As homeowners look to spruce up their home, residential experts at Urban Real Estate find that the easiest repairs can have the greatest impact. Whether you are considering selling or not, maintaining your home’s value is key to your own asset, as well as to keeping your home beautiful. Before you start painting walls - read these tips to help you maximize your return, and still beautify your home.
Chris Vernald, partner with Urban, works with investors and residents looking to rehab properties and guides their improvement efforts. “Routine repairs can be golden. Owners often overlook the simplest maintenance. Settling marks, cracking in paint, and discoloration from a leak are all easy repairs that should come first.”
The kitchen is key to a buyer shopping for a new home. “Many condos have galley kitchens with walls that can easily be opened. A seller looking to list their home should consider taking down a wall and removing a few cabinets. It takes the guesswork out of what a home might look like, and makes a condo more valuable,” Chris notes. “Removing drywall and creating an open space is more affordable than most realize. If your cabinets are older, don’t swap them out. Simply change the hardware and hinges, add a fresh coat of paint, and your kitchen can look incredible.”
On carpet, another hot topic Urban’s brokers are asked about, it’s a perfect component in a sale to negotiate smartly. “If you are removing carpet to put in hardwood floors for your own enjoyment, do it,” Chris advises. “However, if you are looking to sell, get your carpet cleaned, then let your broker price your home with a potential credit for flooring. This way, you maintain your value and leave the flooring out of pricing, but as a credit to the buyer.”
Other things to note as you consider your home rehab include:
- Buyers often look at the kitchen and master or main bathroom first. Therefore, if you are remodeling with the intent to sell, know that your dollars after routine maintenance are best spent in these areas.
- Make your home yours – but do it in for your own enjoyment. Homeowners often select details for their own enjoyment, in hopes that one day, they will recoup the dollars on the sell end. Not so fast… The truth is, the pink granite you love for your bathroom with the gold trim may be gorgeous, but may not be in style or to the liking of the next buyer who makes your home theirs. Definitely make improvements, but be realistic about what you hope to make back, and what you spend without the expectation of much back in return.
- If you do consider to sell, interview a few brokers. Compare what one recommends over the other. If you get handed a to-do list that is way more than you can stomach in improvements before a broker lists your home, then you need to find the broker right for you. There is typically a happy medium between pricing a home compellingly, and certain basic maintenance your home may need. The goal is to make a home appealing for you and for a potential buyer, so that they, too, can envision themselves living happily in the home that you’ve enjoyed for so long.
For more insights on making your home more valuable for a potential sale, email Chris Vernald , or connect with an Urban agent at (312) 528-9292.