You are intent on selling your house. You select the realtor. They insist you call their stager. You glare at the realtor thinking - "Why? what's wrong with this house now? I thought you loved it and said there'd be no problem selling it? That's why I'm listing with you." The realtor explains that this is not a judgement, it's just a way of ensuring that you maximize the opportunity. You shrug, wondering what that means, "alright, I'll call the person."

The stager arrives. Seems nice, but you're counting the seconds until she says "you know you have to pack up all your personal photos, of course"... and sure enough, 2 minutes after the "oh, what a lovely home" out it comes.

"Why?" you snarl truculently, "shouldn't people know that nice people live here?"

And here's the logic: - 3 reasons

1. People are looking for a new house. A NEW house. New to them and preferably, new altogether. Coming to see your pre-owned thing is already a compromise on their dream. Seeing you and your family all over the place is a constant reminder that there's people living here. It's not new at all.

2. Gallery Mode You really want people looking at the house, not the pictures. if you've got them out and about, we can't help it. As people, we're naturally drawn to faces. It's fun to look at the photos and see the kids have grown, etc. Buyers will walk into a room, study the photos and move on to the next room, having no idea what room they've just been in! True. It happens. You want bland art, that draws the eye to the features of each room, and the good things about every space.

3. Tend to be small Most people's family snaps tend to be small - 4 x 6 or 5 x 7s - in lots of little frames. It adds up to a nice warm cozy feeling, until you're trying to make every space as light and airy as possible. That vast portrait, expensively framed, with everyone in the family in white, or the same outfit... that can stay. Why? It looks like you've spent money. If you've spent on that, chances are you've spent money on maintaining the home's inner workings as well.

That's one exception - the big, expensive-looking family portrait photo.

Here's one more category I consider an exception: -- Large photos of dinner parties with famous people (preferably signed), yachting shots in black and white, polo (do real people actually play polo?) or things that speak to the kind of lifestyle all of us wannabes could easily see ourselves living!

It sounds like a game, and maybe it is... but it's a decent, fun game - of illustrating how much fun can be had in this particular home. (Good, clean, fun mind you. That odd-looking swing in the Master Bedroom, that thing gotta come down.. and those icky books have to be put away too!)