Is virtual staging worth it to sell your house?

If you've ever stumbled on HGTV, you know that there is a big push toward staging homes for sale. Cluttered, tacky, dirty, and even unfurnished homes are, we're told, a lot harder to sell than tastefully decorated homes because buyers need to be able to visualize themselves living in the property.

And with a glut of homes on the market, staging may be more important now than ever. But it's also expensive: hiring a professional stager and renting furniture to showcase a home can cost thousands of dollars -- and it may be worth it on a million dollar property. But on a $100,000 condominium or starter home, it tends to be impractical.