One of the services we take pride offering at urbaneer.com is called a Style Enhancement. It’s where we guide homeowners on how to prepare their home for sale in a fresh current style that will help it show to its maximum potential and best use.
To start, we begin listing items which should be removed to pare down and reorganize the space. Then we identify improvements which will freshen up the property. These include decorating tips like using contemporary paint colours, changing hardware, adding window coverings or upgrading lighting. And for those properties which need more than just a tweak, we’ll recommend a capital investment that will elevate the value and generate a faster sale.
After all, don’t you want to sell your property for the highest price in the shortest amount of time?
We also offer home furnishing assistance. We’re reluctant to call it ‘Staging’, despite it being a term more and more homeowners understand. Staging is where the homeowner frequently removes most of their belongings in order to move in new merchandise. More often than not, the furnishings that are brought in look like those ubiquitous Department Store showrooms…you’ve all seen it…the same brown loveseats, a glass coffee table, a few pillar candles, maybe some seashells and a container holding a bunch of sticks. The look has become so common and devoid of personality most every urbaneer Buyer we take out to show properties can pick out the staged home in an instant. And rarely do they have positive comments. Will staging help sell your home? Maybe, but we offer a better solution.
At urbaneer.com, we prefer to ‘tweak’ the homeowner’s property, using as many of their belongings as possible while introducing some of our own that might be more suitable to the scale of the dwelling, more current in the style files of today’s home decor, and a little unusual and eclectic so it makes the property more memorable.
In our latest reveal, our newlywed clients Glen and Liz are looking to move up the property ladder into their first house purchase. But if you’ve been following the news as of late, the Toronto condominium market has been struggling as hundreds of new towers are nearing completion and portend an imminent oversupply of product. Changes in mortgage financing and media doom-and-gloom froze the condominium market through September and October and sent downtown condo values plummeting around ten percent over a 30 day period. Click HERE and HERE to read our recently published points of view on the matter.
Being cautiously optimistic, we encouraged Glen and Liz to pare down, upgrade and style their one bedroom and den suite in a reputable ten year old midtown building, and then test the strength of the market first before making a house purchase. After all, in a changing market where some properties have been listed for sale for months, we wanted to determine what the specific demand and market value would be for their midtown condominium. If we could achieve their price, it would make sense to sell it so they could purchase a larger long-term family home. If it didn’t sell, then they could extract some of their equity with a mortgage refinance, keep the condominium as a rental investment, and buy a house that would serve them for the next five to seven years.
To get Top Dollar in today’s market, we advise our clients they’ll have to both pull out all the stops to make their unit shine against the competition, and be realistic in accepting that the market value of their unit may not surpass the peak values seen in the condominium market this past Spring.
First, we recommended Glen and Liz pare down her former bachelorette pad their pied-a-deux pad which was chock-a-block with two combined residences of disparate furnishings.
Second, we convinced our Sellers to make a capital investment upgrading the ten year old builder’s grade kitchen and lighting throughout the entertainment space. With a little design guidance, a list of retailers, and our promise that all would be right, our Sellers wrote a cheque for $10,000, hopped on a plane, and enjoyed a 7 day vacation while urbaneer’s contractor worked his magic and renovated the space.
Here’s a snapshot of our Sellers’ kitchen before they did the upgrade, with its oak veneer cabinets and laminate counters, and a photo of the entertainment zone as they were paring down their property and getting rid of their gigantic sofa.
Here is the kitchen our Sellers’ returned to. A new white cook top, white-painted cabinets with steel pulls, a white subway tile backsplash and a speckled caesarstone counter, all beautifully lit with an abudance of new track lighting, breathed new life into this former builder’s beige kitchen. This open concept kitchen went from 2002 to 2012 in a week!
Next, we had our Seller’s place several items in storage so we could showcase the space plan. We also encouraged them to purchase a new sofa that would suit both their condominium and their future new home. After all, who wants to move into a new home and not have some new furnishings to go in it? So many buyers spend every cent to acquire a property that they have no funds left to buy furniture which can deflate the excitement of starting the next chapter of ones’ lives. So we gently guided our clients to Stylegarage, where we helped secure a stunning floor model with a great sale price that was easy on their pocket book. Click HERE to read our amusing post where we gently asked … “Please don’t make us sell your condo while that couch is swallowing your living room.” (see living room photo at top). Here’s the new sofa:
Urbaneer has long had its eye on these amazing vintage blue velvet chairs offered for sale at Caviar20.com for $1200. Curator Troy Seidman has some pretty amazing finds, and these were two piece we coveted for our warehouse of goodies. We borrowed these first to see how they would fit in the space with the sofa above. Click HERE to see the story on these chairs and see more of Troy’s delicacies. We just knew it would look great with our multi-coloured wool Ikea Orsted rug.
The end result was urbaneer fantastic. With their furnishings, the newly purchased Stylegarage couch, the blue velvet chairs from Caviar20 (which Glen and Liz loved so much they bought them!), some of our own furnishings and art, plus a well-invested $10,000 renovation budget, we elevated this ten year old dated condominium into a contemporary turn-key midtown showcase.
Our objective? To garner the highest price in the shortest amount of time on terms favourable to our client.
The result? This $389,900 offering sold within 48 hours, attaining more than the list price with a four and a half month closing date so Glen and Liz can search for their next house without any undue pressure.
We’d like you to thank Glen and Liz for being amazing dream clients. From the moment James and Sabrina, featured in our August 2012 Home Of The Month, referred urbaneer to serve their real estate needs, Glen and Liz entrusted us to advise, develop and co-execute a plan of action that would enable them to confidently move into the next chapter of their lives. We’re half way there!
Want to see some more urbaneer Style Enhancements?
Click TERRACE SWAG to see how urbaneer guided one Seller to invest $10,000 upgrading her 800 square foot terrace at St. Clair and Bathurst, which sold in three days!
Click SEDUCING THE FIRST TIMER to see how one Seller enlisted urbaneer to renovate and furnish his vacant King West garden towne to achieve a precedent-setting price!
Click THE ZOOMER HOME to see how urbaneer steered a down-scaling couple to upgrade their 20 year old condo to appeal to their target market.
At urbaneer.com, we take pride in offering a comprehensive sales and marketing program that will enhance your property and attain top dollar. Our design service, access to contractors, and warehouse of home furnishings are all included in our competitive listing commission. With designer discounts, sterling trades, and connections to several of the city’s best purveyors of home funishing product and fittings, we are your one stop real estate shoppe.
Have questions? Please know we’re here to help at 416-322-8000!
~ Steven and the urbaneer team
We’re Here To ‘Earn Your Trust, Then Your Business’
City Living
Style Enhancement Staging
