Your Domain: The Design Files editor Lucy Feagins' tips on styling to sell your home

So you’ve decided to sell your home. So it’s time to get a professional property stylist in to help you get top dollar, right?

Not so fast, says design expert and editor of The Design Files, Lucy Feagins.

Feagins, who has a regular column in Domain magazine, says would-be buyers are looking for an emotional outcome, not just a financial outcome. So it means styling should be about creating a feeling, and professionals won’t always do that.

“I’m not always an advocate for property styling services,” she says. “They do have their place and can be really useful at times but they don’t always create that emotional connection that you’re looking to achieve with home buyers.

“If you’ve got a tenanted house, it’s very helpful to fill it with new furniture, but if you’ve got a house you love and it’s furnished in a way you really love, chances are someone else is going to love that too.

“It’s good to remember it’s not about perfection, it’s about comfort. You want to create a home that really feels comfortable that people come in and want to linger in and hang around. Forget about magazine picture perfect, it’s about a comfortable space.”

Feagins advises that often times, styling can just be as much about removing some clutter as it is adding new items.

“Definitely you want to tidy up a bit and remove some surface clutter, but it’s not about overhauling your space, not a redecoration from the ground up,” she says. “It’s really about little tweaks that can make the difference.”

And with costs for professional stylists starting at $3000 and easily soaring to $10,000 (thanks to them needing to hire furniture), Feagins suggests getting a friend to help – if you trust them.

“Sometimes you can be a bit shop blind when you’re looking at your own house and it’s about having some extra advice  and looking at the space in a different way,” she says.