Sometimes it’s easy to forget that everything we own and every service we use has been acquired as a result of some form of retail. By definition retail, is the selling of goods. Simply put, retail requires a product/service, seller and buyer. Even the biggest ticket item and often intensely emotional purchase, our home, falls in this realm.
Although the focus of my blog is the built retail environment – bricks and mortar retail – my recent experience has led me to think about the retail aspect of the real estate sector. Over the past 3 months, having endured the search for and purchase of a new home, and prepping, purging and staging of our existing home, I have experienced both sides of the process of buying and selling real estate. As with other competitive retail sectors, the bar has been raised considerably in real estate (especially from when we first purchased our home 18 years ago). Professional staging is now an expectation. Presenting the product in the best possible light and appealing to the customer emotionally, allowing them to envision how the home can define and enhance their life, is a must. Carefully stripping personal items out, and streamlining and staging to appeal to a target buyer, is the norm. Really, the same principles are now at play whether you are selling a home, perfume, clothing, electronics or home accessories; appeal to the emotions and create irresistible desire.
The response to a well presented product is an emotional one, period. When emotions are tapped, the customer or potential buyer can easily imagine how their life might be changed for the better. The decision to ultimately buy is not a rational one but an unconscious one. When positive emotions are evoked, desire is created and only then can we rationalize our choice to satisfy the left side of our brains.
Knowing how the consumer responds does not make me immune. I’m still human and I’m still a consumer. When I first saw the property that we purchased, I felt something – actually both my partner and I felt it. The product was beautifully presented and from there it was easy to rationalize our desire against our list of parameters. Within less than 36 hours we owned it. Presumably the buyers of our home felt the same intangible, undefinable twinge that we did. That’s how emotion works in the purchase of everything – including your home.
