You are thinking about selling your home in the next few months but want to make some improvements to maximize your resale price. What are the best home improvement projects to do before you sell to get the best purchase offer? While no home improvement project is guaranteed to give you a distinct return on investment, there are some improvements that have a good track record in doing that.
A Refreshing Bathroom
A minor bathroom update can make a big impression. This type of renovation involves refreshing a bathroom but not reshaping or resizing the foot print. You can go with a cosmetic update by painting the room a fresh color and adding coordinating towels and shower curtain. You can do a major refresh by replacing the tub, tile, toilet, sink, and hardware. Finding great deals on these fixtures can maximize the return. Even removing old shower doors and replacing them with a fresh curtain and rod can make a significant improvement.
Landscaping
Landscaping updates are great ones for any homeowner to do before putting their home on the market. Overgrown shrubs or trees can actually hide the nicer details of your home. You can either trim these older items back, or take them out completely. Putting in new plants and good mulch can freshen up any planting bed. Sodding the yard or growing fresh grass can make an even bigger impression on potential buyers. Add a splash of color with annuals around the front door.
The Heart of the House
A minor kitchen update can also make a great impression on potential home buyers. A minor update in the kitchen can mean something as small as painting the walls and changing the window coverings. It can also involve painting or resurfacing the cabinets and replacing the counter tops and flooring. The choice of how much you can do should depend on what your kitchen looks like. A severely outdated kitchen can still look better with resurfaced cabinets and a new floor.
Outside the Home
Exterior updates are also things to consider. Even something as simple as painting the front door can make a good impression. However, if your home’s exterior is weathered and worn, you may need to go another step. Covering the outside with vinyl siding is a cost effective option as is using fiber-concrete siding. Painting the exterior of the house yourself is a very cost effective option.
A cost effective update to any home is a fresh coat of paint in every room. Choosing a modern color palette can update a house quite easily. Removing wall paper is another way to update a house. Most wall papers tend to date themselves quite quickly. Removing it and painting the wall can bring a room into the 21st century without a great deal of money invested.
The Little Things
Another update to make to a dated home is in window coverings. Heavy drapes should make way for light airy panels that let the light pour in. Replace dated vertical blinds with the same panels. This simple change can make a very big difference in how your home feels.
Omni Chaparala works for DFW Realties, a DFW real estate company serving home buyers and sellers in the Dallas – Fort Worth metroplex.
Even though there might be no space for tables and chairs, you can just place several bar chairs. This is also an indirect technique to get rid of too many crowds inside your cooking space.
Updating the look and feel of the kitchen always helps. It’s amazing what a little paint and decorating can do for the kitchen. Make it feel warm and inviting.
I agree that remodeling your kitchen and bathroom will allow you to sell your house at a higher price. But I think that you need to see if the cost offset of how much the remodeling costs compared to how much it will actually increase the sale price of your home. So if you spend $20,000 on remodeling your kitchen and bathrooms (which isn’t a bad price) and your house price only goes up $15k… you just lost 5k and lots of headaches on top of it. Nice article.