Also see the rest of my series on Home Staging:
Part 1: the nursery.
Part 2: the front yard.
Part 3: the front of the house
Part 4: the garage
Part 5: the laundry room / mudroom

What is Home Staging?

And my tips for creating Moving Lists.

When you pretty up your home for company, you stuff clutter behind closed doors, but don’t forget, there ARE no closed doors when you show your house!

Potential buyers will want to investigate the storage in the house, which means they will be poking their noses into the places where polite company usually doesn’t. And while you may be embarrassed if your sister-in-law sees that you have shoved all your clutter in the linen closet (who knew your nephew would spill and she’d go fetch a towel?) if a potential home buyer opens up a linen closet and finds an avalanche of papers and odds and ends, you may lose a sale!

So these forgotten spaces need special care. Don’t forget to use home staging to make storage spaces look extra appealing when you show your home.

Closets
People love large closets—a large master closet is what first drew me to my second house! In order to make closets look bigger, have empty spaces in your staged closet. Empty spaces will make it seem as though you couldn’t use all of the closet because it was too big. Get rid of any extra organizers: you want buyers to think there’s already enough storage features there. Lots of empty floorspace will also make a closet look large, so store your shoes up, or neatly.

Store off-season clothes in off-site storage. Have only articles of clothing and accessories in bedroom closets. If it’s not associated with getting dressed, it doesn’t belong in a bedroom closet. Matching hangers keep a closet looking neat and decrease the visual “noise” in the small space. Don’t have anything worn or dirty hung up or in sight when staging a closet—potential buyers like cleanliness!

Finally, put at least one (pretty!) item on every shelf and hang at least one article of clothing from every rod. This may seem to contradict my advice to empty out as much as possible, but you need to highlight every feature so a buyer can see a closet’s full storage potential.

Pantry
You pantry should also be half empty. Give away anything you and your family won’t eat in 2 weeks to the food bank. You are not under siege, and you don’t need that much food in your pantry! If you are worried about bad weather, keep a large bin in the garage full of hurricane or blizzard supplies. (Don’t label it “Hurricane Supplies” in bright red letters, though: you don’t want to scare off out-of-town buyers!)

Separate all dry goods by type, and line it all up in military rows in your pantry. Use every shelf, and put pretty vases, et cetera on some shelves. Keep floor mostly clear in the pantry because it will make the space seem larger. And the most important thing for a pantry to be is CLEAN!! This is where food is kept, and people will judge you harshly on a pantry’s cleanliness. So clean: wipe every shelf and clean the floor. If there are stains, either repaint or put down contact paper or both.

Linen Closet
This may be difficult for some, but keep only linens in the linen closet. Fold everything neatly. Keep all these neatly folded stacks of linens centered: leave space on the outside in order to create a larger feeling in the linen closet. And, of course, try to have the space half empty—you want to make the linen closet look too big, not too little.

When you show your house, keep only three sets of towels: a pretty set that is hanging up, one set folded neatly in the linen closet, and one set in use thrown in crate or hamper under sink or in the bottom of the linen closet. You only need two sets of sheets per bed, and consider storing the extra set under the bed itself—there’s no reason for a potential home buyer to look there!

Finally, in all the “forgotten” storage spaces: don’t store bills, prescriptions, or personal papers in these spaces or in any cabinet drawer! Potential buyers won’t intentionally snoop (not with the Realtor there chaperoning), but if they see it, they see it, and might use it against you.

Keep personal things and anything with your identity on it locked up in a secure, freestanding piece of furniture.