The Listing Prep Almanac

What a home staging contract needs to settle

Most staging disagreements are not about money. They are about something both people assumed, in slightly different ways, and neither one wrote down.

One thing before any of this is useful: I am not a lawyer and this is not legal advice. Contract and consumer protection rules are provincial, and a template downloaded from an American staging site is drafted against statutes that do not apply to you. Pay a lawyer in your own province to read your actual document once. What follows is not clause text to copy, but the questions each clause has to answer.

The scope of work, and what counts as a change to it

Scope gets written in the language of the walkthrough instead of the language of the invoice. "Stage the main floor" feels precise while you are standing in the house. It stops being precise the day the seller asks whether the den off the kitchen counted.

Name the rooms. Not the floors, the rooms. Then say what a room includes, because furniture, art, textiles and accessories are four separate decisions and clients tend to assume all four are in.

The half that gets skipped is the change clause. It has to settle what counts as a change, who has to agree, and in what form. An added room is obvious. A moved install date, or a second trip because the sellers had not finished packing, are the ones that actually turn up. If a text message is enough, write that down.

The inventory list, and who carries a loss

Attach a list, piece by piece, with photographs taken the day it leaves your building. It is what your crew pulls from the warehouse, and it is what you check back in against six weeks later when nobody remembers whether the brass lamp was yours.

Then settle who carries the risk while the pieces are in the house. Usually that sits with the seller, because the seller controls who comes and goes and you do not. The clause has to say what a loss covers, including damage, staining, and pieces that are simply not there at de-stage, and how a replacement is priced, because "replace it" and "pay me what it cost me" are different amounts. It should also point at the seller's own insurance rather than assume it. Most home policies were not written with somebody else's warehouse in the living room.

The rental period, and what happens when it runs long

The rental period decides whether a slow listing is an inconvenience or a problem. It needs a start, and the start is install day, not the day the agreement was signed.

Then say what happens at the end of the period if the property has not sold. Renewal can be automatic or it can require the seller to agree again. Automatic is easier for you and worse for the relationship when the seller did not understand it. Renewal by agreement is more work every month and produces fewer angry calls. Pick one deliberately.

Say what happens if the listing is withdrawn, if the seller changes brokerages, or if an offer comes together with a closing two months out. Furniture usually stays through closing, and someone should have agreed who pays for those weeks. Then say who books the de-stage and what notice you need, because one nobody scheduled becomes one you do on a Sunday.

When the money moves

The default in this business is that your inventory leaves your building before you have been paid. The agreement is where you change that: a deposit that holds the date, and the first period paid on or before install day.

Be specific about who the paying party is. A realtor saying she is covering it is not a party to your agreement unless she signs it, and "the commission will cover it" is a promise from someone who has not been paid either. If a brokerage is paying, the brokerage goes on the document. There is more on that arrangement in the guide on who pays for home staging.

Then say what late payment does. Interest, a pause on renewal, or the right to collect your inventory are all defensible. Choose before you need it rather than during the call where you need it.

Photographs and what you may do with them

Your portfolio is how the next client finds you, and a signed release is what makes an install photograph usable.

Settle four things: whether you may photograph, whether you may publish, whether the address may be named, and how long the permission runs. Sellers quite often say yes to the photograph and no to the address, which is easy to accommodate but only if you asked.

One thing stagers get caught by: the listing photos are not yours. They were taken by the photographer the brokerage hired, and your agreement with the seller does not license somebody else's images. Posting the professional shots is a separate conversation with the photographer or the brokerage.

Access, keys, and who is in the house

Say how you get in on install day and de-stage day, and whether you may be in the house alone. Some sellers are fine with a lockbox code and some want to be there, and that changes what you can schedule.

Logistics belong here too. A downtown condo tower will usually want a certificate of insurance on file and a service elevator booked several days out, so make that something the client arranges by a stated date. Companies working Toronto learn this once and never forget it.

Cancellation, before and after the van is loaded

Before install: how much notice, what is refundable, what is not. The deposit usually is not, because you held the date and turned down other work to hold it.

After install: rarer and more expensive. There is de-stage labour, a second trip, and inventory that is out of the warehouse and unbookable for the rest of a period nobody is paying for.

Then write the clause almost nobody writes, which is your own right to cancel. If you arrive and the house is still full, or the pre-install list has not been touched, you need a written right to leave and charge for the trip. Every template contemplates the client walking away. Very few contemplate you doing it.

None of these clauses are complicated. They just tend to get written in the order you get burned. Write the one that cost you money last year, then write the next one before it happens.