How Much ‘De-Personalization’ is Too Much When Selling a House?
By Bill Primavera
With many of us stuck at home because of COVID-19, we probably have more time on our hands to consider our surroundings. Therefore, it might be a good time to question whether those surroundings truly express who we are and whether they support our comfort and interests.
Further, we might consider how others perceive our home, especially for anyone who might be considering selling in the near future.
I have always believed that our home surroundings should project who we are through the use of highly personal items that remind, motivate and inspire us to achieve certain goals, both professionally and personally. But how much of that should be revealed to prospective buyers?
As a realtor, I know that when a home is on the market and prospective buyers are invited in, sellers are advised to “neutralize” or de-personalize the décor with blah colors and to “hide” personal items so that the buyer can project their own lives into the space. Such personal effects as family photographs on the refrigerator, it is advised, can sabotage that objective.
But here’s a realtor who did not take his own advice. When I put my colonial home on the market five years ago, I tried de-personalizing in just one room of my house, but failed when I found that I was uncomfortable being set adrift in a world of sterility without all the reminders that comfort and inspire me, collected over a lifetime. I wanted to experience them every day, despite the fact that my home was on the market. Prospective buyers would just have to see beyond this little kink in my thinking.
I became aware of this issue about revealing too much of ourselves to buyer prospects during my first week in the real estate business. My office received a call from a client who complained that a visiting agent had left her business card on the seller’s “home altar,” certainly a very private matter. When the agent was advised of the complaint, she responded, “Gee, to me it just looked like an end table. I thought the statue of the Buddha was just for decoration.”
While I do have evidence of calling upon the Divine in my own home, my main focus for motivation and inspiration – and this is highly confessional – has always been my daily quest for fitness. Having been involved for many years in the food and restaurant field as a promoter, I was like a kid in a candy shop, coping daily with all the products I represented – and I didn’t have Medifast or Nutrisystem as a client. As a consequence, I surrounded myself with motivational tools for health and fitness. Any visitor to my home would clearly know that.
In my dressing room, for instance, was a weight bench, although it was mostly used as a pants rack. Directly over my barbell rack was a framed watercolor, painted by my daughter when she was eight, depicting me as a muscleman pumping barbells, with a photograph of my face pasted on the neck. It’s just too charming and motivational for me to hide.
Then there were the nutrition and diet books in the kitchen bookshelf, including the very first book published by Weight Watchers, signed by the group’s founder, Jean Nidetch, whom I once met.
Also, I devote myself to achieving mental calm and relaxation through meditation and have tools to encourage that, including a tubular tuning chime and an extensive collection of crystals that all but make my man cave vibrate.
And I hid nothing when there was a showing.
I have found some real estate bloggers who share my view that there is some confusion between de-cluttering and de-personalizing. I think the former is what should be sought, rather than removing the history, love and taste bestowed on a home by its sellers. Creating clean and open spaces is a good thing. But removing distinctive colors with boring beige is not something I recommend as professional stagers sometimes do.
As for items that project our personal lives, I suspect that buyers have more than a little curiosity about them. The lifestyle that we may take great pride in might just be an attraction rather than a turn-off. Many times, I observe buyer clients looking at family photographs and, in particular, reading the titles of books on the shelf.
I welcomed prospective buyers to my highly personalized home with all its revealing evidence of a life well lived and enjoyed. Despite that personalization, we sold quickly and at a good price. It’s all a matter of a case-by-case consideration. Does personalization project your home in its best light? Then, I say go for it.
Bill Primavera, while a writer and public relations practitioner, is also a realtor associated with William Raveis Real Estate in Yorktown Heights. To engage the talents and services of The Home Guru to market your home for sale, call 914-522-2076.
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