We’ve all heard the prattle and preaching from the various personas within the Home Staging community: the statistics, the befores, the afters, the testimonials and the bid for top billing in the eyes of home owners alike.  You won’t hear any of that from The Home Stagers Corp.’s own Head of Design, Kiki Phukan.  It comes down to one thing for this designer, there is too much experience and training under her belt for her to do anything other than quietly design each property perfectly. Although  she  looks  far  too  young,  her  20  years  of  international  design  world  experience has made Kiki’s stagings nothing short of magazine photo-ready masterpieces. A list of Kiki’s past clientele is enough to make the city’s top designers weak in the knees, yet she need not boast or explain herself.  This lady is simply blowing away anything that has been done to date.  Everyone wants her and it’s easy to see why. Simply put Kiki has done it all. From clients like Winners, Chase Manhattan Bank and The Ritz in London, Kiki has personally designed rugs, cushions, paintings, textiles to bathroom accessories and more. When asked about her background, Kiki simply says “I was staging million dollar properties  in  Bombay  15  years  ago  before  staging  even  existed”.  Clearly Ms. Phukan is no mere stager with a skill set like textile design,  window treatment design  and  creation,  area rug design, home décor accessories, upholstery fabrics, tapestries and wall hangings, decorative cushions, fabrics (cotton, pure silk, jacquard), accent lamp design to name a few.

Possibly one of her most remarkable skills is her innate ability to foresee upcoming trends before they happen. She has repeatedly proven her prowess to not only see the coming trends but create and establish them. Working directly with international design giant Shyam Ahuja (Manhattan/London/Bombay) her cutting edge creations have set trends with heavy weights like Ralph Lauren and the Hilton Suite Hotel chains worldwide.

After moving to Toronto, Canada, Kiki has taken up the mantle of Home Staging and Re-design. Seeing the need for a better  and  more  credible  product  for  home  owners  and Stagers, Kiki’s focused on supplying the industry with better furniture and better design standards. “Many stagers I’ve spoken to are disgruntled about the quality of available rental furniture. The stores that supply these currently offer very ‘run of the mill’   items that are terribly used and difficult to pass in an upscale home.  I know some of the top staging companies swear by these furniture suppliers simply because the cost is low.  But we‘re in the world of design aren’t we? It is up to us to lead the homeowner to a better product.  If you’re selling your home, you need a better product than everyone else. That’s how you sell first and realize a financial gain on your property. ”  With the belief  that home owners need to make an investment in staging to see the real return on  their  money  Kiki  has developed  a line of furnishings that she feels far outclass the current local furniture renters. 

But isn’t all this expensive furniture going to cost a lot? “I realize price is important and we’ve been able to strike up some good relationships with our manufacturers to be competitive.  At the same time we simply don’t supply the same level of product as other companies.  I think everyone should have access to better looking furnishings so we can really upscale the whole staging industry in Toronto. Isn’t that the whole point?”

Kiki Phukan is President and Head of Design for The Home Stagers Corp and THS Furniture Rental Center. Born in India in the 1960’s she resides in her beautiful home near the lake in Ajax, Ontario, Canada with her husband and 2 cherished sons Veer and Ved.

Many people call home staging a fad implying it will fade. I don’t see any evidence of that. It is huge on the west coast and growing on the east coast.  Heck we’ve staged homes in the middle of the country!  I think it boils down to this; real estate  is  extremely  competitive  and  for  those  that  need  to  sell  or  want to make money on what is often their most important investment…here is the newest hottest tool to do that!  Staging is a tool and if you’re not using it, you simply have less than the other guy. That will show in your product.

We are not your typical staging company. In fact what we bring to the table is unique and extremely important to homeowners. I got into staging because of the realization that I have something other stagers don’t have and homeowners need. I’ve been investing in real estate for almost 5 years. I’ve been involved with real estate projects from simple investment REIT’s to hands-on demo work.  I’ve had duplexes and triplexs downtown that I managed myself and I’ve flipped almost 20 homes within the GTA.  Real estate is an incredible way to make money and can be a lot of fun.

More to the point for our clients is I have been in the same position as they are and probably more often, which puts me in a very good position to advise them.  As well, I’ve worked with so many real estate agents that I could easily be a walking referral service.  I  like  working  with  agents  who  are  trying  staging  out  for  the  first  time. You know there is someone who is willing to go out on a limb to get the job done.

Before  real   estate  I spent  20  years  in corporate  sales  and  augmented  my skill set by studying Psychoanalysis on the side.  I’ve  essentially  learned  just  about  everything  involving  negotiating and how to sell something. I find my unique abilities have given me an incredible edge with homeowners. They are commonly emotional about selling their homes and  I  am  able  to  lead  them  through  the  emotional  part  of preparing to sell as well as assess exactly how much they should spend  on  staging to sell their home quickly. As an investor, my goal is always about getting solid cash back from the sale. You have to see a return or why would you invest your money.

When I was flipping houses in Toronto I would do everything to the house; new windows, new mouldings, kitchen etc… Sometimes however, my house wouldn’t sell right away. I couldn’t understand this and being seasoned sales pro I was continually looking for the key to closing the deal.

On one house I had listed for a month and a half in East York I was introduced to Kiki Phukan who told me to stage. I had no budget left and simply couldn’t afford it. Anyway once I got over that thought I scraped the money together and just did it. 3 days later the offer came in and we negotiated an additional $15,000 more from the buyer. This mind you was about $24,000 more than most agents told me I was going to get in the first place. We immediately ran over to another one of my properties and staged that. 4 days later I got asking price!

Ladies and gentlemen you don’t ask for what you want you almost always ask for more than you want and in this case I sold this place for $29,000 more than the guy down the street who had a bigger house. So… “ding” a light went off in my head and I’ve been staging ever since.