Making Mild Decor”Wild”
Cool is definitely “in”…real “in”(Daddy-o)! In case you have not read any of my previous blogs, my qualifications are not only as the lead designer of (now) over 2,000 homes,but I have also decorated countless numbers of these homes. I know many respected home designers who know little about home decorating. That, I see as a disadvantage since a properly designed home should not be a challenge to fit furnishings into. MANY folks tell me that their home is big but does not fit furnishings very well.
That is likely because their home’s designer did not care about sweating furnishing details and re-arranging entire rooms because they only had one possible spot to fit a couch. I prefer at least 2 couch spots , a big hutch wall, walls that will work with large wall art, enough space next to windows for curtains , enough space on your foyer tile floor to fit a 3ft. x 5ft. rug in front of the door WITHOUT covering the ornate tile design inlay or tile boarder. BUT, LET”S GET BACK TO “COOL being “IN“.
You see, just knowing how to place furnishings and having traffic and sight line paths that make living easy and joyful is not enough. Just having walls that are well insulated and the latest “green” gizmo, and the nicest carpets ,and granite counter tops, is not enough. I don’t care how much attention you put into all of the floor plan, quality, and features, it’s not going to cut the mustard in selling the home and that is because despite ALL of these important things, if it isn’t “cool”, it isn’t going to sell, at least is not going to sell very soon or at a very high price.
I beleive that folks decide they are going to buy a home in the first 30 seconds after entering a home. The rest of the touring and talking is just a series of justifications which allow the purchasese to happen. Homes today need to have that elusive “cool” factor and I believe few builders, few home designers have figured this out. Some home decorators HAVE figured this out, but I see many, MANY home builders and designers who think that throwing a lot of money at a home and including high-end features is going to do the trick. A year ago, I was in a home that was quite expensive on a larger lot, with a super view. The home designer apparently had little thought about where to put the furnishings once the home was built. This home had a two-story great room with a huge, expensive , soaring combination of stacked windows. This home had very high end amenities. It had all the hot buttons, yet it was languishing on the market for way too many months.
I was called-in to assist (a friendly competitor) to use some of my furnishings to help decorate and stage the home. This rectangular room was indeed a challenge to fit couches into. At first, nothing would seem logical where the seats could view the big windows and yet also see a television, a fireplace, and allow folks to walk through the room without weaving through furnishings. I orderd two couches and a love seat to be delivered to the home and one of my assitants gave the set-up a very quick attempt. It did not work and i stood a log time on the balcony trying to imagine the answer. I found the magic key, when I placed the furnishings all on 45 degree angles to the walls. Suddenly, it all worked AND the layout began to be “cool”. I staggered a set of 4 matching framed art pictures amongst the tall soaring window arrangement. I put a floor rug into the furnishing group on an angle as well.
I could not do anything about a dining room that had barely enough room to seat 4 or a traffic path to the deck that was awkward for guests, but “COOL” trumped logic and the home sold. The home in fact sold to someone who had previously seen the home. I was not there when the home sold but I suspect the buyer who had seen the home previously, liked the new coolness and it pushed them into the sale mode.
I also see home buyers who think one feature in a particular home of mine is “cool”. So, they try to “take” that element and transplant it into a different home design. It rarely works since true coolness is not any one particular item, but rather how many items relate to each other. For example, putting a curved fireplace mantle into a home where there are no other curved items, is likely a bad idea. Putting a “cool” fireplace into an area in a home where it is not easily and prominently seen, is likely also a mistake since the fireplace usually needs to be the heart and soul of the great room and must therefore be prominent.
My biggest case example for “coolness” comes from me having designed a home that I KNEW was a winner. The suprise was that once built, it seemed more like a loser. It had ALL the hot button items. A large kitchen, a walk-in pantry, a Corian topped kitchen island which seats 4, a dinette which seats a possible 8, a great room which has 3 couch positions around a central fireplace. It included 4 nice bedrooms, all with generous walk-in closets. This home design even had a 16 foot long laundry room, and a dining room which is just as much a den if you wish. This home had the best finished basement design for the future. I therefore did not finish the basement, but rather kept every mechanical item confined to a small area so a finishing of this area would be a sinch! I even plumbed the basement bath and wet bar area.
The real kicker was that this wonderfully laid out , large 2024 sqare foot home SEEMED to “have it all” and was priced WAY below anything on the market. It had it all, all except the “coolness” and the buyer. You see, as soon as someone walked through the door, they did not see “cool”. They saw a nice home, but the salesperson had to try to convince them that since this home had all the hot button features, green-built, energy-star, the works, they should therefore want to buy the home. I had forgotten my own big rule”MAKE IT COOL”. I thought, maybe this model was not seelling because of the location, or the market conditions being so poor.
I then went to a big Home Builders conference and I listened to one speaker, who said, if you don’t give the public a reason to move form their present home, why should they move at all? This speaker was telling me something I already knew, but I thought if I was designing the lowest priced home, the fact that the price was so low, and the fact that I was including so much, should be enough to sell the home. In my higher priced homes, I had always tried to get these homes to be the coolest I could create. Money was not as much of an obstacle, so I felt these higher-end buyers deserved to get a really cool house with lots of alcoves, textures, and neat shapes, and lower cost buyers did not deserve or pay for this “coolness.” I may never had spoken these words, but they were ingrained into my design thought process.
Since every builder in town was building low cost homes VERY PLAIN, I adopted that same attitude. Then I thought, why should anyone want to move into a home that was not emotionally connecting to them? What I needed to do was to get past my prejudices that inexpensive homes could not afford to be as “cool” as higher-end, bigger homes, and find ways to creatively AND inexpensively, wow home shoppers with “coolness” with-in the first 30 seconds after stepping in the door. Suddenly,…the light bulb came on and my eyes were opened and the result, …SALES and much more importantly, very elated and happy people!
Next time, we explore how and what I did to create the “coolness” factor on this lower cost home design and make it our best seller.
ONE MORE THING…. In my last blog entry, I mentioned how I had some new “solar” powered home news. Several blogs ago, I went into detail as to why I felt that Solar Power in homes was not such a great idea…yet. I gave the example of how one competitor’s home next to one of our current model homes was solar powered. I went on to say how the original price of that solar powered home was closer to $300,000 than $250,000. I explained how the price had creeped downward to $249,000 and stayed at that price while I was building a smaller home directly next door and was blessed to had soon soldit for more than this neighboring home , before my home was even out of the drywall phase. This solar home is now being offered in the $230’s and I now reverse my opinion on this home to anyone who has read my previous blog. At some point, a home is priced so well that a home shopper can’t ignore it. This IS a high quality home, green built, big, new, and your energy bills will be very small. At this price, I just thought you should know. If anyone wants more information(this is not a home I have built or will make a nickel in selling)on this home, please give me or my staff a call so we may direct you to the builder.
We’ll continue the “cool” subject next blog. C’mon out this weekend and see our Milwaukee, Ixonia, and Monterey homes. The one I am blogging about in this entry is in Milwaukee near 91st and Good Hope.
Blessings,
Tom Hignite
