How to Assess When to Renovate Your Home and How to Compare Your House to Others in Your Market
It’s hard to know when to or whether to renovate your home. Here are some things to consider when making your decision.
Retail Value of Renovation
It isn’t very often that renovation decrease the value of your home. Small cosmetic things like a new coat of paint on the walls, cleaning the exterior of your home, and minor landscaping all help to get people more interested in your home before they really know anything about it. Looks are very important. However putting value on any kind of home renovation can be difficult, because it’s really up to what amount of value the buyer thinks the improvement has. However, there are some tried and true projects that always seem to make back their money, and bring in offers. Adding wood floors to your home can be pricey at first, but homes are much more likely to sell if they have wood flooring. Replacing the paneling on the side of your home is also another cosmetic repair that makes back most of its cost. Really what you’re looking for is projects that pay for themselves, usually standard things like replacing insulation are your best bet, as they are necessities.
Comparison
Whether you should renovate and how much you should spend depends greatly on the condition of homes selling in your area. If homes of similar size and features–number of beds, bathrooms, floors, etc.–are selling easily then there may be no need for renovation except for upon the request of the buyer. It’s important to go online and check out other houses that have recently sold near you. You can see if they have made an recent repairs in order to make their home more appealing to buyers. If they have done small updates like installing new light fixtures, then you should probably do the same. The devil is in the details, and a cheap fix like that can really make a difference to potential buyers. If you see these other homes installing new floors, fixing up bathrooms, and doing other big projects, it’s probably in your best interest to do these things too. However, you should always consult your real estate agent first. They know what buyers are looking for, and make think the your home is perfect as is. The point is that you shouldn’t do more than you absolutely have to to sell your home, especially if other homes aren’t. You can also base the price of your house off of how other houses have sold if the are similar to yours.
Construction Costs
It’s hard to cover all of the costs that you might encounter while renovating, but let’s try to go through the basics. If you’re planning to redo your kitchen, you could spend anywhere from $5,000-$50,000. This includes new countertops, flooring, and cabinets. Of course, the price will vary based on the materials you choose and the size of your kitchen. The price of a bathroom is hard to pin down because of all the different components and materials that there are to choose from. The combined price for a cheap bathtub and toilet can be $500, while it can be $9000 at the high-end side of the spectrum. So really it just depends. A build permit on its own can cost $1000.
The final thing you need to consider is the price of a contactor, but that is for another time. However, we at Blue Marble Properties are here to answer any of your questions. Visit our website today to learn more.