Subscribe via:
Show Summary
In this conversation, Theresa Agey discusses the importance of home staging in real estate, emphasizing how it helps potential buyers visualize the space. She highlights the need to appeal to a wide audience and the challenges of staging homes to attract buyers without misrepresenting the actual living experience.
Resources and Links from this show:
-
Listen to the Audio Version of this Episode
Investor Fuel Show Transcript:
Theresa Agey (00:00)
I learned that staging bedrooms is a waste of time. It’s a waste of time. It’s a waste of money. In my opinion, you know, everyone has a different opinion. That’s fine. But I have found that as soon as you your realtor opens that door, you see the living room, you see the dining room, and you see the kitchen and maybe like a main floor bathroom. Those are the first areas that you see. And typically by that time,people have already decided whether they like the house or not. So it really doesn’t do a whole lot of good to go then, you know, go upstairs or further into the home and see a bedroom that has furniture.
Quentin (02:05)
Hello everyone. Welcome to the Real Estate Pros podcast. I am your host Q Edmonds. Excited to be with you today. Excited because I have another fantastic guest that we get to learn from. That we get to see things through their lens, through their expertise. And I love her story.She started off with one vision and she just was a visionary and see it growing to a whole nother different thing where she is now and she has found success. And I am very, very happy to introduce you all to Ms. Theresa Agey Ms. Theresa. how you doing today, ma’am?
Theresa Agey (02:42)
Good morning. I’m good. Thanks for having me.Quentin (02:44)
Absolutely, absolutely. So, so glad you’re here. So glad to see things through your lens. I think that’s one of the highlights of what I do is just to talk to people that contribute to real estate industry in so many different ways. And there is no one big, no one small. It all matters. And so I absolutely love that we get a chance to look through your lens at what you do. And so I’m going be honest with Ms. Theresa. I want to, I want to go ahead and just dive in.I kind of want you to take us into your world. Tell them what your main focus is these days. Maybe tell them a little origin story, maybe about how you got started, how you walked up to your success, to where you are now. And also tell them what part of the world you’re in. So Ms. Theresa, you got the floor, man.
Theresa Agey (03:30)
Sure, okay. Yes, I am here in Des Moines, Iowa. So I, you know, it’s kind of a little different market here maybe than other parts of the country. But I started out just as a retail furniture store. We sell a little bit of everything. And I had an opportunity from a friend of mine whose mom is in real estate to stage a house about, almost a decade ago, I guess.⁓ and our home staging business just kind of grew from there. thought that was, you know, kind of a fun opportunity. And so we just kind of ran with it and we’ve been doing it ever since. so we started, you know, doing one a month, you know, or so, and now we’re doing anywhere from one to four or so a week. And then that kind of evolved into furnishing like short-term rental properties, Airbnb’s, VRBO’s, and things like that. So anything furniture related, we’ve kind of just.
you know, dabbled in and found what’s worked for us. And home staging has definitely been something that has been good for us. So we’ve kind of, you know, taken it and ran.
Quentin (04:36)
Absolutely, I love it. I know you told me a little bit that furniture was kind of in your blood. Like there’s even origins to how you kind of got into the furniture business, correct?Theresa Agey (05:33)
Yes, yes. My dad was in the furniture business. I also have an uncle in the furniture business. I have a cousin actually that took over his store also just about 10 miles from here. we are not really competition, but we are close. ⁓ We’re nice to each other. So yeah, so it’s definitely in our blood. So.Quentin (05:46)
Yeah.Absolutely. Absolutely. And so you went from just staging maybe one or two a month. I think you said now it’s maybe doing one to four houses a week. And so obviously the business has grown. Obviously you have identified some strategies that’s kind of working for you. And so I was wondering if you can tell us about some of the core strategies.
that you use business-wise and actually some of the core strategies maybe that you use on a personal level, right? Are there personal things, systems that you have in place to kind of keep you motivated, keep you looking towards the goal, actually keep you as a visionary looking ahead. So I would love if there’s any strategies that you can identify that you use.
Theresa Agey (06:37)
Yeah, I definitely think there was a lot of trial and error over the years. went from, it would take us two hours or three hours to to stage a house. And now we’re down to like 20 to 45 minutes probably. We were in and out pretty quickly, but I’ve had the same guys with me throughout and they know what I expect and you know how I want things to look. But it’s definitely been a trial and error process as far as findingProducts where, you know, even a sofa where we don’t have to take the legs off to get it through the door that has like a lower back or there’s a lot of things that kind of come into play as far as, you know, products that are durable or whatever that we’re not replacing constantly. You know, we make money on restaging the same products over and over again. So there’s definitely been a lot of learning and a lot of blood, sweat and tears to make it all work.
But I think it really is important to be able to you know purchase products that are neutral, that you can use anywhere and things like that to really maximize your opportunity and to have things on hand all the time that will work pretty much anywhere. Obviously there’s always gonna be those one-off houses that are very unique or super modern or very mid-century or whatever, but generally, you know.
we really try to streamline things. We find a product that works and we buy 20 of it or whatever so that we have the same product, it works well and that way it just makes things flow very easily. And like I said, my staff knowing what I expect and how I want things to look and they’re very good at kind of knowing you know what I want.
Quentin (08:18)
Absolutely. So he said, you got it down to about 45 minutes. So take me into your world. Like is there, is there like a tier system? Like when they call you in to stage a home, are you thinking I’m a stage this thing from the basement to the bedrooms or is there kind of, it’s just a central place that you focus on? Like how does that, how does that process, how does that decide?Theresa Agey (08:42)
Yeah, that’s a good question. I have so that was kind of one of the things that I learned along the way wasI learned that staging bedrooms is a waste of time. It’s a waste of time. It’s a waste of money. In my opinion, you know, everyone has a different opinion. That’s fine. But I have found that as soon as you your realtor opens that door, you see the living room, you see the dining room, and you see the kitchen and maybe like a main floor bathroom. Those are the first areas that you see. And typically by that time,
people have already decided whether they like the house or not. So it really doesn’t do a whole lot of good to go then, you know, go upstairs or further into the home and see a bedroom that has furniture.
We all know a bedroom is gonna have a bed and a dresser and a nightstand or whatever. So I don’t think that that is going to change anyone’s mind as far as whether they’re interested in the home or not. So I… I
only specifically do those rooms. So living room, dining room, kitchen, and like a main floor bathroom or, you know, if it’s upstairs, whatever. But one bathroom basically. And there’s people that don’t necessarily want to do that. And so, you know, I very kindly refer them to somebody else in our area that would do that. But for us, you know, it’s just all of the extra setting up and all of that tedious stuff is very time consuming, you know, putting bedding on and bed skirts and pillows and the bedding and
and all of that, you know, it’s enough to remember the shower curtain rod and the hooks and the curtain and every accent pillow and every wall art piece. And, you know, I think it’s very easy for people to just say like, wow, you know, that’s so easy, but there’s a lot going on up here to be able to, you know, get it all done in one trip. Of course there’s times where you know you forget something and you have to go back, but obviously.
the easiest is to remember everything and just get it done the one time that you’re there. You know, that doesn’t always work or something breaks in transit or whatever, and you have to come back. But a lot of, you know, we do out of town delivery or staging as well. So you could be an hour and a half or two hours from here and you’ve forgotten something, you know, so that’s super unfortunate. So we try to keep things very streamlined and we have a lot of the same products and we’re using the same thing because you also don’t want to go in and, you know,
Quentin (11:15)
Yeah. Yeah.Theresa Agey (11:26)
you have a bright red chair in there and then someone comes in to view the home and they just can’t stand red. And now they don’t like the house because it has a red chair in it. Because the whole idea of home staging is people can’t necessarily visualize what the home would look like. So when you put something in there that doesn’t appeal to a wide variety of people, ⁓ it’s the same way that I don’t put bless this home sign up because not everyone’s religious, not everyone.Quentin (11:34)
Mmm.Theresa Agey (11:55)
you I don’t want to turn someone away. You want to appeal to, you know, a mass group of people as much as you can, you know, in hopes that you find someone that loves, that falls in love with the staging, not necessarily even the house, unfortunately, but a lot of times they’re so drawn to what the home looks like as a staged house that they forget that that’s not actually what it’s going to look like when they arrive. So.Quentin (12:19)
Absolutely. No, absolutely. I hear you. I hear you loud and clear. That’s, know, and that’s why you’re the visionary. No, I’m reading a book and it talks about if you see somebody that does something very easy, chances are they’re doing it easy because they did it over and over and over and over and over again. And so that’s why you’re the visionary, right? Because you’ve done this over and over. And like you said, you provide people the vision.that they can’t see themself, right? You actually give them a tangible vision of what makes them feel good, even if they can’t put words on it, even if they can’t describe it. You’re the person that does the staging. So when they come in, they can be like, yes, this is what I’ve been looking for. Like, ⁓ this feels like home. And they couldn’t even put words or language to it. But what you do actually put language in their vision to what it is that they actually want. And so I love it. And I love how you’ve walked this up through your success.
starting off as a furniture store, that friend telling you, hey, I want you to stage your home, like a decade ago, 12 years ago. And now you’re staging for homes and now you’ve got your systems in place. You have your strategies in place. So we can clearly see why success is working for you. But I want to look a little bit behind the scenes as well, because every success story, unfortunately, have failures, right? They have times when things get real, when things go sideways.
times when you have to pivot fast. So through your journey, has there been adversity that you had to face in order to get to success that you’re at now?
Theresa Agey (13:57)
Yes, I think a lot of that goes back to like products that we were using. You know, in the beginning, things were taking us so long, you know, instead of getting like, like a shorter back sofa that we can fit through any doorway, you know, we’re sitting there, taking legs off, putting legs back on. I had a gal come in here, probably a year ago, and she was trying to start a staging business and she wanted to know if I would help her, you know, and she said, it takes me like all day to stage a house, you how long does it take you? And I said,Quentin (14:02)
Mmm.Theresa Agey (15:08)
an average house we could be in and out in 30 minutes, you and she almost died because she’s like, how, you know, and I said, because I’m not gonna give you all my secrets, but because I’ve had to learn them myself, my knowledge is not free. ⁓ Because it, you know, it’s taken me a long time to get here. But you know, you have to, you have to think about like what you’re doing. And I did tell her, you know, about, we don’t do the entire home, you know, because it doesn’t matter, like stop doing.all four bedrooms, stop doing all of that, you know, and she just couldn’t quite understand that. But ⁓ I think, yeah, that’s honestly saved us a lot of hardship, I think, is just finding products that work. That is honestly the most important part in our world. And I think as far as like our advantage kind of over maybe other places is like we are buying furniture at wholesale pricing.
versus like a lot of these other staging companies are having to purchase the furniture at retail price. So that allows us to charge less for the staging because the cost that we have into the products is less. And so I think that makes a difference too in how we do have a little edge on other companies a little bit. ⁓ It’s all, I don’t know. It’s all the same in the end, I guess, but. ⁓
Quentin (16:04)
youYeah, no, not. Got you.
Theresa Agey (16:30)
But I do think that helped us a little bit. But I think during COVID, for example, that was not necessarily hard. But we didn’t have any business really during COVID because houses were selling so quickly that nobody was staging houses because they couldn’t even get them on the market before they were sold practically. So in that case, I’m glad that we’re still out here selling furniture because that was a very busy time for furniture sales, but not necessarily home staging. So it’s nice that we are.kind of dabbled in a few different areas so that if one thing is not working, hopefully the other is. And that keeps us afloat during times when it may be tough for one area of our business.
Quentin (17:12)
Absolutely. Love it. Love it. Let me ask you this. What are you most focused on solving and scaling next? Like, what’s the next real goal for you, Ms. TheresaTheresa Agey (17:21)
⁓ I don’t know that I want to scale anymore home staging wise. ⁓ I do feel like I like to be present at every staging. I really do care about what these homes look like. And not that I don’t trust anybody else, but I like that if my name is going to be on it, I want it to be completed the way that I want it. ⁓ And so I don’t know that I’ll scale much more in home staging necessarily. ⁓But I do think we are getting more into short-term rental properties. And that’s kind of a different challenge, ⁓ similar to home staging. But even again, it’s a different product. You’re selling things that people are going to use and abuse. And people that rent other people’s properties are not always very respectful of things. And so with staging, it’s like we’re using things that are very lightweight.
but as durable as possible, because we move them a lot. So then it’s like you get to short-term rentals and you want things that are very heavy duty. So it’s a little different product. So I’m kind of learning more things that work well there versus home staging and then versus what we sell. They’re all three kind of different categories. So when I am shopping for things like ⁓ the Las Vegas furniture market or wherever where we go to,
kind of source new products. I’m looking for three completely different categories in different items. So it’s hard to find all those things necessarily. But so I think, yeah, my next thing is to maybe get a little bit more into the furnishing of short-term rental properties. ⁓ And that stuff is a little bit easier because once you get it all in there, at least, it’s there to stay. So we’re not having to pick it back up and move it a million times. ⁓
Quentin (19:06)
Yeah, yeah.Exactly.
Theresa Agey (19:10)
But know, another thing that like we’ve learned about home staging is when we first started, you know, as soon as the realtor would tell me, you know, the house is sold, inspection has passed, you know, you’re good to pick the stuff up. I would immediately go and pick it up. But you know, closing might not be for 20 days or 60 days even or whatever. So I learned even there, you know, why am I picking up this furniture? I should leave it there.until we have our next home ready. And then I’m only picking it up and I’m moving it to the next house. And you know, not everything always works at every house. You know, you might need a round dining table instead of a rectangle or whatever. But the majority of items can be just moved. And so that was even, you know, it took me a long time to realize that, which sounds stupid. But you know, it took me once I figured that out, that was a game changer because I’m not like storing things here. And of course,
you know, like anything it’s like, you know, feast or famine, we either have like so much stuff back like during COVID where we weren’t really staging anything that my warehouse is like, busting at the seams because we have so much stuff or like right now, it’s empty because I can’t even keep up with demand right now because the market is not good here, which is good for me. But you know, it makes it a little challenging because I don’t want to buy so much more stuff because at some point I’m gonna have to sort it all. So it’s a
Quentin (20:31)
Yeah.Theresa Agey (20:33)
It’s a blessing and a curse as far as growing goes because you have to have the manpower to move all of this stuff. I feel like we have a really good team right now. And so it’s hard to find good help and people that understand my vision and what I want. ⁓ So growing is hard, I think. I actually had two stores at one time and I have just condensed to one. And I love that. I love being here and being present. ⁓you know, just knowing what’s going on every day in my business, whether it be furniture sales, home staging, whatever, but I like to have my hands in everything. It probably drives my staff crazy. ⁓ But another thing, you know, challenging wise is ⁓ there is a lot of like AI staging now. ⁓ And so I guess as far as competition goes, you can kind of consider that a competition. I
From realtors that I speak with, I don’t know that it’s loved by people just because it’s so misleading. And I think people feel very misled when they get to a home. Because like you or I might be able to tell that it’s been virtually staged, ⁓ but the average person can’t necessarily. And so when they open that door expecting to see what they saw in the pictures and it’s empty, I think people are very disappointed and it puts kind of like a distrust.
in their mouth a little bit. ⁓ So I think that as much as like everything is going to AI and you know, all of that stuff, I do think that we have a pretty secure place where we are and actually physically putting furniture in these homes. So that makes me feel a little better.
Quentin (22:00)
Yeah.And it’s interesting. I’m so glad you spoke to that, you know, AI versus this personal connection. Like there’s only so much AI can do, right? And so, like you said, you still feel the security because you are boots on the ground. You are investing in people, dealing with people, connecting with people. And I even love how you talked about your team, like got a good team in place. And so this brings me to talking about relationships just for a little bit.
And I just want to see your perspective on relationship building. Like how has like growing and building relationships made an impact or a difference for you?
Theresa Agey (22:54)
Yeah, I definitely think relationships is a huge part of this business, especially, you know, there there are other home teaching companies in our area. Obviously, everyone kind of drives with different people. But I think finding relationships and people that you really can connect with easily is a game changer. You know, there’s a lot of people ⁓ like I worked with one guy for like several years before I even met him in person because we just had this like trust and relationship, whichsounds weird with someone that you’ve never even met. But you know, to where they give me the access code to the house, I have his credit card on file, we don’t even speak hardly, you know, but those are like the time that you spend with people that you know, I’ve had people that they want to come in and pick out every single pillow that’s going to go into the house or every piece of wall art and like your time as you know, is so valuable. And so I choose to just not work with those people which
I hate saying that, but the time that you spend with them just isn’t worth it. The juice is not worth the squeeze, as they say. It’s not worth it. And so to find people that you trust and that they trust you, to me, is much more valuable in any business because it just makes things flow so much better. And I don’t like the idea of someone breathing down my back all the time. I know what I do.
Quentin (23:58)
Yeah. Yeah.Theresa Agey (24:17)
I feel like I’m good at it at this point. And if you want to do that, that’s fine. There’s people that want to spend that time with you. I ⁓ just don’t have the time to spend with people like that. And I do love people. When it gets to short-term rentals or something like that, and there are people that want to be more involved along the way, I love that. Because I want people to care about the space that they are hosting. ⁓ But just in regular, everyday home staging, you don’t need to be picking out every.every pillow and every throw blanket that’s going in there. If you are hiring me to do the job, I want you to trust me that I’m going to do a good job for you. And if we don’t have that trust, then I don’t feel like it’s a good relationship. So I think keeping relationships with, you I have several people in the area that flip homes and, ⁓ you know, I try to maintain good relationships with those people. And, you know, I always think like a referral is the best form of flattery for any business. You know, I don’t advertise. ⁓
in our furniture store or our home staging business. I wanna treat people well and I want them to love their furniture purchase. I want them to love their home listing. ⁓ It’s funny when we stage homes for people that have already moved out of their house and then we stage it and then they come back and they’re like, I wanna live in my house again because I just never thought it could look like this. And so ⁓ it’s just funny that different things.
Quentin (25:36)
Yeah, yeah.Theresa Agey (25:41)
You know setting up a room a different way or bringing in different furniture whatever can change the look of a home So much and so that’s why I do think you know when I first started this I thought this can’t really work that well You know, but it does it changes the look of a space so much and I truly do think that Staging is you know, we get into some of these houses that you’re like, ⁓ my gosh. This is this needs some work, you know, but you throw some furniture in there and itIt looks completely different, you know, and so I think we add so much value for such a small investment after these people have already spent thousands of dollars, you know, flipping the house completely or, doing a lot of work in there. You know, an extra home staging bill is really nothing to make the house really stand out. And, know, everyone sees homes on Zillow or, you know, realtor.com or whatever they’re wherever they’re looking and they are basing their
Quentin (26:24)
youTheresa Agey (26:36)
opinions of what houses they want to see solely based on those pictures. And I would have a hard time believing that stage homes do not get higher priority on their list, you know, just like a short term rental or, or whatever, you know, you are picking your say, basically based on the pictures, what does the house look like, you know, you’re not going to stay in a home that doesn’t look presentable or, you know, cute. So you’re you’re you’re really picking based on pictures. So I think that’s so important that first look.Quentin (26:41)
Yeah.Yeah.
Yeah.
Theresa Agey (27:06)
is so important in selling a home.Quentin (27:10)
Listen, I thank you. Like you have really given us a unique peek at what you do. You have really took us in your world and really showed us around, you know, to say in your world. And I can just see how you bring so much value to the space that we’re in. And so listen, before we wrap, if someone wanted to reach out to you, connect with you, collaborate, learn more about what you’re doing, what’s the best way for them to reach out to you?Theresa Agey (27:37)
Yes, you can go online or home furnishings iowa.com you can send us a message that way on Facebook Home furnishings and then I’m also the furniture girl on Tik TokQuentin (27:47)
She is. Listen, I appreciate you so much. Thank you for your time, for your story, for your perspective. I know all the viewers are really going to love this episode and find the great value that was in it. And so again, I thank you for stopping by. This was one.Theresa Agey (28:04)
Thank you for having me.Quentin (28:06)
Absolutely. So listen, y’all heard it from the furniture girl. Am I getting that correct on TikTok? The furniture girl, right? Yes, you heard it from her. Y’all got the… Listen, you got it. Listen, y’all heard it. Y’all heard the value. Y’all got it from this episode. Please subscribe so you do not miss out on the amazing people, just like Ms. Theresa. that we’re going to continue to feature and bring up. And so Ms. Theresa. I thank you again and to everyone else. We’ll see you on the next time.
