SAVVY HOME STAGING & DÉCOR

Licensed Realtor in DC, MD, and VA, & CEO of Savvy Home Staging & Décor Sharen Sylvester Shares The Best Way To Stage Your Home During The Holiday Season

Article By Alyson Turner Photography By Ken-won Miller

Whether you are selling your house and need home staging or starting the process of buying a home, Realtor Sharen Sylvester is here to help. A licensed realtor and CEO of Savvy Home Staging & Décor Sharen was born in DC and then moved to Prince George’s County when she was 12 years old. She tells us, “I know the area really well and a hobby of mine is keeping up with the development going on in the area. Development in the area has a huge impact on home trends. It is a huge love of mine to keep up with commercial and residential development. I am familiar with Bowie as a resident and as a business owner.”

Sharen’s love for design and her love for helping people led her to her current career. “I had already been a business owner for close to 30 years. I was a hair stylist and started working in Bowie in 1998. Around 2007, I became a part owner of a salon in Bowie. During that time, I was thinking about my next career move while preparing my daughter for college in 2010. I enrolled myself as well and pursued a degree in interior design. I liked the final stages of interior design and started researching home staging as a career path. I went on to research for a few years,” Sharen says, “I decided to get my real estate license in DC in 2017, and became licensed in Maryland in 2018. I was working a dual-career as a stylist and a real estate agent. During 2020, when things closed down due to the pandemic, I started to get the staging business off the ground. I started contacting realtors I knew to tell them that I was doing staging. I retired from the beauty industry in July 2021. I handed a lot of my clientele over to my daughter and left my space to her. I am a full -time realtor, and I recently became licensed in Virginia as well.”

Being able to stage the home is an asset to her clients who are selling their home. “My value as an agent is that I can help make a great impression for buyers by preparing the home. When you first open that door buyers need a ‘Wow’ factor and that is what I try to bring to the table. Staging helps to bring a full price or over-asking price offer. Currently, I am also studying to get my broker’s license and open my own real estate brokerage with the option of in-house staging,” Sharen says, “Home staging is a method of decorating that neutralizes the home to make it appealing to the largest number of buyers. It depersonalizes the home so that a buyer can see themselves inside the home instead of the current home owner. It is not a personalized style of décor. We try to update, freshen up the space, modernize, and declutter. Sometimes a homeowner’s personal items can be used with some edits. Many times, it is a vacant home and we are totally furnishing the house with furniture.”

“We want to create an emotional connection with the home. It also shows buyers how to use a space. It creates possibilities for homes that a buyer might not have considered in the beginning. The buyers remain in the home longer and tour a home that has been staged longer. Staged homes tend to appraise for more than homes that are not staged and it creates better photos for home shopping. It puts another set of eyes on the house. A current homeowner is really connected to the house while a buyer doesn’t have the same emotional connection. When we suggest edits, it really helps to sell the home faster and for more money. Many buyers are watching HGTV - they want to see that when they go home shopping. Once they do, they are excited to make an offer. A lot of times buyers will even ask to purchase the staged furniture. People get excited about the staged product because it creates a fantasy and a lifestyle,” Sharen says.

Sharen started Savvy Home Staging & Décor as a home-based business and then moved onto self-storage units. She now has her own warehouse to store her inventory and a moving truck to transport her inventory to homes for staging. Sharen says, “My business is growing. We currently have two stagers and two movers, but we are always looking to add to staff. I’ve also attended a Master Class in San Antonio, Texas to become a master level staging professional. Women from all over the country came and completed a three-day workshop.”

When it comes to staging during the holiday season, it is important to keep everything neutral that includes avoiding specific holiday connotations, religious pieces, and sports teams. “Fall décor is popular so we can decorate seasonally with leaves and pumpkins. We want to stay away from any specific holiday, for example we wouldn’t decorate for Halloween because some people may not celebrate Halloween. When we go into December you want to stay away from specific religious displays because you don’t know who your buyer is and what they celebrate. You would stay away from anything that depicts a particular holiday. For the same reason you might not decorate with a specific sports team because the buyers might not be a fans of that team. The goal is to sell this house and you don’t want decorations to cause a buyer to not want your house,” Sharen says, “For winter holidays, gold and silver are still neutral and can be used in staging any

time of the year. You can turn people off with green and red. We stick with cream, gray, beige, and taupe. If you are staging your house for the holidays – stay with gold, silver, and white decorations in order to avoid turning away buyers. You even have to be careful with scents when people come to your home. Strong odors in the house can turn buyers off. One great way to get rid of odors is to set a dish of white vinegar out and that absorbs odors. Fresheners just mask smells. It can be a little uncomfortable when selling your house because you have to focus on getting to your new house. Not everyone is a pet lover, so you have to put your dog away or take them out of the home during showings. Put away family photos. There are ways you can decorate without things screaming a certain religion or a certain holiday. When you are staging a home, you have to make it like a model home. Buyers want to see themselves living there.”

As a Realtor and Home Stager, Sharen is there for all of your real estate needs. “I love working with home buyers because I love educating them on the process. I love simplifying the process for a home buyer because a lot of people are scared to own a home, and they are afraid to ask questions. I enjoy helping people who are first time home buyers, and people who are moving on to their next home. I am patient, you can call me at any time and ask what is going on with the home process. I like to help people learn how homeownership can build generational wealth. Educating people on the value of homeownership is very important to me.”