Younger buyers have a specific set of criteria they look for when searching for a home, and it’s quite a bit different than that of baby boomers, according to”Staging a home for millennial buyers: Don’t make it look like Grandma’s house” on Bankrate.com.
“Millennials want a home that’s move-in ready, modernized and furnished with all the colors and comforts of a Pottery Barn store,” Marcie Geller wrote in June 1 post.
According to Geller, the National Association of Realtors reported millennials were the largest group of homebuyers in 2013, 2014, and 2015, accounting for 35% of home sales. Bottom line: Sellers shouldn’t ignore the wants and needs of this group.
“No millennial wants to buy Grandma’s house,” Melinda Bartling, a home stager and Realtor at Keller Williams Partners in Overland Park, Kansas, said in the article. “And a lot of them don’t want to buy their parents’ house. It needs to be hip. It needs to be fresh.”
To make an older home more appealing, Geller enlisted the expertise of a Bartling and other professionals, who had these suggestions for staging a home for millennials:
The look — Millennials look for clean-lined furniture, clutter-free spaces, light-colored walls, dark-colored floors, and bold patterns and colors, according to Geller.
“They want that glamorous, this-could-be-a-movie-set look,” Paige Elliott, a Realtor at Dave Perry-Miller Real Estate in Park Cities, Texas, said in the article. “They like that because they’re young, and they want the lifestyle.”
No fixer-uppers —Outdated homes that don’t offer the look millennials want might be outright ignored by this big segment of social media-savvy buyers, Geller wrote.
“Millennials aren’t just picky. They want updated homes because they don’t have the time, money, or desire to fix up a home themselves,” Kathy Streib, a home stager at Room Service Home Staging in Delray Beach, Florida, said in the article.
Updated decor — Removing old decor and accessories when showing a home can create the right impression. Dated decor like shag carpeting and mirrored walls should be removed. Bartling also suggested removing knick-knacks and collectibles; doilies; flowered wallpaper; old recliners; and bedding like quilts and chenille bedspreads, because those things don’t offer the slightest appeal to millennial buyers.
Equity drain — Real estate agents should provide sales data to sellers who aren’t willing to put effort into staging their home for millennials. Elliott said she offers sellers sales prices of comparable homes that were and weren’t presented to appeal to millennials.
“We say, ‘If you keep it as-is, here’s your price. If you want to get the most (money) out of it, you’re going to have to do the following things,” she said in the article. “We make suggestions. We know what it needs. Then we bring in a stager.”
