While organizing my 2016 IRS records, I was reminded of the huge waste of money I invested in a company offering staging services prior to putting my Seattle condo up for sale last spring. The company, Priorities First, was recommended by a real estate broker as the end-all organizer, I found quite the opposite.
I engaged Priorities First about three weeks before I needed actual staging to assist me in organizing residential and business belongings so that my condo could be painted, a job that was to take two-three weeks. Two work days were to be spent clearing non-essential items out of the space with movers coming on the third morning to take these items to storage.
The company owner and two workers appeared on the appointed day. Only one of the workers did organizing, and I must say that the organizer worker was quite good. Of the three people, she was the only one who asked for my input and listened to my response.
The other worker began the staging process immediately (at the direction of her boss), which was totally stupid since the condo was going to be painted--and I was going to be living there--for several more weeks. Not only did this arranger worker spend time (and my hard-earned money) doing something that the painter was going to undo, but she was totally unskilled at arranging space.
When I kept objecting to the mess she was making of my beautiful condo, she kept saying, "design is a matter of personal taste." This explanation drove me up the wall as I am an architect and know that design is a learned skill. What she was doing--including making displays of rolls of toilet paper and cheap wine bottles while having me pack lovely decorative items, which she referred to as "beauties"--was dreadful by any objective measure.
In addition, this arranger worker spent time (and my hard-earned money) arranging my plants, which I told her I intended to downsize and repot. Another total waste. However, it was when this worker ran out of stuff to arrange that she did the real damage by switching to the organizing task.
I had a large closet with hardware and art supplies neatly organized in two different sections of shelving. Arranger-turned-organizer worker indiscriminately crunched all my supplies together, putting rusty nails and screws on a single shelf with expensive gouaches, paint brushes, and light bulbs, etc. It took me six hours to sort through the mess she made.
However, the real annoyance was the company owner, whose name I have wiped from my memory. The reason her service was so inappropriate is that she was absolutely incapable of listening. Every time I tried to explain what I needed--what would work for me--she would cut me off with "moving is hard." So impatient and unbelievably rude.
I had contracted for Priorities First to come back after the painting was completed and do the final staging, but of course I cancelled. From the messing around the arranger-turned-organizer worker did, I picked up what had to be done and did the staging myself. BTW, the real estate agent complimented my on my work!
I paid close to $5,000 for 2.5 days of service. Because the service was so poor, I sent the crew packing early on the second day, so it was more like 2 days. I have only shared the worst of what happened because the story would be too long if I relayed everything that went wrong. Suffice it to say that I should have just opened my window, and thrown one hundred dollar bills to the wind. read more