If I listened to every real estate agent who told me home staging wouldn’t work in my city seven years ago, I would not be a successful home stager today.

Just last month I talked to the owner of a vacant condo that she’s about to put on the market. It will be one of four that’s for sale on her floor. Her agent suggested that she put tape on the hardwood floors to indicate where furniture might go to give prospective buyers a sense of how big the rooms are!

Imagine expecting home buyers to be inspired by tape outlines and fall in love with an empty $895,000 condo that’s priced well above anything else in the building.

And what about the real estate listing photos with all those white walls and boxy empty rooms typical of most condos?

Fortunately this home seller is smart enough not to take this bad advice and went online to search for a home stager. She found my home staging website, and while her agent made no mention of the possibility of staging her vacant property, she’s now prepared to invest at least $5,000 in having me stage it for her.

> If you’ve been discouraged from following your dreams of becoming a home stager, read the rest of this story and add to the fantastic comments you’ll already find there from fellow stagers.

As stagers, we offer a tremendous and valuable service to home sellers that makes a huge difference in their lives.

> If you have any doubt about how much you can help people with your talents, please read the many examples of what Staging Diva Graduates have done for their clients here.

Some agents can be educated about the difference staging can make; others have too many barriers to our message. There are plenty of better ways to build your staging business than pouring all your energies into that one group. That’s why real estate agents are only one of four target markets I talk about in the Staging Diva marketing course.