Staging Diva Dispatch

Monday, February 20, 2006

Home Stager Debra Gould shares her money making secrets with The Wall Street Journal

Home Staging expert Debra Gould shares her money-making secrets with The Wall Street Journal

Home Staging expert Debra Gould of Six Elements Inc. shares her money making secrets with The Wall Street Journal in Tricks of the Trade "Setting up a Home for Sale".

Gould started decorating client's homes to sell after staging 5 of her own over an 8 year period. Her number one trick to making money in real estate is buying the ugliest house in the best location.

Then she turns her home staging talents to restyling the ugly bits to appeal to the greatest number of buyers when it's time to sell. She has done the same for hundreds of clients over the past 3 years. Most earn somewhere between $10,000 and $50,000 profit on Debra Gould's Home Staging services.

Read Debra Gould's interview with Hannah Kate Kinnersely of The Wall Street Journal.


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Home Staging expert Debra Gould also known as The Staging Diva is president of Six Elements Inc., a leading home staging company that provides free information to raise home staging industry standards and build awareness amongst homeowners and their real estate agents about the benefits of decorating a house to sell.

Debra Gould developed The Staging Diva Program to create opportunities for others to grow their own profitable home staging, real estate enhancement businesses.

Sunday, February 12, 2006

10 reasons to look at home staging as a great new business opportunity

kitchen decorated to help sell the home quickly by home staging expert Debra Gould
If you have a flair for decorating and you're interested in real estate, Home Staging could be the right business for you.

Home Staging is also called House Fluffing, Real Estate Enhancement, Home Styling. This service business is based on the art of decorating a home to sell quickly and for top dollar.

And Home Staging is a great service business to run from a home office for these 10 reasons:

1. Home Staging is a low cost business to start.

You don't need to invest in any inventory (unless you want to). You also don't need a store front or expensive advertising to grow your home staging or house fluffing business successfully.

2. It does not require specialized training or official credentials because there are none for the Home Staging industry.

Despite what some organizations claim for their own marketing reasons, there are no official credentials to be a Home Stager. You can call yourself a Professional Home Stager today and no one can say anything about it. Of course calling yourself a Home Stager doesn't mean you'll automatically know how to price your services, build your business and get clients.

These are important skills to acquire if you want to be financially successful. The relevant point here is that you don't have to undergo years or even months of training to get into this business.

In fact, The Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program will teach you how to grow a profitable and creatively satisfying business in only 10 hours! But you need to already have a basic talent for how to arrange furniture in a room because this is not a hands-on decorating course.


3. There is no need to invest in inventory or recruit others into the business. Home Staging is not a multi-level marketing scheme.


If you've researched the subject of home-based business, you've probably encountered lots of schemes that want you to buy inventory and recruit others into the business too.

These are multi-level marketing businesses. Home Staging is not a multi-level marketing business. You don't have to buy anything and you don't have to recruit anyone else to join the business. This is something you can do on your own without any recruiting pressures. You aren't expected to pester every friend and casual acquaintance you've ever had to invest in your "unique opportunity."

4. The financial rewards are there if you work hard to build your Home Staging, House Styling business.

Home Stagers create real wealth for their clients by effectively decorating their homes to sell quickly and for top dollar. Once clients realize the significant return they can make on their investment in a home stager's services, they don't feel it's unreasonable to spend hundreds of dollars for even two hours of stager's time.

With real estate markets slowing in many parts of the US and Canada, demand for (and interest in) home staging services will grow.

Les Christie of CNNMoney.com interviewed Home Staging expert Debra Gould on how home staging could give homeowners an edge as real estate markets slow down.

5. You can still have time for your family or other demands while running a Home Staging or Real Estate Enhancement or Styling business.

You control when you meet clients. If you only want to work during the day when your children are at school you can arrange it that way. "I have an opening for you on Wednesday morning at 9:00 AM" works well!

Or, if you want to start this business on the side while you already have a full time job, then you can meet your clients on evenings and weekends. Many of them will really appreciate it as they work themselves.

6. As a Home Stager, you will have daily opportunities to be creative and meet interesting people.

Home Staging projects very much depend on the creative solutions you develop for your clients. You get to see the end result very quickly and meet lots of different people as you deal with real estate agents and homeowners.

7. You will enjoy variety and a sense of adventure in a Home Staging or House Fluffing business.

Home Staging projects are very short term in nature, lasting days or a couple of weeks. Each house is different and you'll be visiting streets and neighborhoods you didn't know existed as you build your home staging client base.

8. You can control how fast you want to grow your Home Staging business.

Being your own boss, you are in control of how fast you want to grow your home staging business. There are no outside income pressures because this is not a multi-level marketing scheme.

9. You decide who you want to work with and what kind of Home Staging projects you want to take on.

Since a Home Staging project is short term in nature, if you find yourself with a "client from hell," you know they won't be in your life very long. If you find there are certain real estate agents that don't share your approach to business, or treat you with less respect than you deserve, don't work with them again! There are thousands of real estate agents to choose from in most markets. Did you know that in California alone there are 200,000 agents? Clearly not all of them are equally good or equally pleasant to be around!

10. Since you visit clients in their homes, you do not need to worry about what your own home looks like to run a successful home-based business in Home Staging.

Nobody needs to know where your home office is and they certainly don't need to visit your home. So, don't worry if your house isn't a reflection of what you want to present to Home Staging clients. As long as you always present yourself in a professional way, that's the important thing.


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Home Staging expert Debra Gould also known as The Staging Diva is president of Six Elements Inc., a leading home staging company that provides free information to raise home staging industry standards and build awareness amongst homeowners and their real estate agents about the benefits of decorating a house to sell.

Debra Gould developed The Staging Diva Program to create opportunities for others to grow their own profitable home staging, real estate enhancement businesses.