White, gray, wicker: is home-for-sale staging beginning to look all the same?

I love good staging at homes for sale.  Yes, furniture and accessories do help to sell homes.  Lately, though, I've noticed a sameness to the staging at most of the homes for sale that I see here in the L.A. area, regardless of who the staging company is.  Everything is white and gray, with a "pop" of  bright accessory color.  And wicker.  Lots and lots of boxy wicker outdoor furniture. (There's a lot of new home design similarity too, but I'll save that for another time.)  The east side homes aren't quite as guilty of this as the west side and valley, but they're catching up.  For example, this is what I saw during just the last few days. I wish I had invested in this patio furniture company.

My property showings on L.A.’s “Eastside”

Thanks to a couple of my buyers, I've been spending a lot of time in what's being called the Eastside lately. (Check out the Echo Park post below.) This past Sunday, I showed property in Atwater Village, Eagle Rock, Mt. Washington, Highland Park and Glassell Park. I had never shown property in the last two communities but I had a great time and really learned a lot about the areas. I was very delighted by what I saw and intend to get to know these localities more in the coming months.


Yes, some of the neighborhoods are “transitional” but they offer good housing stock at affordable (at least for now) prices. The gangs that were so prevalent in years past seem to have moved out. The flippers have gone through these neighborhoods and have worked their magic, too. And neighborhood amenities are increasing, too – cool coffee houses, restaurants, small retail, farmers’ markets, etc. (We could barely move through Atwater Village as the streets and sidewalks were so crowded.) Cons: the schools aren’t all that, and buyers would have a helluva commute if they work on the Westside.

Here are the highlights:

Decorating trends (above) The flippers are hiring stagers. Now, I love staging but I’ve seen a lot of it in recent weeks and it’s beginning to look the same. It’s all modern or semi-modern furniture with pops of color, folk accent pieces, and no window treatments. Not a bad thing, but..

Another trend: forget yards; it’s all rock and bark now.

Most disturbing/interesting trend: crazy chicken pictures as art.  I saw these in at least two houses.  Sigh.  Just another next big thing that I'm not cool enough to know about.

Coolest location: 1316 Highgate Ave., Highland Park, listed at $499k (above). This 3+2 flipped craftsman is in a charming, wooded hillside neighborhood.  You'd never guess that you could almost walk to downtown L.A. from here.


Nicest view: 3600 Maceo Street, Mount Washington, listed at $440,000 (above). This 2+3 is actually in Cypress Park and close to Glassell Park. At the top of its big terraced backyard, it overlooks the entire L.A. river area from downtown to Elysian Park to Glendale. And you have your own bare hillside right next door.

As you can tell, I get really excited about discovering new neighborhoods. IMO, these areas present excellent options for buyers looking for affordable price and revitalized neighborhoods.

Staging video for 1106 N. Cordova

This is a really rough look at the living room staging for 1106 N. Cordova in Burbank.  This is my first "sequenced" video and I promise to improve my technique before posting anything else.  But at any rate, you can see the big difference that staging makes.

1106 N. Cordova, Burbank closed today and here's how it went

1106 N. Cordova Street in Burbank closed escrow today.  We had two offers very quickly after putting it on the market at the end of May, and it sold over list price at $464,000. The transaction went very smoothly -- I wish all transactions could go this well!

Here's how we got offers over listing so quickly: 1) The sellers had the home expertly upgraded.  No, it wasn't a flip in the classic sense as the owners had lived there 17 years until they bought a bigger house last summer.  They spent some money, and it showed. 2) It was beautifully staged. (That's the living room, above.) I thought this was essential as the house was small and I knew furniture would make it look bigger.  I'll post a before-and-after video soon. 3) I marketed the hell out of this.

The inspection went pretty well as far as inspections go, although the water heater conked out and the sellers had to replace it. The buyer, her agent and his team were really on top of things and responded to everything in a reasonable, timely manner.  And we had a back-up offer.

However, there's pain in every escrow.  The only pain here was with the appraisal.  As I said in a previous post, the first appraisal came in low.  Even though the buyer was putting down a hefty sum, Wells Fargo balked.  The buyer changed lenders (Great Western), we had a second appraisal that came in to value, and the lender got the loan done in two weeks (!!!).  And everybody is happy!