Poll: Do you prefer furnished and staged homes? (price, furniture, rooms)

[MikeJaquish]

Just what it says.
Furnished and staged, or vacant, or "Who cares?"

For poll purposes, we will assume that the house is clean as a whistle, smells OK, etc.
This is about perception of spaces.

Poll will stay open.

[davebarnes]

Poll?
Staged with either staging furniture or some of the seller's pieces.
But, I am not in the market for a new house and just attend open houses for fun.
I find staging is also an indicator of a smarter seller attitude.

[MikeJaquish]

Originally Posted by davebarnes

Poll?
Staged.

Mark the poll, Dave. CD/vBulletin requires the thread to be Live before a poll can be entered.
I was as quick as I could be.....

[stan4]

Vacant.

It bothers me and disrupts my vision to see stuff.

[hotkarl]

I prefer vacant. 100%.
I don't want to look at other peoples stuff, or have to talk to anybody.

[glamatomic]

I prefer vacant. I've got a good enough imagination to work out how furniture will look in the space without it actually being there.

[saibot]

Vacant. Seeing other people's furniture distracts me. I can picture my furniture in an empty room; I can't picture it when the room is full of other stuff.

[Lovehound]

I prefer vacant although light staging is okay. My imagination is good enough to mentally "stage" the house, and the absence of furniture may expose damage that is hidden by furniture if the house is still furnished.

[bande1102]

I prefer staged homes, but not lived in homes, if that makes sense. however, I ended up buying the vacant house. Here's what happened......

I chose a neighborhood. There were three very similar homes for sale: one vacant, one staged, one looked lived in. I hated the lived in one. It looked small and dark. It looked clean and smelled fine, but I still felt like I was buying someone else's home. Not a house, but a home.

Then I saw the vacant house. I wasn't sure how to arrange furniture in the family room (had a weird layout) and had no idea what another room was for.

Then I saw the staged house and totally got it. I knew the house would work. I bought the vacant house bc the list price was lower and the seller was extremely motivated. The staged home sold a short time later.

[MillennialUrbanist]

I definitely prefer vacant. The staging furniture might not be in my style, which will interfere with me picturing myself in that home. My imagination is good enough to visualize my current or future furniture in the empty spaces. I usually look at smaller homes, so there isn't an issue of large, cavernous rooms looking intimidating or otherwise not buyer-friendly. (In that case, at least a simple couch and/or table might help.)

In addition, as a single childfree man, presence of baby/kid furniture (often found in staged homes) makes me feel ill-at-ease. Maybe not enough to deter me from buying, but with all else being equal...