Real Estate Marketing with Feng Shui

One of a Realtor's challenges in listing a house is to persuade the sellers to "stage" it for presentation. Potential buyers are put off by cluttered counters and overflowing toy boxes - not to mention overflowing kitty litter boxes! Ideally, the house should look like no one lives there - or like the owners have full-time maid service.

All Realtors recommend getting rid of clutter to create a spacious feeling, keeping the drapes open to fill the rooms with light, and keeping everything clean and neat. But sometimes that doesn't quite do the trick.

Sometimes the cleanest, neatest house just doesn't "feel" good. And that's where feng shui comes in.

You may or may not believe in the power of color and placement to create good energy flow and bring all you desire into your life. You may not believe that energy flow makes a difference at all.

But you'll have to agree that some houses feel like homes, while others only feel like houses. They feel cold and uninviting.

By using the principles of feng shui, you can create warmth in a cold house. You can even make old and shabby look inviting. It's all about balance, and blending the colors of nature. With feng shui, every room has some earth tone, some red or purple, some black or blue, some yellow, and some white. Each room also has some sign of "life" in the form of flowers or green plants.

The idea is to either have or represent fire, water, earth, wood, and metal - and to be sure that no one of them overpowers the others. Think of rooms you've been in that were all glass and chrome - did you feel comfortable? Probably not, because it was out of balance.

The result of a feng shui slant to decorating is a room that feels good - a room where you might want to stay and chat a while.

I don't know why it works, and I don't care why. I just know that it does work, and that buyers are more drawn to a house that feels like a home. So if you're having a hard time selling a house that should sell quickly, look at it from the standpoint of feng shui. Then make some gentle decorating recommendations to the sellers.

Bookstores offer a large variety of books on the subject, but do take time to look through them before you buy. Some are complicated and some recommend buying all kinds of strange objects. My favorite is The Western Guide to Feng Shui. It's easy reading and shows how to use objects that most people already have.

Once you've convinced your sellers to make these small changes, you can advertise "This house feels like home," and you'll be telling the truth.

Marte Cliff is a Freelance Copywriter and former real estate broker.

Two of her e-books were written to help real estate buyers avoid the pitfalls she saw during her 19 year career - and during her 20+ years as chief bookkeeper for her husband's custom home building business. The newest addition is a collaboration with her husband - Home Building Simplified. It outlines the steps in home building and offers a "heads up" about all the decisions you'll need to make. Read about it at: http://www.yourhomebuildingsite.com.