Fabulous Find

Amazing

 

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I Love This

I picked up a copy of Style At Home Magazine April 2013 issue and as always I was flipping through looking for new ideas and trends, and there is was on page 54-55 "Dressing the stair case". I have always had a fascination for Stairways and Doors, maybe because they always lead somewhere and I like going places. I blogged about my stairs in an earlier post called Refresh and Renew which you can read later and I love the new look even though I got tennis elbow after all the work it took but totally worth the pain BUT it was missing a runner and I didn't want the tradition one piece top to bottom so I patiently was waiting for something to be made just for me. I should have invented this and I kick myself for not thinking of it. 

Windham Stair Tread in "Ebony is this one and I bought it at Home Depot it comes in brown also with another pattern called Garden Gate and one that comes in a neutral beige with no pattern. The best part is they are $3.99 and I did the entire staircase for $52 What a great deal AND its a DIY project. You do need to use 2 way tape or staples to tack it down because they will move. I chose to use a staple gun with 3/8" staples, they disappear in the carpet fibers better on the lighter sections.

Amazing what a little Elbow grease will do!

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Call me if you would your home staged. Most of the time all it needs is de-cluttering, cleaning and maybe some paint.

Word combination Fun

                                    

 Combining words is fun

 

                                    Stage-enomics 

 Staged Home’s Economic Studies:

  Weather the economy is rising or falling you still have to compete with others. There will always be homes on the market as well as more potential buyers. Your home must be showcased to stand out from the rest.

 Statistics have shown that professionally staged homes sell faster and for more money. Studies have shown that 63% of buyers prefer to pay more for a house that is move in ready. Statistics show that the average difference in selling price over list price for a staged home is 6.3% vs. 1.6 for UN-staged homes.

                                       Stage-ology 

 Staging Psychology- Study of the soul or study of the mind. Emotion,Perception,Attention,Motivation etc:

 Home staging is the process of preparing a home so that it appeals to the majority of potentials buyers. Resale homes are competing not only against each other but with Professionally Decorated New Model Homes and Suites. The pictures that home buyers see on line are first and sometimes the only chance to make that good impression. Unappealing photos put homes at a serious competitive disadvantage and lead to the elimination of these properties from buyer’s viewing lists. A potential buyer will compare your home to everything else they see in the market place. A staged home that is well cared for will leave a lasting impression. Some people will make decisions based on the emotions and senses that they feel when entering a space.
 First impressions will be very important especially because this decision will dictate the rest of the tour. A bad first impression may lead buyers to focus on any negative features the home may have and overseeing all the good ones. Buying a home is the biggest investment that most people will make in a lifetime, a positive viewing is one that lets buyers envision their families living in your space.

Refresh and Update Your Stairs

With a little (ok, a lot) of elbow grease, you can update and refresh your staircase. What I did was lightly sand and wash with soap and water entire surface. I mean spindles, risers, handrail, side-rails, steps. Then I applied a coat of high adhesion primer (I used Fresh start by Benjamin Moore) over all surfaces with a paint brush. When that was dry I painted the spindles in a BM White, OC 117 simply white semi-gloss for the spindles, risers, and sides, basically everything vertical and I did 4 coats. Yes, 4 coats, 1 per day. It is a lot of work but only the first coat takes the longest, the rest goes pretty quick. Next is the hard part, the steps, I am pretty good at cutting so I did not use tape, I found that a 1 inch brush did a good job if you have a steady hand if not use tape but you will have to wait for the white paint to dry very thoroughly at least 1 week or more before you put tape on it. Or what I did was do my best and then I applied a 1/2 inch cove trim to the joints in the same white pre-painted to give an extra clean line and more detailed look. I used a satin finish BM and the colour was Space black 2119-10. (note: I did every other step so we could access going up and down) Finally the hand rail in the black, everything horizontal in black. With all the steps and drying time, it took about 3 weeks from start to finish. I only used 3 quarts of paint, 1 white 1 black and the primer. I have left overs of all three. Total cost was approx 80.00 including brushes. I had a quote from a painter to do this job because of the steps and labor it would have cost me 1200-1400 dollars.

I think I did pretty good