Staging your home to sell is a great way to invest in your property if you are thinking of selling in the future. Today we’re sharing the stunning reveal of Riverbend, our rural property, along with sources because everybody loves a good before and after.

Riverbend Kitchen – before and after

We have owned Riverbend for over 12 years.  We bought it when our children were tweens.  It allowed us to have all their friends up, get to know who they were hanging with, and create great memories with them.  As our children grew up, our own friends and family became the main guests.  We were busy every weekend with family and friends and loved it.  We also got a dog the week before we closed on the cottage.  Our new puppy – named Mickey, loved the cottage.  It was his happy place.  He spent time there from 2 months old to the week before he died at age 11.

Last summer was our first without Mickey.  It was also the summer of fewer guests.  When my niece came up for a visit in July, we laughed about the carpet on the wall.  When you have less people around, you suddenly see the real state of your place.  A dozen years of family, friends and our dog had left our rural retreat looking tired and needing some interior decorating help.

Design trends that work for staging

We were also considering selling and knew we had a lot to do to make Riverbend show better.  I have staged several properties to sell, so I knew the basics of making a place look appealing.  I really enjoy looking at design trends and what styles have longevity.

What works best – white paint, uncluttered rooms and a common accent colour to tie the spaces together. And cleanliness.

Everything needed to be updated

We started with painting the bedrooms from blue and green to white.  Bye-bye stencils.  We replaced the burgundy plush carpet that had turned brown in some spots from sun bleaching.  The carpet was in a bedroom, the living room and the stairs and loft.  We picked a Berber rug in mushroom to make the place look bigger.  Then we tackled the kitchen with fresh paint on the cabinets, a new quartz counter top, a stainless farmhouse sink, a gorgeous faucet from Delta and new subway tile backsplash.  We also installed an updated gas fireplace, improving the coziness to the living room.  And as fate would have it, both our hot water tank and propane wall furnace died during our renovations, so they have been replaced as well.

Now, we had a wonderful neutral canvas to work with that would also appeal to future buyers. We had also upgraded all the elements that cause a future buyer concerns – roof, furnace, kitchen, fireplace, and ugly carpet.

Make sure your space looks fresh and uncluttered

Of course, we had to upgrade with new furniture.  We were gifted a used cream sofa (incredible quality) and a newish queen-sized bed (which multiple guests had requested over use of the twin beds we had).  We brought in new chairs, bedding and areas rugs.  I realized once the wall-to-wall carpet was installed the living room, I needed a big area rug so people could still eat and drink wine in there with out the worry of spilling on the new carpet and staining it.

Curb appeal counts too

Well, now that the inside of the cabin was looking so good, we decided to look at its exterior landscape situation. Curb appeal matter as that’s what will be seen first in the photos of your home online.

We started by enlarging the deck platform at the front door, while redoing the gardens on the front and side of the cottage.  We also added a beautiful teak table, accented by gray wicker chairs.  Can you imagine the farmhouse dinners we will have there!

Wow.  That was a full summer and autumn of intense work.

To sell or not to sell

Are we selling – not yet?  We have fallen in love with it again.

We are considering making Riverbend a rental property for limited guests.  I’d love your thoughts on that idea.

Sources:

Carpet and counter purchase and installation; Home Depot Canada

Kitchen

• Faucet: Delta Trinsic in Champaign Bronze
• Sink: Blanco Quatrus 401519
• Counter: Silestone Calacatta Gold Polished
• Paint: Benjamin Moore Cabinet Coat Lower – Coventry Gray HC=169 Upper CC-40 Cloud White
• Subway tiles and grout: Lowes Canada

Living Room

• Wall to wall carpet: Home Depot
• Sofa: Used (thank you Liz & Rein)
• Chairs: Pier One Imports
• Area rug: HomeSense
• Paint Benjamin Moore Walls; Cloud White, Fireplace ceramic tile Stix primer then Cloud white

Bedrooms:

• All linens HomeSense
• Paint: Benjamin Moore CC-40 Cloud White