Home Staging Business Program

Starting a home staging business is not like building a baseball field in Iowa. If you build it, they might not come.

Just because home staging is the career you've chosen, doesn't mean that you will automatically be an overnight success. There are so many variables that determine how successful a business becomes. Hard work and passion are only two factors. Timing is critically important. Adequate funding is also a key ingredient. The home staging business program we've developed for you on these pages will guide you through the launching of your home staging business.

To help you gauge the probable success of your new home staging business, you will first need to do some investigative work. Once you have satisfied yourself that there is room in the marketplace for your very well-thought-out business, you then must decide how your business is going to look legal-wise.

Assessing demand is one part science and one part conjecture. Any good home staging business program (especially this one) will advise you to make sure that there is potential for your business already in place. It is much easier to meet demand than to create it.

• If there is a successful home staging business in your market area, then there is demand. The question then becomes, is there enough demand for another provider of home staging services? You can answer that by finding out how busy that company is at the present time.
• If there are no like businesses in your area, then you will have to speak with some real estate agents about their need for staging services. How do they stage homes now? Do they wish they had a stager on-call for homes that need help? How many times a year would they employ your staging services if available? Keep track of your findings, you will need this data when we get to II. Planning and Budgeting .
• How are market conditions right now? Are there a lot of homes coming on the market? Is it a slow time of year? Seasonality affects almost every business. Make sure you know if it is a slow or busy time of year when you are querying agents.
• Another way to gauge demand is to check out furniture rental companies in your area to see if they do a lot of business with home stagers. If someone is placing rental orders consistently, then you should have a situation with pretty good demand.
• Sometimes agents will say they don't use staging services because they don't have a budget for it or the homeowner doesn't want to pay for the staging. Here's where planning and budgeting come into play. If you lowered your pricing, you might find more demand. However, if you can't make a living at that lower pricing, then you might want to think twice about starting a business. Businesses must make money or they are not businesses - they are hobbies.

Just as a home has a foundation, so do all businesses. It is what the structure is built upon. You want to build your foundation to suit your business plan. In this home staging business program, we encourage you to spend some time and really think about how you want your company to look and feel.

• Businesses need to have a legal structure. These include sole proprietorship, corporation or limited liability company (LLC) in the United States. Choosing a legal structure will determine the tax status of your company and who carries the liabilities of the company. The best person to ask about what legal form your company should take is your accountant or attorney. They can also help you set up your company or you can use one of the online business formation services (Insert link here) that have now made this process quick, affordable and easy.
• Your business will probably need to be licensed by your state or local jurisdiction. You will have to get a tax i.d. number (if you choose a corporate or LLC form of business) so that you can file tax forms and open bank accounts. If you choose the sole proprietor form, your own social security number will serve as your tax i.d. Some municipalities will require you to purchase a business license which is a yearly obligation and the fees are not usually too steep. This process is the same whether you want to start a staging business or bakery -- businesses need to be licensed and your state needs to know that you are conducting business.
• When you choose a name for your company, make sure you are not infringing on someone else's trademark or their name. You can do a quick search of names and trademarks by using an online service (link here.) You don't want legal troubles before you even get going!

With your tax i.d. in hand, you can now open a bank account. You will need a bank account to accept payments for your services and to pay for the goods and services you will need to perform your services.

• While at your bank, you can check into getting set up with credit card processing. Your bank will give you their rates for processing your charges and you should definitely check around to see who has the lowest rates for processing in your area. We live in a credit society, so you will want to be able to accomodate your clients with this expected service. (Home staging busines program tip: check online sources as well. You might be able to save yourself some money!)

Preparing to start a lucrative home staging business is not unlike starting any other business, you have to lay the groundwork for success. You need to follow certain legal formalities and get the "back room" operation in place so that you can spend your time helping your clients and doing staging work instead of administrating. (If you wanted to be an administrator, you could easily look for work in a school district or municipal office.)

Now that you have an organization in place and have dotted your legal "i"s and crossed your banking "t"s, you can begin planning your home staging business with the next step in our home staging business program.

Return to Laying the Groundwork - home staging business program.