How to Increase the Value of Your Home
Buying a house will most likely be the biggest purchase you will ever make during your life. Because of this fact, you should do everything in your power to make it as valuable as you can. Your home should be treated like any other financial investment. The money you spend improving your home now will be beneficial if the time comes when you finally decide to sell it. Selling a home is a very competitive process. Buyers are looking for many of the same desirable features. If your home does not contain any of these desirable features, it will severely limit the amount of money that potential buyers will offer you for it. Knowing what the buyers are looking for is one of the best ways to get outstanding offers when you sell your home. Making improvements that will always be in high demand makes good sense. Make sure you consider protecting your investment with a home protection plan to see if the cost is worth the minimized risk to your investment. Let’s take a look at some of the best ways make your home worth more.
1. Carpeting
Whenever a person enters any room in your house, the first thing their eyes will be drawn to is the carpeting. If the carpeting in your home is ratty, worn out, and looks like it is more than 30 years old, this will be a problem for you! If you are entertaining guests, they will wonder why you do not take pride in your home’s appearance. If you put your home up for sale with substandard carpeting, buyers will be immediately turned off. Carpeting and carpet cleaning is a critical issue when it comes to selling your home. Your carpeting’s condition can literally be the difference between a person making an offer or deciding to pass. Therefore, installing new carpeting throughout your home is one of the most important things you can do when it comes to increasing your home’s value. This can typically be accomplished at a reasonable cost.
2. Aluminum or vinyl siding
It is not difficult to figure out why aluminum and vinyl siding have become incredibly popular over the past couple of decades. Houses without siding can be damaged by the elements throughout the years. This can cause paint to begin peeling, necessitating the repainting of the entire home. Siding eliminates the possibility of this happening. Siding is durable and is made to withstand the elements. However, some types of siding are better suited for certain environments. Homeowners who install siding will never need to worry about paint that is peeling. They can also power wash their home without fear of damaging their paint. Buyers generally want a house with siding, so having it installed on your house is a wise investment decision that will pay for itself in the future if you decide to sell.
3. Central air conditioning
This is yet another modern convenience that many potential buyers want their new home to have. This is especially true in warm climates where air conditioning is so important for daily comfort. While window air conditioners will cool individual rooms, people nowadays want to have the ability to control the temperature throughout the entire home. Also, digital thermostats allow the homeowner to preset the temperature. This allows a person to keep the air conditioning off or at a low setting during the day while he or she is at work, saving the home owner money. At a specified time of the homeowner’s choosing, the air conditioning will turn on and cool the home. The person will them return to a home that is cool and comfortable. While having a central air conditioner installed is a very expensive project, few things can increase the value of your home as much as this. With the low cost of digital, programmable thermostats, everyone should invest in this upgrade.
How to Increase the Value of Your Home – Final Thoughts
Even if you do not plan to sell your home soon, it makes good sense to invest in these upgrades to increase the value of your home. You can enjoy years of happiness and ensure you don’t have a million things to upgrade when it comes time to sell! What other tips do you have on how to increase the value of your home?
I agree old or ugly carpet can be a huge turn-off to buyers. But we have little kids, host a lot (= spills), and therefore don’t plan to replace our carpet for a long time, or possibly closer to whenever we decide to sell.
Kalie recently posted…Waste Less, Want Less
Kalie,
As long as you know that you’ll need to replace it when it comes time to sell, I guess it’s no harm done 🙂
Some home improvements must be done as soon as possible to avoid more house problems.
April,
I agree – in some cases it is necessary to spend money immediately to prevent future damage. Examples could include a leaking roof or a termite problem. In other cases, it is best to hold off. It mostly comes down to a judgement call and good old common sense 🙂
It makes sense that aluminum or vinyl siding would be a good way to increase the value of your home and make it more attractive to potential buyers. That’s actually one of the biggest reasons that I’m actually considering having some installed around my home this summer. I don’t plan on living in this home forever, so I want to be sure that it’ll sell quickly once I put it on the market.
McKayla,
Vinyl siding is real low maintenance and not too expensive. The installation is where you will spend a lot of money if you don’t do it yourself. Good luck!
Carpets do need to be taken care of. You will always sell the home eventually, or your kids will, so don’t force yourself or your kids to replace the carpets if they wouldn’t have needed to be replaced. It’s less money for you or yours in the long run.
Good point Guy! When we sold a house years back the realtor actually suggested that we NOT replace the carpet because we would probably not see a good ROI. I guess it really depends on the condition and the asking price you are targeting.
While it is listed as the third tip, it is one of the most important. A central air conditioning unit is extremely valuable for the home. We love our air conditioning in the summer. It keeps us from melting away in this heat.
Thanks for stopping by James. I agree with you – life would be tough without good AC 🙂
I had never thought of siding adding value to your home. I can see why buyers would consider it a preferable quality to have. It’s pretty easy to maintain and if you do it right, it can last a long time. Besides that, it’s pretty easy to replace or repair if there’s a storm or something. Thanks for sharing your tips!
Gerald,
Glad to be of service!
I am planning on moving out of my home in a few months, and I really wanted to make sure I did all I could to increase the value of my home. And after reading this, I realized that there were a ton of different things I could do. The siding on my home is starting to get worn down, so I think that is going to be the first thing I start to redo.
Taking care of paint on a home can be costly and time consuming to maintain. Your suggestion to install vinyl siding is great because vinyl siding does not take as much money to maintain and lasts much longer. I will have to look into installing vinyl siding to my own home in the future.
Thanks for your insights on how to improve the value of your home. I especially liked your second section on replacing or upgrading the exterior siding of your home. I definitely agree that adding this feature to your home improves the maintenance precautions you have to take. It’s nice that cleaning siding only consists of power washing the outside of your home. Plus, you don’t have to deal with peeling paint every few years. Thanks so much for your insight in this topic, I definitely will consider more seriously what it would take to upgrade my home’s exterior to some kind of siding!
Thanks Meg!
It is really comforting to hear that I can actually power wash my vinyl siding. I would have thought that the high water pressure would make the layers of the vinyl peel. Now I don’t have to deal with the mildew and grime that occur during the rainy season around here.
Don’t put yourself at risk of sustaining injury in an effort to save a few dollars. Hire someone who has the training necessary to complete the job without significant risk.
A siding job is not something that you can start and then finish as your own leisure. Once you have torn up the old structure, you only have a few days to make sure that you get the job completed.
And unless you have been formally trained in how to install new sidings, then it is best to hire one of the many professional siding companies.
April recently posted…Hardi Plank Siding Job
April,
This can be true but with YouTube, you can learn how to do this yourself pretty easily.