Electrical Outlets over the Mantle
ARDELL on 06 18, 2007
I just finished getting a house ready for market over in Green Lake/Phinney I don’t normally bulk things on the mantle like in the picture below, but there were two electrical outlets on each side of the mantle. A potential buyer said that these are used for big screen TVs. I think it’s just because the building code required them to be X feet from each other.
I just didn’t like the visusal of the outlets, so I grouped “stuff” on the mantle. But if anyone can shed some light on the benefit of this outlet placement, I’d appreciate your comments.
[photopress:jd.jpg,full,alignright]
The rest of the staging was pretty simple and I just tweaked and moved furniture around. When the cabinets are 42″ers, and go all the way up to the ceiling, you don’t have to have as many bottles full of peppers and olives 
[photopress:jc.jpg,full,alignright]
Some houses are a lot of fun to get ready for market. This one was remodeled in 2006, so there were few challenges, but I still can’t get pictures of the bedrooms. I don’t like the integrity of wide angle shots that make the rooms look twice as big as they are, and I can’t find a vantage point where I can take a picture of the whole bedroom. I just load up the 15 shots permitted with other good looking rooms and features and figure people can see the bedrooms when they get there.
How important is it to show pictures of all of the bedrooms in the mls? Would you rule out a house that had no photos of the bedrooms?
Just picking your brains today. I don’t like staging that hides the house. Just a few things here and there. Seems no matter how many table settings I have in my toolkit, I always end up running in to Sur le Table for just the right placemats, napkins and napkin rings. I think I just like buying them. The ones I used here are super cool rich colored bamboo place mats I found for only six bucks at Sur le Table. Two place mats, two napkins and two napkin rings cost me $27. Theory is I can use them many times over, but I always seem to get new ones for most properties.
I ended up taking that big artifical tree out of the dining area and putting on the front porch, before I left, and after I took the photos. I like to keep the rooms as simple as possible.
Have you seen anything out there you particularly liked or disliked in staging lately? Any staging complaints? I usually drag a stranger in off the street when I’m finished, and sometimes they see something that bothers them that I didn’t notice. But when I finished this one and dragged in two couples who thought it was an Open House, they both seemed to like it and the owner was very pleased. Getting the house ready is a nice break from the contract and negotiation and the escrow side of the business. Nice to have “a hobby” that becomes part of my “work”.
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42 Responses to “Electrical Outlets over the Mantle”
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The outlet placement is for flatscreen TV’s.
BTW, WRE dogged another RE company before I retorted.
Andrea
I don’t understand “WRE dogged another RE company before I retorted”.
Do you need two outlets for a flat screen TV? Not sure why there are two there.
I have an outlet above my mantle that I took out recently. Based on the type of wiring and the non-polarized plugs, my guess was that it was installed sometime in the 1960s but could go all the way back to original construction in 1940–therefore not installed for a yet-to-be-invented flat screen TV. Perhaps there was some fashionable purpose then? Ambient mantle lighting?
Someone did mention “ambient lighting”, but these were installed in 2006 when the house was pretty much gutted and totally redone. I just can’t figure out why there are two of them, instead of one in the center, if it’s for a flat screen TV. And how does the TV hide them if they are flush with the top of the mantle?
Many of the flat panel installs I have seen required multiple plugs beyond what one outlet would offer–tuner, stereo, DVR, etc. What is odd about installation above a fireplace is that, if you are going to flush mount a television, you usually need to get access from the other side of the wall somewhere in order to route the wires. It would seem to me that an installation above a fireplace would be difficult to access and would leave a lot of cord clutter.
I’m not sure why you might need 2 outlets, but I put one on the far end of my mantle when I remodeled my house 2 years ago. It’s for plugging in Christmas lights for the wreath and garland that I hang above the mantle, or the light-up village that I put on it. (I thought I invented the idea!)
I am always frustrated when a listing does not have pictures of each of the major rooms. My time is too valuable to just go and see it, so I like to do as much research as possible online. Often if a listing doesn’t depict certain rooms I assume they are awful and pass on the listing.
i prefer a photo of the main bedroom, main bathroom, kitchen and a living room. if it’s distorted, that’s fine. i’ve come to expect all photos to be somewhat inaccurate, but you can usually figure things out by looking at the furniture in a room.
when there is no picture of the main rooms…red flag.
I can always tell a staged house by the apparent compulsion of stagers to place major items of furniture diagonally (beds and dining room tables being the most common — see your photo above, for example!). No real people do this.
I love to ogle over beautifully staged rooms and excellent real estate photography so the most annoying RE photo “thing” is poor lighting. I know of a couple very good agents who just need to turn on some lights before they take the photos. I hate squinting at the screen because the photo is too dark. You don’t seem to have that problem so yay!
JD,
I place the furniture for people walking around, rather than sitting.
Often there are two people and their agent walking around together, so you want to leave a lot of walk path from the front door into the kitchen. The owner had four chairs there and not on an angle. I used two chairs and diagonal to create a wider walk path.
Maria,
These front rooms have lots of natural light and also ceiling lights. I do use a program to enhance the lighting rather than bring in photography lights sometimes. But I prefer not to use the lighting program unless I have to, because it washes out the rich hardwood floor or cabinet colors.
I can usually get 15 good photos in, which is the limit, without putting all of the rooms in. I think bedroom pictures, especially in vacant houses with no furniture in them, are boring.
Lots of activity here today, so the no bedroom photos didn’t seem to hurt anything. I agree with Michael and Seattle Hotty with regard to no picture of the kitchen or only 3 photos instead of 15. But 15 good photos should make you at least want to come and see it in person, which is the goal.
I had an outlet over my mantle and later found out that the former owner was using it for his sun tanning machine (portable) as this was the best angle for him apparently!
The outlets on either side of the mantle may be remnants of electrical candelabras or wall sconces. The base of the lighting fixtures may have covered any asemetry.
Looks like we’ll be going through the home inspection process pretty quick here. I’ll be moving the staging stuff away from the outlets to make ready for the inspector.
ARDELL, You certainly are hands on. I like that. I normally don’t photo shoot the extra bedrooms. In my area they are normally 10×10 and you just end up with a wall or a very distorted panoramic.
Well this one is in escrow already, so I guess I did OK
I’m with you BB. If I can get the shot with a regular camera, I do them. If not, I don’t.
For the buyer, I quite like the feature of the outlets on the mantle – for a myriad of reasons all mentioned above, be they sconces, christmas lights and TV, VCR etc. For the stager it is a bit of a pain in the neck. Ardel, you did the right thing by plonking stuff in front of the outlet. In fact your staging is spectacular, crisp, clean, minimilistic and innexpensive, just as staging should be. I love to see an agant who does their own staging. Again this is just the way it should be. ANY and EVERY home should be staged and EVERY agent should have the know how, even if only as a service to their clients. In my experience these are the successful agents who move their inventory quickly and get known for exactly that. Selling homes that look good and selling them quickly. The advantages are all too obvious. Good Job Ardell!!
Thanks Andy!
I have a couple of glass tables that are easy to transport. I did a blow up bed on milk crates. Some of my clients laugh when they see their staging items travel from house to house and even to my house. At my Birthday/Last Sopranos party one of my clients pointed and said “Look! It’s the ‘lucky’ vase!”
When I back out of the house after I get it just so and load up the photos into the mls, it’s a great feeling. And people really do appreciate all the hard work. Most ask if I will come to their new home and stage that one for them when they move in.
Actually they now do double thickness blow up beds – I saw them at Costco and also at the Bed and Bath Stores! Safer than the ones on crates! I always challenge my RE students to see how much staging stuff they can fit into the back of a SUV or Mini Van. BTW Tuesday Mornings has great staging stuff for that little inventory we should all have!!
Well, placing a TV that high is a no-no anyway. I hate watching “up”. Even if the screen is tilted downward, it is still very uncomfortable and unnatural after even a short period of time. The top of the TV screen should be at eye level when you’re sitting down to watch. Go to any high-end media room design consultant and that is what they will tell you.
My $.02
Andy,
It was a “double thickness blow up bed”. Thanks for the comment. I was wondering if I needed plywood under, but that makes it harder to transport the “makings” of the bed.
Duddester. I think you are correct, but I am seeing more and more “up” over the fireplace. Especially in smaller new condos where there is not enough floor space to have it “down”.
In fact I rarely see a flat screen TV on a wall that is “down”. But that said…you’re right.
I was going to say pics of the bedroom don’t matter, as long as the fifteen other pictures aren’t of the exact same room from 15 different angles! It was great to read a non-agent perspective though. I hadn’t thought about it being a red flag. Great post, and great job, Ardell! Is it still normal in Seattle to have things go under contract that quickly?
Ardell, I don’t mind not seeing pictures of the bedrooms. What I find suspect if when there are no pictures of the kitchen or at least one bathroom along with living areas. These are the listings that usually turn out to need major kitchen and bath repair. I don’t like the wide angle or “fish-eyes” stills taken from a tour.
Here’s a link (I hope it works!) to photos of a staged home that I recently viewed and thought they did a great job. Notice the (partial) photo of the bedroom. http://www.tempo.socalmls.com/default.aspx?command=be382667-ff23-40b5-8291-47e8fdf75853&ReturnTo=00000000-0000-0000-0000-000000000000&TargetOrClassification=a165ebf1af7544cebb919d53b794389a
Virginia,
That link doesn’t go where you thought. If you email me the picture, I can post it in your comment.
I agree about not seeing the kitchen. I did put three of the kitchen and some of the bathrooms. I often do these rooms in pieces. I get better response doing that than using wide angle, which is deceptive as to room size. Like a picture of the slate shower and the granite sink area. That works for me.
I miss the days when we posted every room size instead of total square footage. I like seeing the size of the bedroom more than a picture of the bedroom. When I started in real estate we posted all room sizes except for bathrooms sizes, so people could tell if their furniture fit in the house.
All property flyers had all room sizes as well and not total square footage.
Ardell, I emailed the link to you for the home I thought was staged well. I know what you mean about having all the room sizes listed. That is still commonly done in the Chicago area, where I’m originally from, but not here in So Cal. It would make it a lot easier if we know that a Master Bedroom that is 13 X 15 is not going to work for a client that has given a minimum size of 15 X 20, let’s say.
I do think that smaller square footage planned well and done right can seem a lot larger than it is. I have had clients purchase a smaller home than they anticipated because it seemed more spacious than the actual square footage.
Virginia’s “partial bedroom shot. The living room furniture is not minimal enough for my staging tastes. But I’m glad to see that a house this small sells for over a million dollars there. Supports our “were cheaper in Seattle” theory
Hi Ardell,
The wide angle lens issue is a good one. You guys seem to have a bit of an MLS luxury in that you get 15 photos. In Connecticut we finally moved from 8 to 10 to which I got drooling from Jay Thompson in Phoenix that they had just 6. If you’re limited in the number of shots I’d really suggest a wide angle just to get all the features in. Though try not to make it look like a fun house mirror.
My feeling with bedrooms other than the master bedroom, is that they simply don’t matter all that much for photos. A normal bedroom can be repainted, wallpapered, carpeted, new window etc pretty quick, easy and cheap. Like you say the real issue with bedrooms is dimension rather than appearance. A bedroom in and of itself isn’t really a feature.
Kitchen, Dining Room and Living Room are vital, after that I’m looking for features like fireplaces, decks etc.
Athol,
The reason I don’t use wide angle is the whole issue of credibiity. I have had many buyers come to an Open House and actually be surprised that the house looks like it did in the photos. They are so used to the photos giving the appearance of a much large room and house, that they compliment me when it looks like the real thing.
That’s a little sad.
For me, the purpose of the photos is to give enough so that the buyer consumers can decide whether or not to come and see the house in person. I think many virtual tours give too much, meaning they give enough for the buyer consumer to decide to NOT come and look at the house. Clearly that is contrary to our objective.
Recently I have seen too many photos of the staging, like zeroing in on a vase or vignette, instead of features of the home that the buyer is actually going to get.
I think everyone agrees that no picture of the kitchen is a bad idea. Even I as an agent so uh oh…what’s wrong with the kitchen? It must be REALLY bad.
15 shots seems to be just right, and I try to use all 15, I never post a bad shot. It is not my objective to show it ALL. It is my objective to show 15 good photos, so the agent will show, and the buyer will come. After they get there, I’ve accomplished my objective. To bring as many potential buyers as I can.
Using a wide angle lens and making the house look larger than it is, is like going to see a movie that the world says is GREAT! The relative comparison to expectation is a negative factor. Better to have honest representations of the best the home has to offer.
I agree shooting staging items is silly, or anything else that isn’t conveying with the house. Ultimately the best staging doesn’t look like “OMG STAGING!”
If you only were allowed 6-8 shots on the MLS though – would you use wide angle though?
If I had 15 shots to play with, I’d likely do 2 or even 3 of the kitchen depending on it’s size and layout. Down in the only 6-8 photos allowed range I think you only have 1 shot to use.
It’s not trying to trick the consumer, it’s trying to get all the features in the shots available. Wide angle lenses are just a tool. A good tool, though it’s easy to get over excited by them and over use them.
This is what I’m talking about
The second shot, which I assume is a wide angle lens, makes the room look three times as long as it is.
Athol,
I think everything we do should say we can be trusted. So no, I don’t think I would use a distorted photo as I have shown that makes the house look huge, even though it shows more of the cabinets, etc.
That the photo is not meant to trick them, doesn’t change the fact that they may feel it was misrepresented. We are not allowed to misrepresent a property with words. I take that to mean we are not allowed to misrepresent the property with our photos either.
Well neither one of those photos in #32 would be acceptable to me. The first looks over exposed. The second is shot with what looks to be an ultra-wide lens. It clearly doesn’t trick anyone as the obvious distortion is visually distrubing.
You shouldn’t shot up narrow rooms with a wide angle lens. Thats how you get that horrible distortion the worst.
That being said, I’ve seen now a total of three “grrr wide-angle lens” posts in the last 24 hours. I’m thinking about maybe watermarking wide angle shots or something.
Okay, I’ll be brave on this one…
Isn’t covering up electrical outlets on a mantle piece by staging tricking the viewer then?
/ducks and runs
Showing features of the house is one of the more important jobs we have in marketing homes on the internet. Professional grade lenses and lighting can provide a much better perspective than a simple digital camera that an agent might purchase. We just got a house into escrow in about 36 hours that another agent had on market for 6 months without a single offer. We did a few things to help prep the house a little better than it was before including adding some simple landscaping and potted plants, staged it inside, and had professional photos. We got great response from agents and buyers.
Ardell, you say that wide angle lenses distort and incorrectly show the house but if a person is using common sense and deductive reasoning when looking at the listing they can see what the square footage of the house is and make a fairly educated guess or assumption as to what the room might look like in person. The example of the photos above makes a huge difference in whether or not I or one of my clients would go see that place. Showing the features of the floorplan and amenities in the kitchen is very important in today’s online environment. A majority of my clients will tell me that they won’t go see a house with limited or bad photos. Kind of like online dating – most people pass up the ones that you “can’t quite tell” what you’re getting. I liken it to my personal adage of “if there is fear involved, the answer is no.”
LOL Athol,
I went before the inspector came this morning and made sure I moved the crap away from the outlets, and showed the buyer’s agent and the buyer that they were there.
I didn’t shoot that wide angle shot, obviously, because I don’t use a wide angle lens
Reba,
I watch the agent hits. On the one in the article we had 70 hits and two offers within 24 hours. Helps if you have a great house
Photos are everything. But I still say they should be an honest representation as to size of room.
Hey Reba,
How’s that second team in Kansas going? That sounded very interesting. Do you have it up and running yet?
The “you” in “you shouldn’t shoot up narrow rooms…” was the all purpose you Ardell. Not as in you as in Ardell.
I get that you wouldn’t taint yourself with one of those devil lenses.
Athol,
Just making sure
To me it’s what is known as “puffery”. Some, maybe most, States permit “puffery” and say it is not misrepresentation. Mostly I just go by what I hear consumer’s say. When people are crying for accurate data, and info they can rely on, you don’t want to give any semblance of inacuracy.
Maybe there’s no public outcry for accurate data in Athens, GA Athol. You know your market better than I, that’s for sure.
I don’t think all wide angle shots are as exagerated as that example, but for that top shot in the article, not the comments, I stood up on a chair and just got some height on it. Seller’s happy, buyers’ happy, I’m happy and house is in escrow. And everyone knows about the outlets over the fireplace
I like “the Queen’s WE”, but the universal “you” is touchy.
Ardel, Jillayne, Others
Thanks for bringing back the end user friendly articles back.
Amit
Amit,
We often guess at whether or not what we write about is what people want to read. Can you define “end user friendly articles”. Maybe we’d write more of them if we weren’t just shooting at a dartboard. Your input appreciated. Name 5 articles that qualify and 5 that don’t so we can better understand your thinking.
Thanks!