly for those that had unfortunate episodes where they were defeated. Whether they win or don't place in the top 3, the athletes all have one thing in common - they had to qualify to be considered in the top for their country.

For Home Staging - we have to have standards as well. There are those that don't believe this in practice even though in theory they may spout the need for standards. The International Association of Home Staging Professionals (IAHSP) is a professional association open to all Stagers. However, to join IAHSP a Stager must meet standards of education and quality. They must first gain education and earn a professional designation and then agree to the code of ethics.

The designation IAHSP chose as the one Stagers needed to have in order to join is the Accredited Staging Professional (ASP) Designation. It is the longest standing designation with the most history and credibility behind it. It boasts over 14,000 graduates from classes that have been taught since 2,000 and was developed by the Creator of Home Staging, Barb Schwarz.

Just like the National Association of Realtors (NAR) requires members to first be licensed real e state agents, and then get additional education, and join at the national, state, and local levels in order to be a member, IAHSP does the same. In fact most associations for a professional group require some sort of education and standards in order to join. The American Medical Association is only open to MD's, and the National Speakers Association is only open to professional speakers that have to meet certain criteria.

In the world of home staging, there are groups that allow ANYONE to join - regardless of their background - education or not. Is this helping to serve the Staging industry? No. By allowing just anyone to join, it waters down the quality of service and membership of the group that becomes only as strong as the weakest members.

Opening up a "professional association" to anyone that calls themselves a Stager means I could wake up one day after watching a bunch of HGTV shows and proclaim myself a Stager and join this group. I would be in the same category in the eyes of the public that does not know better - even though I have professional education, a designation, and adhere to a code of ethics that is enforceable. I am not interested in belonging to a group that waters down the importance of professionalism in Home Staging by allowing hobbyists and un-educated people to join.

When looking at selecting a home stager, it is important to find out what association they belong to - and make sure that the association itself is one that serves the industry with a higher expectation of performance - not only in how a Stager interacts with their clients, but also in their overall quality of work.

As an ASP Master Stager, I do belong to IAHSP - and am a proud member of the first and best association serving our industry.

- Jennie

Home Staging Roots are Long and Deep - the Truth about "Where Staging Came From"

Barb Schwarz, ASPM, IAHSP, Certified Speaking Professional, has been recognized for many things in her career - Successful Realtor, Broker, Mentor, Motivational Speaker, and Creator of Home Staging. In this last role, she once again demonstrates why she is at the forefront of the real estate industry as a visionary and expert.

I felt the need to post this blog because I have seen the industry change in the past 6 years as a professional home stager, and certain areas like training have been flooded by many that want to profit off the need for education. That's fine. But I keep my ear to the ground and hear the craziest things about "how" someone supposedly came up with the idea for their course or association - and this post is about giving credit where credit is due - and about being honest about origins and education.

Having had the privilege of being in Barb's company many times as a student, mentoree, and friend (more like family) I have seen how dedicated she is to furthering the education of the public through press, seminars and one-on-one conversations about the benefits of Home Staging and how it can change lives, one at a time. She literally sleeps, eat, and breathes staging, and no one that I know is as devoted (or as she says, "possessed") with this responsibility of properly educating the world about Staging.

The roots of Home Staging are long and deep and like an oak tree have stood the test of time. The character of an oak tree is about strength, courage, endurance, and truth - and this is a great parallel for our Staging industry and Barb Schwarz, President & CEO of Stagedhomes.com and President of the International Association of Home Staging Professionals. Barb is not "perfect" but if she has made any "mistakes" in her journey, they are few, and her successes are many.

Over the past 36 years the service of Staging has been shared with over a million Realtors and helped launch the careers of independent business owners that started a home staging business. For over 15 years in the 1980s and 1990's, Barb toured the country, sharing the benefits of Staging as a key marketing tool for Realtors - reaching mass audiences and nearly 1 million Realtors with her message and success principles. Since that time, she continues to educate mass audiences, with her Accredited Staging Professional (ASP) Course - the first course, designation and Accreditation developed for Realtors and Stagers.

When she created the first professional designation for Home Staging in the 90's, she opened up a door for many others that would come years later that saw an opportunity in the educational arena. She clearly remembers the moment she had the vision to create the first professional designation - and it was a vision for the future. Ask others about their "moment of inspiration" - I know it was not the same as Barb's - where hers came from a spiritual place of a calling that was bigger than herself and was not about ego.

It's like that movie "Working Girl" when at the pivotal part in the movie, Sigourney Weaver's character is asked how she came up with the idea for the project, and she bumbles and stumbles - because she did not originate the idea, and she instantly loses credibiltiy and respect for lying to her colleagues and trying to claim someone else's work as her own. Wouldn't life be great if it were so easy to expose "imposters?" (or at least those that are not truly honest about their own education origins?)

In a place where Barb nearly lost her life, and did lose her ability to walk and talk for a period of time, the vision for a designation and industry that would parallel the National Association of Realtors and National Speakers Association are clear benchmarks in the development of the educational process that has now reached thousands of Stagers and over a million Realtors. Most of the others have come from a place of competition, of trying to benefit from what they saw as a profitable industry, and were not born from innovation or inspiration, or heart.

We have had posts on the origins of home staging where others have claimed to have been the first, and I have even heard first-hand at trade shows those that were associated with Barb's claim THEY trained Her - which is laughable.

Some of these people's claims are just fraudulant - they never were in the real estate industry and so would not have been able to come up with the concepts, phrases and processes Barb developed as a succesful Realtor and innovator. And yet they are teaching programs that are eerily similar to the ASP program developed by Barb and based in HER years of success in real estate. She even has a book that was published in the early 1980's where much of the content of her program is published - so the idea for the ASP designation and course was based largely on her stories and success principles chronicled and documented in this best seller. No one else can demonstrate that clear connection or history in the industry.

She was recognized as one of the Most Influential People in Real Estate - as voted on by her peers in the real estate industry. Other awards that I have seen are given by relatives or friends of those that are nominated and in my opinion do not have the same merit and prestige as the nominated field was not all inclusive, not voted on by peers throughout the industry, and for some was rather incestuous.

My research on the various companies out there that offer any sort of Staging education - from very basic information with little or no credibility to a handful of companies that actually offer a respected designation - is that they ALL can trace their roots to Barb in some manner. If they were not a student or former trainer of hers, they saw her on the road or read her books on Staging, or perhaps saw her videos from years past. There are those that have come at this whole staging industry from a different origin - decorating or design industry - and so their roots are not in, to me, the purest form of Staging - which is real estate and marketing. Still, they have used the model Barb set forth in her company to build their own training organizations. There may be one or 2 exceptions - but I believe I am pretty accurate based on my research.

Some may dispute my statement above, but go ahead and do your homework, like I have. No one else can boast 36 years of history in this industry - and no one else remembers the day they said the word "Stage your house" for the first time - and created an entire vocabulary related to what we do - stage, stager, staging, destage, etc. - and so I know that the others that came after Barb, like myself, would have found information online or in a book store, or from word of mouth that winds its way - even if in a small thread - back to Barb. All you have to do is ASK - and listen to their answers and find out for yourself where the truth is. Fortunately, the truth is documented and published in books - so it's pretty hard these days to claim something as truth that can easily be disputed by the facts found in many places.

There are those that have blatently (and illegally) taken her copyrighted materials to form a framework and basis for their own "training" companies. There are those that have studied with her, or served with her company - and have started competing groups without even giving credit for where their knowledge came. Some of these people were like family - invited into Barb's home and life, loved by her, and the way in which things unravled were painful and incredibly mean spirited towards Barb by some. Still Barb marches on - because she has to - because she is driven by more than just her emotions that I am sure made her ask herself "is this all worth it?"

These people amaze me - It's as if they want us all to believe they woke up one day in the past few years or less, and had all this knowledge on their own. It sometimes makes my stomach turn to see people that have used Barb to further their careers turn against that which made them successful. No matter the circumstances for departure from "Barb's world," the fact remains that there have been many that have built their next move on her shoulders. I, for one, would like to see that acknowledged but to do that it takes courage, grace, honesty, and integrity. I could not sleep at night if I knew my entire existence as a company or entity was based on anything but truth and honesty.

The media exposure opportunities shared by Barb willingly with her family of ASPs has created a basis for "expertise" in Stagers that today refuse to even acknowledge or honor the source of their so-called "fame," and yet continue to hang their hat on their participation in segments originated with Barb - that she did not have to share - in order to perpetuate their status as an expert Stager or Realtor.

I have not yet seen any other supposed "expert" involve their fellow colleagues or graduates in as many segments, articles, and events as Barb has. Well - part of that is because they don't get the same volume of media opportunities. Others hog the spotlight for themselves - and Barb shares - as it is one of her foundations and commitment to those she serves.

I don't have a problem with other companies taking advantage of a training industry, or others that want to help Stagers launch businesses. That is not the point of this blog post. I acknowledge there are some good courses out there headed by wonderful people. And there are those that I would not give a second glance. My issue is with those who conduct their company with such little integrity - not giving credit to the origins of THEIR own education (formal or informal) and instead want us all to believe they came up with all the ideas for their program on their own.

Each time someone else comes out with a course, program, group, or association (and I know we have not seen the last of "new training companies or designations"), I smile inside because I know for the most part that there are no originators - just immitators. Some have said to her, "You changed my life,"or "I did not know Staging even existed as a career and business for me," and then go off without regard to their origins or remembrance of who got them started. Others may toss in items about decorating, feng shui, etc. - and may call things different words or use slightly altered phrases, or even different methods to educate their students, but in the end, they are emulating the one that started it all - started us all on this wonderful journey in Home Staging - and that is Barb Schwarz. Just give credit where credit is due.

As Barb frequently shares, life is too short to be in the darkness - and instead of using her time and energy to pursue or dispute those that have not honored the origins of their education - she moves forward, using her ideas and vision to move ahead at light speed, paving the way for the future of home staging, always rooted in the truth, with courage, strength and endurance - just like the oak tree.

For me - that is the type of person I want to be around - and I do hang my success - not on the shoulders of Barb Schwarz - but in the heart of what she shares with each person she meets - and touches their lives for the better.

- Jennie

Home Staging Convention - IAHSP & ASPs Lead the Home Staging Industry

I just attended the annual IAHSP Convention in Seattle and it was so great! I am so excited to share all the new services and tools with my clients - as no one else in the industry has the resources - than Accredited Staging Professionals. Stagedhomes.com has put together state-of-the-art and cutting edge products and services that will make our role as ASP Stagers serving sellers and Realtors even easier!

I met so many wonderful ASP Stagers from all over the United States and Canada that are working to grow successful Home Staging businesses. The open sharing of what is working in all markets was so helpful, and the high level of education we received invaluable. The convention featured speakers that shared on key marketing strategies, internet marketing, working with clients, integrating multi-media approaches to our presentations, and business management, inventory mamagmenet, and business planning. We heard about key new market niches we can approach to grow our revenue and continue to thrive in Staging even with some areas where the foreclosures have outnumbered traditional listings.

Overall it was fabulous and Barb Schwarz, President & CEO of Stagedhomes.com, was the visionary behind our Convention and inspiration that fed our spirits and hearts throughout the event.

I am excited to depart from Seattle in a few short hours and get back home to Roseville, CA where I will be implementing many new services for our key clients.

Home Staging works - and I am so proud to be associated wth Stagedomes.com and the ASP Masters and ASPs around the country that uphold integrity as the number one trait for business.