Home Staging Helps Buyers Visualize, Homes Sell Faster

Eighty-two percent of buyers’ agents said staging made it easier for a buyer to visualize the property as a future home, according to the National Assocation of Realtors ® 2021 Profile of Home Staging.

“Staging a home helps consumers see the full potential of a given space or property,” said Jessica Lautz, NAR’s vice president of demographics and behavioral insights. “It features the home in its best light and helps would-be buyers envision its various possibilities.”

Staging increased the sum buyers were willing to spend for a property, according to the report. Twenty-three percent of buyers’ agents said that home staging raised the dollar value offered between 1% and 5%, compared to similar homes on the market that hadn’t been staged.

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Pink bathroom – really?

Pink bathrooms became fashionable in the 1950s because pink was Mamie Eisenhower’s favorite color. At one time it was estimated that there were 5 million pink bathrooms in this country, but they faded almost as fast as they arrived. Pink was swapped for woods and neutrals in the ’60s and the retro oranges and greens of the ’70s. The world simply fell out of love with pink.

Today, there is a resurging interest in the pink bathroom—thanks to the revival of mid-century design and millennials’ love affair with all things retro. An intact pink bathroom is now more of an intriguing design challenge than a renovation project, plus it’s a fun selling point for homeowners and renters alike.

Maybe, but a pink bathroom is not something I would choose.

It was a surprise therefore when, earlier this week, I went into my bathroom and to be confronted with this: (more…)

Demand for Pools, Hot Tubs Surging Due to COVID-19

New in-ground residential pools saw a 21% uptick in 2020 compared to 2019. States like Arizona, Texas, and Florida saw permits rise by up to 30%, Janay Rickwalder, a spokesperson for the Pool & Hot Tub Alliance, an industry research group, told The Escape Home.

“This is historic growth for the industry—the next closest period was in 1983 with 16% growth over a much smaller base,” Rickwalder says. (more…)

Why was this stunning Florida mansion abandoned?

“In the heart of Florida sits this impressive neo-Classical mansion, known as the Money Pit Mansion. Having lain empty for decades, its various owners have been unable to restore it to its former glory due to high costs and substantial damage.” (Read MSN article )

Money Pit

© Abandoned Southeast

The house was built in the early 1900s and is still considered one of the most ornate mansions in the area with its Grecian-style pillars. (more…)

Is Tom Brady staying in Florida?

As we Patriots’ fans find ourselves watching the play-offs this year from a position of curiosity rather than passion, we can I hope root for “Patriots South”, aka the Tampa Bay Bucs, home of Tom Brady and Gronk.

Following on from his “you won’t catch me dead living in the Northeast anymore” comment, Brady and Giselle have made moves in real estate which seem to support this statement. (more…)

It’s 80 degrees in Florida…

In this weekend’s Wall Street Journal, Peggy Noonan wrote:
“In the past year the owners of great businesses found how much can be done remotely.
They hadn’t known that!
They hadn’t had to find out.
They don’t have to pay that killer rent for office space anymore.
People think it will all snap back when the pandemic is fully over but no, a human habit broke; a new way of operating has begun. People will come back to office life to some degree, maybe a significant one; not everything can be done remotely; people want to gather, make friends, instill a sense of mission; but it will never be what it was.
The Partnership for New York City reports 300,000 residents of high-income neighborhoods have filed change-of-address forms with the U.S. Postal Service. You know where they are going: to lower-tax and no-income-tax states.

A recent report suggested that 850 people per day will move to Florida for the next 5 years as they seek “the weather, lifestyle and tax benefits” offered by Florida. (more…)