Staging Your Vacation Rental: 3 Ultimate Tips to Stage your Home
- Vacation Rental Tips
- By: J&J Hospitality
Your listing photographs can make or break your vacation property’s popularity. To add onto that statement, professional photos matter just as much. After all, no matter how costly the camera or how experienced the photographer, if your home isn’t thoughtfully set beforehand, your images may look dull, and you’ll have to set the scene to appeal to the widest range of potential guests.
Unsure of where to start when it comes to staging your vacation space? We have all the tips and tricks on how to stage your vacation rental like a pro.
Vacation Rental Staging: Why it is Important?
Although it may seem easy, there is a lot of work that goes into planning, designing, and carrying out a style for your vacation rental. Make sure you’ve taken every step possible to gain a competitive advantage when renting out your vacation property, and that’s where staging your vacation property for guests comes into play. Knowing how to stage a property is equally important. Staging helps you get great photos for your online advertising that attract your ideal guests, increase your rental price, and get more bookings.
"Staging should paint a clear picture of what it’d be like to live in that home"
When you’re staging a property to sell, you’re preparing it for tours, walk-throughs, open houses, and an online listing. It’s intended to give potential guests the opportunity to visualize what it would be like to live in that home. According to the National Association of Realtors, when a property is staged, more than 77% of guests find it easier to imagine it as their vacation rental home. The bottom line is simple: arranging your vacation home keeps money flowing while reducing the amount of time it spends on the market.
3 Ultimate Tips on How to Professionally Stage Your Space
1. A Welcoming Atmosphere
It’s what sets a wonderful home apart from merely a good one, and it’s what encourages guests to linger as long as possible. How do you achieve that (or improve the environment you already have)?
First impressions really do matter, as the saying goes! (take it from us). As a property management company, we assure that our vacation rental homes have a pleasant atmosphere, and that each room has been decorated to make guests feel welcome.
"Highlight your Focal point"
It’s very important to take into account the the placement of your furniture. It should direct guests toward the room’s focal point. Make something other than the television the main point to get a fresh feeling. Is your vacation rental home situated in mountains? Create a game area with a foosball table, video games, a projector on a feature wall, and cozy chairs and blankets by the fireplace.
Is there a pool on the property? Add a outdoor grill/kitchen, fun lounge area, or a fire pit to the patio to make it the focal point of attention.
Or if you have a large backyard, arrange your living space to focus on a window overlooking that area. Arranging your furniture to maximize personal interaction is a great way to ensure everyone feels welcome when they come into your home.
2. Let the Natural Light in!
Using natural light to change the ambience in your vacation rental home is perfect and it is the best way to brighten a room. Opening the curtains, turning on the lights works best in staging our properties in J&J. It illuminates the beauty of the home and allows you to show off the surrounding scenery. It must be noted that quality interior and exterior lighting is also important. Newer, flush, LED lights are in make sure there actually is enough light in each room and there is no dark corners. in your home.
To be more creative, we love to add more brightness in our properties. Example, patio lights that are strung around a tree or along the top of a patio to provide an event lighting feature. Natural lighting creates an organic invitation to an effortlessly stylish getaway. Our guests love it!
3. Spruce up the Outside
At J&J, we always make sure to shoot exterior photos of our vacation homes. The outside should look just as good as the inside. These provide guests with a sense of the surroundings and outdoor areas. Even if your stunning master bedroom or lavish living room is the focus of your main listing photo, guests will still be interested in the home’s exterior.
You can hire a professional landscaper to trim greenery and create a welcoming scene for your guests. Clean up your garden, ix any dead patches in your yard or add some vibrant shrubs to the area around the mailbox. These modest additions will enliven your outdoor area and encourage guests to take advantage of your home both inside and out.
Another tip for professionally staging your exterior is to make sure that the little things matter. For example, you must ensure that dirty and stained windows are cleaned, as well as the windows and shutters. Again, the purpose of staging a vacation rental is for the property to look nearly identical to the photos when guests arrive.
"Hire a Professional Cleaner"
Did you know?
Before every photo shoot, our J&J team makes sure that each of our properties is professionally cleaned and staged. As a property management company, it is important to make sure that our listings are not only professionally or meticulously cleaned, but that a quarterly deep cleaning is also performed, making sure our homes are shiny and spotless for every photo!
Getting Your Rental Ready for the Photo Shoot
The Don'ts and Do's
× Leave any TVs on or ceiling fans running. Turn them all off.
× Schedule the photoshoot during bad weather
× Forget to professionally clean
√ Make sure that your focal point is setup and functioning
√ Lights should be lit if there is a pool. Turn on the fireplace. Fold the blankets neatly
√ Turn on all your lights
√ Open all blinds and curtains. Show off all that natural light
Summary
By staging your vacation rental, guests can picture staying there. In the end, you’re creating the story of their stay. Does your place appear livable? Experiential?
In fact, you can probably see why not staging your rental property would be a disadvantage that could essentially cost you money when you could be making more from your rental property. A properly staged vacation rental is sure to lure in new guests and increase your property’s value.
Feel free to reach out to our team for a free consultation if you’d like to learn more about preparing your rental property or marketing your vacation home with a professional management company. J&J Hospitality is here to remove the hassle out of owning an investment property, from staging your rental before marketing it to cleaning it after guests have departed.
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