Ready for Market. Julie F Sullivan
So you mentioned the Real Estate Staging Association organization, so you recommend that people choose a stager that’s listed with them because that means they have some training. How does that work?
SHIRIN: Yes, so this is another thing I like to emphasize, our industry is not regulated at all and different people have different ideas about home staging. Some people just think they bring a sofa and a chair and one wall art and one floor lamp and that is called staging – and there are a lot of home stagers that are like that. If you’re listeners are interested in hiring a home stager I really recommend for them to go look at their websites, look at their before/after photos, look at their gallery photos, make sure they are not stock photos – believe it or not there are some that use stock photo’s – and find someone that they really can rely on. Resa is a good source; it’s trying to help bring some home stagers together, collaborate and educate them so I think that’s a good place to start. And the most important thing is, like when I go stage a home for example, if I go stage a townhouse in one area and the same exact floor plan in a different area I will stage them totally differently because the demographic of the buyer is going to be totally different. So you want a home stager who understands the market, it is not just about bringing furniture in but understanding who the buyers are and creating a lifestyle. And that’s the key phrase – lifestyle – for that home. And that’s what your listeners should look for when they are trying to hire a home stager.
JULIE: So wow we were talking and I just went and had a look again at your website and of course I looked at it before I decided to invite you to be on the Ready for Market summit and I’m really impressed with the photos there. So if people want to take a look at some photo’s they can go to your website
right?
SHIRIN: Right.
JULIE: Okay wonderful. Well you have some really gorgeous pictures here and I am super impressed. And I’m also seeing on your website that you’ve won Best of Houzz for 2016, is that correct.
SHIRIN: 2016, 15, 14 and 13, yes four years in a row.
JULIE: Well it’s great to hear all of your ideas and opinions about home staging. I really do feel like you’re very knowledgeable in this market so I appreciate you being on our telesummit. And is there anything else you wanted to share with the listeners before we go?
SHIRIN: No that’s it. And I’m just emphasizing again, that first week is very important and be prepared when you come onto the market.
Letting Go of Clutter
Mary Cate Claudius
Charmed City Organizers
Mary Cate opened her business in 2010 and has helped numerous home owners and businesses live less stressful, more productive lives by decluttering their spaces, schedules and implementing systems that can be maintained for years to come. Mary Cate is a member of the National Association of Professional Organizers and she’s the vice president of the local and APO Baltimore Chapter, and she has served on the board for several years. She has been mentioned in numerous media outlets and highlighted in the Baltimore Sun, The Daily Record, Chesapeake Home and Living and was a guest on Fox 45 TV and WYPR Midday Radio.
She has written for publications including NAPR.net and the CCO blog, and enjoys speaking and coaching to a broad range of groups. She and her organizing team also remain active through sponsorship and volunteering in local community events. Happily living in Hampton with husband John and little girl Pryor, she loves some down-tome outside on the porch with good friends and neighbors, and of course, reorganizing a random drawer or list once in a while.
MARY CATE: I’m really proud of the certification I got a little over a year and a half ago and I am one a a handful of certified organizers in the state of Maryland. NAPO, National Association for Professional Organizers, teamed up with the Board of Certification for Professional Organizers and decided that this was the way to sort of weed out the women from the girls, so to speak. It takes 1500 paid hours to sit for our exam, so that’s roughly three years consecutive work without interruption in order to sit for the exam. So they are pretty serious about who want to maintain. And then we have 45 TEU credits per year that we need to maintain to keep the cert.
JULIE: I’m surprised to hear how stringent those requirements are – 3 years and you had to go for an exam. Did you learn a lot about how to work with people who are having trouble letting go of things or keeping organized?
MARY CATE: Exactly, that and many other things. There are so many specializations you can go to in organizing and one of them, of course, is chronic disorganization and hoarding. Hoarding comes at many different levels and can be really misconstrued today. In today’s society the word is misused and of course television has helped bring awareness, but it hasn’t really helped in terms of judgement and the definition out there. So it’s a whole new gamut and the ICD, The Institute for Challenging Disorganization, is an excellent resource for those who are looking into challenging disorganization or hoarding and it comes across all boards.
There is a whole other gamut which is folks that deal with ADHD, executive function and OCD. We have tools and techniques to be able to help people hold on to those memories without holding on to their stuff, which of course lessens the burden on our loved ones after we’re gone and it helps us be able to move ourselves if we have a life transition so we’re not just drowning in our things.
JULIE: I know when people are moving, a lot of times that it's due to a life transition, even if there’s no loss involved. For example a happily married couple, there are a lot of baby boomers who are thinking, “You know, it’s time for us to downsize. It’s time for us to retire.” And so they’re looking at their family home as their largest asset – and it’s their most valuable asset – and they need to sell it in order to be able to retire. And yet they have raised their family there. So do you want to talk a little bit about how you help people. They have to get rid of a lot of things and yet how do they keep those memories?
MARY CATE: You know it’s such an important thing going on, especially with the boomer generation right now, as you well know our assisted living and nursing homes are overcrowded with long waiting lists and folks are waiting too long to make that transition. And we have a whole other story that we could talk about with in-home care and how that whole industry is going nuts right now. But, for the people that can and do make these decisions on their own before it’s too late, we’re the ones that can help them do that. And from anything from arranging a measurement and special arrangement layout in their assisted living facility or their fifties plus community or even their retirement home on the shore – whatever they’ve chosen to do to downsize – we can help them make that transition a lot smoother by a) sitting with them and making sure that their going through the items, 1, 2 and 3 – what is really important to hold on to and what’s not? Why? Who would this burden later on if we held on to it? All the questions that come along with letting go of an item can be really emotional. If you don’t have another family member or an adult child that can sit and do that because they don’t have time take out of their own jobs/careers/children/lives, we can do that. We’re trained to do that compassionately.
I have a great story about downsizing that might help others: My own parents, who are only in their late sixties / early seventies, decided to do their downsize two years ago, which some say, “Oh my gosh that is so early!” Well yes and no, my dad has had some heart complications and I think my mom realized - who was also then a professional artist – “I want a life too and so does dad. Why would we stay in our home that we have trouble up keeping with leaves and rakes and chopping wood and gutter cleaning and everything that comes with home ownership.” We’re having to pay a lot for other people to do that for them when we could have a fairly easy life in a fifty plus community that is transitional. So when we need it we’re there.
One, I couldn’t thank them enough for a better gift, as their child, to basically do that for me before it’s too late, before they can’t make the decisions on their own and before they’re not physically able to do it themselves. And then two, their enjoying themselves so much more now in a community where they have others like them, that they have so many