Protect Your Home Staging Business with Professional Staging Contracts

As a home stager,  you’re an invaluable part of the real estate sales team. You make properties look their best by downplaying unfavorable features and highlighting attributes. You create the perfect conditions for buyers to imagine themselves living in listings. More importantly, you help sellers and agents optimize their profits. As such, you deserve your fair share of the proverbial pie.

To ensure that you get it, you want your clients to have feasible expectations, clear breakdowns of your costs, and itemized lists of what you will and will not supply. Without these things, you run the risk of being paid late or not at all, and you may face legal issues due to misunderstandings.

Read on to learn why having the right staging contract is non-negotiable for every successful home staging business.

What Are Staging Contracts?

Staging contracts are mutually binding agreements between home stagers and their clients. They detail the responsibilities of each party, the costs of services rendered, the specifications for all materials, and service and payment terms. Staging contracts protect both parties. Having formal contracts lends home staging businesses an air of professionalism and makes sellers and their agents more comfortable in taking on staging costs.

Why Many Home Stagers Overlook the Importance of Contracts, Especially When Starting Out

Many people underestimate the importance and profit potential of their businesses when just getting started in home staging. Along with under-pricing their services, new home stagers frequently overlook the critical nature of service contracts. You might think that you’re doing little more than “freshening homes up” or “decorating”, but the science and psychology behind home staging makes your work one of the most essential parts of selling homes. Your work is just as important as that of agents, brokers, and escrow officers. After all, in most cases, without you,
these professionals would have no work to do.

As a new stager, there are also lots of potential problems that you can’t foresee. For instance:

• What happens with your furnishings, lighting elements, and decorative accessories when keys change hands?
• Who’s responsible for damaged items if a plumbing system fails or a listing is ravished by fire?
• Who will clear out clutter before staging starts?
• Who will coordinate your work with that of other contractors?
• What if you purchase or rent materials for a project and the client cancels at the very last minute?

Home staging contracts prevent stagers from discovering the answers to these and countless other questions the hard way.

Unfortunately, when new home stagers are desperate to land jobs, going contract-free might seem like a great way to attract clients. Given their lack of experience and their desire to simply get a “foot in the door”, some new stagers feel that establishing their terms and making demands could somehow make them less marketable.

Two Reasons Why Having the Right Contract Matters

Contracts establish feasible expectations on all sides and give both parties peace of mind. They also create a path for legal recourse in the event that something goes awry.

1. Protection

Many sellers and their agents may be unwilling to pay full-price for comprehensive staging services. You might verbally negotiate the cost for a partial staging plan only to have the client accuse of you failing to deliver after you adhere to the agreed upon scope of work. Contracts detail exactly what clients are getting. The more detailed and project-specific your contracts are, the lower your
risk of misunderstandings.

Contracts also work out liability issues. If someone trips over an area rug or lamp cord, does the claim go to your insurance company or the current homeowner’s? If an agent spills a beverage on a costly sofa, who pays for it? Without a contract, you have no protection against these and other forms of loss. Worse still, every other contract-holding member of the sales team will.

Contracts also protect stagers by:

• Guaranteeing timely payment
• Ensuring acceptable conditions to perform their work
• Safeguarding their brands

3 Common Pitfalls in Staging Contracts

There’s a big difference between having a home staging contract and having an effective home staging contract. Downloading general work contracts and altering them to suit your industry could result in glaring areas of vulnerability.

1. Missing Signatures

Not only do you need an airtight contract for every project, but it’s also important to ensure that your clients are honoring your contract from the very outset by signing their acceptance of this document and initialing all major sections and clauses.

2. Ambiguous Language

Without legal expertise in contract drafting, you run the risk of using ambiguous language that leaves you unprotected. For instance, requiring payment “after project completion” could mean that you’re willing to accept payment right away or six months later. Requiring payment “within seven business days of project completion” will stand up far better in court.

3. Overlooked Clauses

With a never-ending list of potential problems that you can’t foresee, there’s a good chance that drafting your own contract will result in lots of overlooked clauses. Clauses pertaining to damage issues, property maintenance, the return of furnished items, and payment can jeopardize the long-term financial health of your business if you leave them out.

RESA®’s Professional Staging Contracts

The Real Estate Staging Association (RESA®) provides its members with access to five attorney- drafted contracts that are specifically designed for home stagers. The attorneys that have created these contracts have more than a decade of experience in writing policies and contracts for the home staging industry in collaboration with RESA®’s CEO.

Valued at over $2,000, these contracts include:

• Interior Styling Agreement
• Occupied Staging Service Agreement
• Sub-Contactor Agreement
• Vacant Staging Services Agreement
• Staging and Accessory Rental Agreement

These five documents cover all critical aspects of a staging business and all common project types. With these documents, you can focus on the core functions of your business while enjoying consistent peace of mind.

Join RESA Today to Build and Protect Your Home Staging Business

You can join RESA® for just $190 annually and get access to all five of these contracts and many other high-value member benefits. RESA® is the only North American non-profit trade association dedicated to home staging and designed to help home stagers safely and successfully meet their goals. Join RESA® today to secure your home staging business with professional contracts that will
elevate your staging career!