Home Staging Training: The Power Of Scents

Unlike what most people commonly think, it is not just what people see that could determine a sell in real estate. It is not just the decorations that you use, the furniture and the whole effect of the appearance of the room. Of course, these things are important. But beyond these things, the scent of your house can also do wonders.

The sense of scent is often judged and underestimated. A lot of people do not see its power on making a sell. They do not consider it a factor in making or breaking a sell. Moreover, they do not see it as something that could potentially bring a lot of money into their real estate business.

In trying to impress people, you have to be very careful in whatever instant impressions your house creates. And first impression is what scent creates – thus a scent that creates nice impression would make buyers become interested and a scent that would create bad impressions would make buyers feel otherwise.

The brain has such amazing responses when it comes to smells. When scents reach the brain what happens is that it triggers the olfactory sensors. These olfactory sensors are connected to the limbic system and this limbic system controls mood and emotions. Thus, with this process, one can see how scents could elicit some emotional responses from people. This whole process happens even before a person could make an impression about you house. Thus, certain response formation occurs even before a person realizes it.

So, if you intend to portray certain moods, you have to carefully choose what to use for certain scent effects. Say for example, you intend to be romantic, you use scents such as rose, gardenia, sandalwood or jasmine.  To elicit some relaxing effect, you can try using chamomile, sandalwood, lavender and bergamot. And, if you intend to give a refreshing mood, citrus, pine, eucalyptus, or mint will do the trick.

About the author:

By Karen Schaefer, Founder of Simple Appeal, Inc. and APSD – The Association of Property Scene Designers. Through Karen and APSD, you can learn more about home staging, marketing houses and selling houses quickly.