She said staging, then soft staging, and I think she means virtual

Question

An inherited house is going on the market and the listing agent has used three phrases in two conversations. She said the place needs staging, then said we could do soft staging to keep costs down, then mentioned that her photographer does virtual for a couple hundred dollars a room.

I assumed those were the same thing described casually, and now I'm not sure any of them are the same thing. The house has the previous owner's furniture in it, most of it old but not falling apart. Is soft staging what you call it when you use furniture that's already there? And if virtual is a couple hundred a room versus thousands for real furniture, why does anyone pay for real furniture at all?

Rena Guide · Accepted Answer

Three different services, and the words get used loosely enough that you should make her name which one she's buying.

Vacant staging means the stager brings in everything, furniture included, because the house is empty. That's the expensive version and the one people mean by default.

Occupied staging means working with a house that already has furniture in it. The stager edits what's there, removes what doesn't work, rearranges the rest, and typically brings in a smaller set of items to fill gaps. Some stagers sell the consultation alone as a written list of what to move, paint, and pack.

Soft staging strictly means accessories only, art, lamps, bedding, mirrors, plants, with no large furniture moved in. It's often applied to a vacant house to make photos less bare, and it's a real physical install. Loosely, people also say soft staging when they mean any light-touch occupied job, which is probably how your agent is using it.

Virtual staging is furniture added digitally to the photograph. Nothing arrives at the house. It's cheap for exactly that reason, and it does nothing for a buyer standing in an empty room, which is the moment that decides most sales. There are also rules about disclosing digitally altered listing photos, and they vary by state and by MLS, so ask your agent what her MLS requires in writing.

Given old but sound furniture, occupied staging is the conversation to have. Ask what she'd remove, because with inherited contents the removal cost can exceed the staging cost.

raj_mehta14 · Answer

So virtual staging is a photo edit and the buyer walks in to a bare room. That's a bigger gap than the price difference made it sound.

diane_kowalski · Answer

The removal point is the one I'd budget first. A house full of a lifetime of contents can run a junk hauler several truckloads, and that bill lands before anyone stages anything.

jessreyes12 · Answer

How does soft staging work in an empty house though? Art and lamps in a room with no sofa seems worse than nothing to me. Or is it for houses where you only need one or two rooms to photograph well?

marcus_hale41 · Answer

@compass it's mostly used on a house that's already selling on land value or location, where the seller wants the photos to not look abandoned and won't pay for a full install. It's a compromise and everyone involved knows it.

@orchard the thing I'd ask your agent is whether she's ever seen the specific stager's inventory. Photos of past jobs tell you whether the furniture is current or whether it's been circulating since forever.

omar_haddad · Answer

Old furniture that photographs badly is usually a scale problem, not a condition problem. Deep dark sofas eat rooms. If the stager's plan is mostly removal and repositioning plus new bedding and art, that's a real service and it's cheap compared to a truck of rentals.

devon_pierce · Answer

Adding to the list of terms getting mixed up: some agents also say staging when they mean the pre-listing punch list, paint and light fixtures and landscaping. Worth pinning down whether her $ number includes any of that, because it usually doesn't.

She said staging, then soft staging, and I think she means virtual

7 replies