Having a consistent colour scheme makes a home more appealing to buyers. Photo / Getty
Having a consistent colour scheme makes a home more appealing to buyers. Photo / Getty
Designer Jade Turner is in hot demand for styling advice whenever his friends want to sell their homes.
Turner marched one couple straight to The Warehouse branch in Royal Oak recently and oversaw his friends spending $987 on homewares.
That expenditure, he says, should add up to $30,000 in value to the Ponsonby home, which is about to go on the market.
It's natural that the uber-cool Turner would go shopping for homewares at the retailer as he's the company's lead designer for home and leisure.
Turner really believes, however, that staging a home for sale doesn't need to cost a small fortune. He wouldn't have taken his friends shopping if he didn't believe he could add value to their home.
In the case of the Ponsonby home, the first room to get a makeover was the "shed", which had been hitherto used for housing spa pool accessories and garden equipment. It was dry and had a concreted floor, which made it a usable space.
With the addition of some paint, a desk, chair, bookcase, plants, and storage, it was transformed into an office. A small wall was added so the garden equipment could still be stored.
Turner isn't the only designer who recommends cheap and cheerful when it comes to staging your home on a budget.
Interior design consultant Nita Pearson, who runs The Goose's Bridle, says if you haven't got unlimited money to throw at your home when you're selling, there are some clever tricks.
Turner believes that any room can be transformed for $100 and set out to prove it at his friends' homes.
To create an impression of more space, his friends turned their inside office into a modern nursery and even borrowed a cot for the duration of the marketing period.
This gives the impression of three useable bedrooms, not two bedrooms and a pokey office. His friends, Turner admits, have eclectic, but slightly dated taste.
"It is a beautiful house. It just needed to be elevated a bit."
Gibbston Valley Gala at Auckland Museum. L to R. Sally and Mandy Whitewoods, Jade Turner and Campbell Orr. Photo / Norrie Montgomery
Black and white bedding and accessories from the Onyx vs Blanco range transformed the space from a boys' room to a tranquil oasis.
The advantage of buying your own pieces for staging, says Turner, is that you can take them with you, sell them off, or even give them as gifts for friends and family who have helped out with painting and decorating.
His friends were suitably impressed, says Turner and he expects they will keep some of the pieces they bought.
Turner used a design trick by carrying the black and white theme throughout the house using black textured appliances in the kitchen.
The average Kiwi knows more about home design than they think, says Turner. By following some basic rules they can make their homes more desirable to buyers.
That includes, of course, the essential declutter. Over and above that they need to add textures, interest, and light to the home.
An example of what Turner means by "textures" is using lots of complementary cushions and other furnishings together. That might be a shaggy cushion, a smooth one and a printed one.
Currently, Turner is a fan of metallic prints because of the way they reflect light. He also recommends a variety of shapes including long, skinny "breakfast cushions".
Interest can be added with artwork, which is cheap as chips. In the Ponsonby home, Turner's friends were instructed to buy horse head and other prints to create a little gallery at floor level to add interest.
In the hallway he recommended placing a mirror opposite the print to reflect it. Because the home will be on the market going into winter, the boys were instructed to buy real and fake plants to give the home a better indoor/outdoor flow. And Turner believes you can never have too many nice candles in a home.
With children's bedrooms, where possible, decorate for an older age group. Parents can envisage their children growing into a bedroom, but may, for example, have difficulty seeing their teenage son living in a pink baby space.
If you can't afford to paint over, put decorative touches on walls such as decals and add large black and white photography.
Always look for ways you can add storage to a room, even if it's just adding a nest of boxes, says Turner.
Think of how rooms will be used. For example, the lounge is for relaxing, but for many people the dining table is a family area where children often do homework. Adding a few text books to the dining table to indicate a study area is a clever trick.
Where possible, carry the same theme throughout the house, which is a good reason to buy/rent staging materials from the same source.
