I live in a HCOLA and what I see a fair amount of at the higher price points is almost unfurnished houses, or one or two professionally decorated -looking rooms that look like they aborted the project at the 80% mark so they didn't pay for finishing touches and a bunch of rooms with bare bones or nothing. These are at price points where the people could afford furniture if they bought less house.

Palimpsest, are you sure that those homes aren't just staged for selling? We're stripping down to a bare minimum to put the house on the market.

We're looking at homes all the way across the country, and I find nicely furnished homes with the most awful paint jobs. Every room a different color, no continuity. Bedrooms in purple and orange and of course blue and pink, lots of awful wallpaper. Ugh!

It's a mix here....some homes can look beautifully decorated, some homes look like a real hack job by someone with no taste, some are clearly staged with leftovers and some are bare bones.

No, lots of personal effects here and there and very lived-in kids' rooms.

Most homes I see for sale here are nicely decorated, but some are quite dated in terms of upholstery and paint colors. I also see quite a few homes that are attractively decorated only when viewed from a particular cultural perspective.

okay, I take it back after looking again; price point does matter some, but not a whole lot. Money does not equal taste, and vice versa, I guess.

Put the lid down on the toilet & clear off the bathroom counter. Make the beds and pick up the clothes on the floor & furniture, clear off kitchen counters and no dirty dishes in the sink. Pick up the kid's toys, no matter the age of the kids. Now it looks a lot better.

I haven't really noticed that here. But then I only tend to look at aspirational listings: the ones just -- or rather far -- out of reach. Those tend to be decorated well

Went to an open house today, every toilet had both seats up. As I moved through the house I wondered if a looker did it. And the soft drink cup behind the vase? Of course the RE agent just sat on the sofa greeting lookers. Interesting house... This is a spec listing, very staged.

I don't look on line that much, but I do occasionally to see what furniture trends are in this area. Most of what I see seems staged, although that was not the case when I looked in person. RA's here do not allow hideous photos on their sites and often will withhold photos rather than show something that is not attractive. People trying to sell here make an effort to appeal to a sophisticated market - otherwise, the price will be significantly lower, I think. If you watch Flip or Flop, you can see how some of the lower end houses are staged - they tend to avoid Los Angeles County, however, and spend more time in O.C.

For the most part all I see is generic houses with poor decorating. However if I look at closest cities around me I might find some lovely homes. Austin has quite a good number when looking at higher price points. San Antonio has some when looking at older historic homes or also at a higher price point. However it is rare for me to see something and think to myself that the decor is perfect.

Depended on the zip code. I picked the last two zip codes I lived in. One was fancy-shmancy (I rented, didn't own, I don't have that much money!) and either properly decorated or completely empty? The next one over, more upper middle class, normal people lived in the houses. Not sparse, but looked lived in.

aktillery, my husband and I like looking at Austin homes (in way out of our reach prices). :)

Our fantasy is to move to Fredericksburg, a stone house on land. I love Hill Country style architecture .... but wow, is that town pricey! Just waiting to win the lottery ....

MizGG where do you live again? I am in Canyon Lake in the Hill Country.

ak, we're just west of Fort Worth (I grew up in Arlington and Dallas).

I've always loved Austin! My husband moved here from Long Island, and being a rock climber, he loves Enchanted Rock, although it's baby stuff compared to the Gunks. :D You all have the most stunning wildflowers in the Hill Country, it's just gorgeous!

I look at listings in my neighborhood, which was built 15-25 years ago during The Time of Brass and Oak. What amazes me is the lack of upgrades. Some of the owners have been in the home for a decade or two and not one faucet or light fixture has been changed. They have the original metal blinds. There is one big high tech employer in town where many of my neighbors work, so they have very good incomes.

My neighborhood seems to be a mix. I looked at a few, and found one with an architecturally nice interior, but they put a sofa in front of the fireplace (not facing the fireplace; the back of the sofa was directly against the fireplace) and a refrigerator in the living room (nothing says "my kitchen is too small" than a refrigerator in the living room). Others were nicely decorated, and at least one definitely looked staged.

I was looking online yesterday and saw a beautiful updated clean kitchen, BUT you could see the eating area in the corner of the picture and that table had several appliances piled on it. Then, there was a picture of that same eating area with the table cleared off, and in the left corner you could see the same appliances piled on the kitchen counter. So someone cared enough to clear off the surfaces for the photographer, but not enough to edit the pictures. I would never hire an agent who doesn't weed out the bad pics.

Depends on the zip code and price range (somewhat) around here. I don't understand why agents take, much less post, photos of areas of a home where the owner (or the agent) hasn't cleaned up or at least attempted to stage for selling. Clean it up, people. Many, however, look nicely decorated, if not to my own taste.

" built 15-25 years ago during The Time of Brass and Oak. What amazes me is the lack of upgrades. Some of the owners have been in the home for a decade or two and not one faucet or light fixture has been changed."

I think GW is a specific subset of people. I think there is a whole set of people who are completely happy with their houses "as bought" and they are only inclined to replace something when it needs to be replaced for some functional reason. My feeling is that sometimes things are better off left alone.

I think many people on GW tend to replace with higher quality than was there originally but I don't think this is necessarily true of the general populace. And I am not really in the camp that thinks that something needs to be replaced just because it's 20 years old and that makes it automatically ugly when it wasn't considered so before. Generally I think developer quality anything of any period has the potential to be ugly, but it's ugly from the very beginning. People just don't notice because it's "new" and new trumps almost anything for a lot of people.

"photos of areas of a home where the owner (or the agent) hasn't cleaned up or at least attempted to stage for selling. "

I am friends with my agent, and I look at real estate all the time and we have talked about this.

It really isn't up to the agent to clean or stage for the owner, or be concerned how bad things look in the photos. The agent or their photographer should be getting accurate, good-quality photos of the property and if they aren't esthetically pleasing it's not the agent's fault, or responsibility either, to do anything other than encourage the seller to do something about it. I think a number of properties that look particularly messy in this area are rental properties, and this is an area that is very strong about renter's rights. An agent or a landlord could probably get into a lot of trouble if they touched a tenant's property to get a better picture.

Even though it is usually in the lease that renters agree to show their unit with adequate notice at the end of their lease, many leases don't specifically say you have to show your unit to people who may be buying the building and evicting you as a result. I tried to look at a property that had two rental apartments and one commercial rental, and one of the apartment's tenants wanted 48 hour notice, during a specific hour of the day, and only if both tenants were there. That was the only unit we saw, and they followed us around and said "don't open that closet", "don't open the back door it's hard to relock" and generally made us very uncomfortable. The second unit's owner agreed to a different day, had to be present and then wasn't there. The commercial unit's tentant's saw us walking up and bolted the door. When we said they had agreed to let us see the space, they laughed and said "So what? We changed our minds".

Clearly, these tenants did not want to have to move and made it very difficult for the building to be sold. I gave up on even trying to look and told the landlord that his tenants were making it very difficult to see the building. That building has been on and off the market for five years, and at least two of the three tenants are still there. And there is little the landlord can really do.

In my area, there is generally a mix. Being semi-rural on large lots, if a place is landscaped, it definitely is set apart. There are some houses that I look at and think that I could definitely live there or at least see the potential. There are many houses that I look at and think they are no different than what you find in many other areas of the country. From my perspective, this sad because why live in a place that is different and try to copy what is done elsewhere? Alas, it is not my money and if the people who buy these homes are happy with how generic they are, good for them. What I do find amazing is even when searching high price points how uninspiring many kitchens are. If I want inspiration, I need to look at other cities.

Auntjen,

How very kind of you to see other reasons ...I needed to read this today and count my blessings.

I still think it looks bad on the agent if the photos are bad. Sure, the realtor isn't "required" to clean things. But we could be talking about a $10k payday for this listing, and you can't even be bothered to move the dishes for the photo? I can personally look past these things as a buyer. But when we sold our house recently, I looked at the listings of agents I was considering buying. If I had seen photos of houses in horrid conditions, I wouldn't have hired that agent.

I don't usually set out looking at listings, I am usually suckered into them on NYT, WSJ, and the like. So there is not a lot of junk via those avenues, certainly no unmade beds and the like..

However, I rarely find homes I truly like. I find a lot of high end homes look "dated" to me because often the sellers of high end homes are of a certain age group and are very traditional (not to overgeneralize of offend). Or, they are too ornate. Or, they or totally "done, done" and au courant but not interesting. Or they are too dark, too Tudor, too masculine/mountainy. too Buatta-y, too LilyPulitzer-y. Ya' know. There are a lot of "types"?

Very rarely do I find a home where I lust after /linger over the décor. The exception was actually and air b n b listing recently where the owner iirc was in the wallpaper business and she had gorgeous wallpaper in every room!

Here, there are sometimes people in the photos. Some teenager sitting sullenly on the sofa, someone in bed under the covers, people leaning back but not actually getting out of their chairs.

I sincerely doubt the realtor or photographer is happy to have things a mess in the photos, or to have people who refuse to move for photos, I doubt the realtor just doesn't care. But they can't force someone to clean, and what if they touch things without the seller's permission?

There is an assumption going on here that just because a seller puts their house on the market that they actually cooperate with the agent, and do things that the agent asks, like decluttering. Some sellers are absolute nightmares. I once bought a property that the seller's realtor made almost no commission because he paid for things out of his projected commission that the sellers refused to do.

There are generally 2 types of listings in my area: new builds which feature what the builder believes are updated features.

Then horribly dated homes reflecting families whose kids are grown and no longer need our schools. They're likely facing college bills and/or retirement and don't care to spend money updating their homes because a crop of new families with time to save up for updates, or DIY, will gladly take their dated home off their hands to be in our school district.

I think pal is correct. A realtor works for the seller and is under no obligation (nor has any right in most cases, I wouldn't think) to make the property present a certain way. I have no doubt that recommendations to declutter, stage, repaint, repair (etc.) are made to the seller; after all, the realtor wants top dollar for the house every bit as much as the seller does, because sales price determines commission. We followed a number of suggestions made by our realtor but drew the line at leaving artwork and some furnishings in the house. She felt the house would show better with those things in place, but we wanted all of our things out of the old place and into our new home. A realtor cannot force a seller to do anything they don't want to do. I would never expect a realtor to "clean up" before the photos are taken either. That's out of the scope of their responsibility, and honestly, I think that expectation is a little bit demeaning to agents.

In our current location (middle of UK) there seem to be a lot of mid-higher end properties (£500k - £1 million plus) for sale that look as though they were last decorated in the 1980s/1990s with what were obviously expensive finishes at the time.......swags and tails (curtains/drapes) show up with surprising frequency!

As we had to sell my old family home fairly recently when my parents required nursing care, I also tend to think of why those homes that show badly in the EA's photos might be in that state - although I hasten to add that we dressed my parents' house for sale and it presented well - if a little dated - not least because it had been well maintained over the years.

I think some members of the older generation tended to adopt an "if it ain't broke, why fix it?" mentality - I've said before that we as late forty-somethings decorate for the long term, so we're not much different ;) - so they often bought well originally and didn't chop and change when interior trends dictated they should......

There's no excuse for not putting toilet lids down though!

On the subject of rental properties, we once bought a Victorian house that had been converted to four rental units. The vendor showed us over but was unable to persuade the tenant in one flat to open the door. We went ahead with the purchase and didn't get to see the flat in question till moving day!

Given the topic, here are two links that have been shared before:

Bad MLS Photos

Hooked On Houses Bad MLS Photo Collections

We look at real estate all the time -- we could move at the drop of the hat for the right property. We also monitor investment property.

Here in NorCal I see the gamut. Often, in San Francisco, staging is overdone to the point every interior looks like a variation on a template. Or, you get a $1M condo furnished with college cast-offs and cheap RTA furniture.

In the more affluent suburban neighborhoods in NorCal you see a lot of faux Tuscan -- some done with quality and some not. Enough said. And sometimes, you do see that more budget does not equal better results. At the lower price points, without the benefit of the higher budget or professional help, things can get a bit bland.

It would be interesting to share listing photos of houses (in various price bands) where you felt things were well executed, regardless of budget.

I am a homecare nurse in the Philadelphia suburbs-I am in and out of many peoples homes and I see a lot of good and bad decorating at all price points.I also see many realtors take horrible MLS photos that depict nothing about the home (like a close up of a piece of furniture??). I have vowed to get professional photos done when I go to sell my home.

My house, built in 2005, sold in less than a month. The only decorating that I did was to buy a few fresh plants and throw pillows. I'm fairly organized and use baskets a lot anyway. I think it all came down to a clean, clean, clean and decluttered house; gardens were weeded and orderly. No one thought the gardens (extensive), pool and water feature were an issue. I suppose since those were clearly shown in the photos, anyone wanting low maintenance didn't look.

I hired a cleaning crew to come in once a week; pool service every other week; lawn service every 10 days; mulch for the gardens. When my husband was alive, we did all of that ourselves, but I couldn't manage it by myself, so those were my biggest expenses in putting the house on the market. Losing him is why I sold.

Whenever there was a showing, I turned on every light in the house before I left. I took my dog to doggy daycare so that I my house was in order every morning. I put the dog bowls and toys inside her crate and covered the crate with a beautiful quilt that my grandmother made 40 years ago. Professional photos.

If I ever see a dog in an MLS photo in the future, I will avoid that listing like the plague. The house we bought had an overwhelming scent of room deodorizer when we viewed it, and that gave me a clue, but I had no idea how bad the smell of dog urine on carpets in the bedrooms would be. The owners never had their dogs in the house during any showings or photos, but the stench their dogs had caused was nauseating. I do not understand how the previous owners lived with it, and if I had known how bad it was going to be, I would have ripped out the carpet in my bedroom before moving in, whatever the cost. My brother removed the carpet in his bedroom to reveal beautiful oak floors, which only required a small amount of repair to get into great condition, but my bedroom was a new addition and had concrete beneath the carpet. Still, I should have removed the stinky, disgusting carpet and had new floors put it. Instead, I went to bed sick every night with the smell of dog urine. I do not know how anyone ever slept in that room before, and I am shocked that they were able to have two daughters. No amount of rug shampoo or deodorizer ever removed the smell, and I tried everything. After a couple of years, it subsided.

Cats would be just as bad, or worse, since I am allergic to cats, but I like cats, although I chase all invasive cats from my yard whenever I see them. I like my own cats, but I do not like other people's cats, and I do not like anyone else's dogs, partly because of dog poop that I used to find in my yard in Venice.

If you are selling your house, best to remove any evidence of pets, as most of them stink. At the moment, I am raising Swallowtail caterpillars in my house, but I will turn them loose when they turn into butterflies.

The sellers or our current house had great MLS photos, and it was very obviously staged, although they kept the pink and lavender organza curtains in their daughters' bedroom, but and fortunately painted over the pink and lavender walls.

Um, you do know that most people have pets, right? Removing all traces of them in an MLS listing doesn't mean they haven't lived in the home. Wouldn't you rather know? I also don't understand how you can't "like other people's" dogs and cats. They're innocent little animals! And - "most of them stink"? So do humans! That's why we clean up after ourselves and the creatures we love.

Saying you don't like other people's animals is, to me, that's like saying you don't like the flowers growing in someone else's garden.

I have a miniature poodle. She doesn't shed and definitely doesn't stink. She is professionally groomed every 4 weeks. She is housebroken and never had an accident in the house that I sold except for one time--during one of my late husband's emergency hospital visits, she wet the stone hearth because it was most like the outdoors than any other surface.

Although sold, my house listing is still up on Zillow. Here's the link my previous home

dyharden, I went to see the link-what a beautiful house. The backyard (it's too big to be called a backyard, frankly..more like a small park to me)) is breathtaking. So pretty I'm sitting now sadly contemplating real estate and all. Would cost twice as much where I live..minimum..

Wow, dyhgarden- what a beautiful home! Thanks for sharing the link.

As for the subject-yes, I look at the listings a lot..sort of routine activity..can't stop)) I usually dislike the vast majority...but I must say I'm more after certain architecture ,so I don't even look at half of the listings..I may be missing something.

But several times I did see amazing homes. I don't remember the exact decor; it didn't matter much as the general feeling of harmony. One house that impressed me was built by an architect for himself; another was older house and I do remember dated wallpaper with little flowers and such, but it still was the cutest place surrounded by greenery, very dreamy..you felt like inside a fairy tale

Both homes were much smaller than we needed:) but i loved them anyway

Thanks, y'all. Here in North Carolina, you get a lot for your money compared to many other locations. But, I'm not in San Francisco, Boston, Seattle---all those "cool" places to live. I have friends in the California Bay Area who have told me that the list price is the starting point and offers run the price up.. Whereas, here, list prices are the starting point and the offers are usually lower.

I still look at real estate photos, even though I'm renovating my fixer-upper right now. I've always loved to see what's on the market and have helped many friends and family find homes or land here. My stepson tells people that if I send a house link to them to look at, they'd best hurry because it will sell quickly. So, house looking at MLS has evolved into a hobby to help out friends and family.

dyhgarden, what a stunning home and lot! My goodness, I'm drooling. Love it all, and the two-toned wood on the island is so interesting.

I can't wait to see what you do with your now home, I just love your style. I know it will be fabulous. :)

dhgarden, gorgeous home!!! I can certainly see why it sold so fast. It is so tranquil and the gardens are obviously fantastic! I bet it was hard to leave that beauty behind!

It was difficult, but after losing my husband last year, it wasn't the same. We poured ourselves into building in 2005 and developed the gardens over the years. I didn't want to be there anymore, so I downsized to my fixer-upper. I'm still living in a "warehouse" with boxes and furniture stored in every room while the addition is finished. Hopefully, before Christmas, I'll have a kitchen again.

As a realtor, I won't take a listing until I have previewed the home, told the seller what they need to do to get it "show ready", which means decluttered and clean, and then met with them to make sure that it is done. Then I schedule professional photos, and show up about a half hr early to do some final touches (toilet seats closed, beds made wrinkle free, pillows plumped, dog dishes put out of sight, lights on.

If I have any doubt that the seller will not keep the house ready to show with a 2 hr notice, then I only do a 60 day listing, and I tell the seller that I am doing the short listing period, so they can make sure I am doing a good job, and holding up my end regarding marketing/showing, and I can make sure they are holding up their end by keeping it show ready. I confess, I have spent slow open houses, cleaning baseboards in some of my listings, and organizing pantries.

I spend a lot of money on professional pictures and virtual tours, and am not going to waste my time with lousy pictures because a house is cluttered or doesn't show well. And if I get bad feedback from other agents, saying the house was dirty/cluttered, unmade beds/dishes in sink, clothes strewn around, I will talk to seller about it, suggest a maid, and if it happens again, I will terminate the listing. I need houses I can sell, not just listings. I have a reputation among other agents, that if they show a listing of mine, they know it will show well. And my listings normally sell in 30 days or so.

What I notice is a general correlation of expensive/hot areas = better photos/staging. But there are always exceptions.

I mainly look at local neighborhood listings, especially homes of the same build as ours, to see any remodels or updates. I remember how our original kitchen was falling apart so I'm always a little surprised when I see other original kitchens still in place (maybe with new sinks, counters, & appliances). Most homes in my neighborhood are tidy, but not especially updated and definitely not magazine-quality decor. We live in an area where I would not expect great interiors, sometimes I'm pleasantly surprised how nice the homes can look inside.

We just sold our home so I've done a lot of looking at the listings in my area for months or probably years. It's a fairly affluent area and the more expensive homes are so perfectly decorated they don't look like homes - more like a luxury boutique hotel. The less expensive ones are usually pretty dated. Probably lovely in their day but not now.

I kind of wondered how the sale of our home would go as it wasn't perfectly decorated like many but it was also one of the least expensive homes in the community. We had moved out and left just a few things for staging. It was pretty neutral and clutter free which is the advice you get from realtors. The listing photos looked better than I expected so I guess less is more. It also sold in three weeks.

Trying to find a house from several states away, we spent months looking through the listings on a bunch of for-sale sites. The biggest impression I got was that people were more like "look at my stuff" rather than "look at my nice house". Ugh - we were not impressed with most of the offerings and always wondered why, if you really want to sell your house, you wouldn't make at least a little effort. No wonder so many that were there when we started looking are still there!

I've been pleasantly surprised (for the most part) in our LCOLA area,with the care taken in readying a home for sale. Although there are exceptions, most are clean, tidy, decluttered and relatively cohesive. It might be a function of the local rea's input.

In our HCOLA, the developer homes are staged and many of the higher end (~= 1,750,000 up) resale are nicely decorated and updated, but in the 600,000- low 1,000,000 range its a mix and many of these homes are pretty dated looking.

Why on earth wouldn't every professional Realtor want to present a listing in the best light possible -- on the web as well as in person? (Kudos, Linda!) Doesn't it serve her interest to attract buyers?

How hard is it to make sure the lid is closed on a toilet, for goodness sake? (I don't know why they are ever left open, photos or not -- filthy droplets flying all over the bathroom with every flush.)

I see interiors that have only 'sketchy' furnishings, obviously an empty house that the Realtor has 'furnished' only enough to tell the LR from a BR. I also see homes of the House Poor, where only the public rooms are painted and furnished. (Our painter used to talk about grandiose mansions along the North Shore of Chicago, where he was only hired to paint downstairs rooms.)

Listing photos in my area are a mixed bag.....not much dirty laundry strewn about but decorating on a scale from bad to good, skewing towards awful. Not really because the decor is dated, but because it wasn't thoughtfully chosen in the first place. And where the NYT has Buatta-y homes per Mtnrdredux's comment above, our town and county has faux Buatta wannabe homes, as in a high / low experiment where the low came from Wal-Mart.

On the other hand, there are some fabulous Neel Reid homes in our town that were decorated once in the fifties, sixties or seventies, were beautifully done then and still look perfect.

I stumbled across this as a listing nearby our loft-- and thought of this thread. It's an anomaly. They did sell in three weeks for an asking price of $1.2M for a 2BR/2BA, ~1100 sq ft

Link: OK, Let's Take Photos Now

Link: I don't need a stager in this market