Vancouver Home Renovations That Don’t Pay – Consult with Bruce Coleman, Vancouver Mortgage Broker
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Vancouver Home Renovations That Don’t Pay
Asides from everyday normal maintenance that you have to perform on your Vancouver home, some folks like to go the extra distance. Major home renovation projects are usually made with the idea of increasing the property value and making the home more attractive to a prospective buyer.
Indeed, some home renovation projects can give you a great return on your investment. Re-doing and upgrading the bathrooms or kitchen are two the more profitable types of renovations you can perform. Also, adding additional space which is functional such as a family room can also help recover a considerable portion of your cash outlay for these projects.
However, there are also projects which you should seriously avoid especially if you are planning to use these projects to sell your home. Otherwise, they may be okay if you just moved into the home and plan to stay there for awhile.
Here are top home renovation projects you should avoid if you are planning to sell you home.
Don’t add a Swimming Pool
A swimming pool is great to have for the long term, but if adding one in the expectation that it will help to sell your home faster or add value to the home this could be a big mistake. Not only is a pool very expensive to install, it really doesn’t add a lot of value to your home and can actually detract a prospective buyer. A swimming pool also comes with expensive maintenance costs, potential liability issues and can be a turn off to couples who have young children.
Don’t Make the Neighbourhood Look Bad
You might think that your expensive project will “wow” prospective buyers by making it stand out from the surrounding homes. However, a project such as adding on a second story or some major remodelling to the exterior might stick out too much.
Sure, you can sell advertise the home for an additional $100,000 above the going price in the neighbourhood, but people who want to spend that type of money will generally stick to neighbourhood where homes sell in that price range throughout that enighborhood.
You can spend that $100,000 to improve your home but if you think you’re going to easily recoup that money, then you might be in for a sobering surprise.
Avoid Excessive Landscaping
Some people go overboard with landscaping projects which is fine if you plan to live in your home for a long period of time. However, you have to keep in mind that everyone has different tastes. A buyer may love you house but hate the yard and have something completely different in mind for their space. Also, extensive landscaping also requires maintenance which a prospective buyer may not wish to undertake.
Landscaping really doesn’t add a lot of value to a property. If you need to perform some landscaping to improve the appearance of your property keep it very basic and conservative.
Avoid Partial High-End Upgrades
Take a critical look at your home when you are considering upgrades. Rather than put all your renovation expenses into a single project, consider trying to spread the money about the home on smaller projects.
The reason is that if you put all your renovation money into a single project, and the rest of the home of the home is still stuck in a 1975 design, then that single high end project is going to stick out like a “sore thumb” and make the home look like a work in progress.
A prospective buyer is going to think it’s going to cost them a lot of cash to make the home look consistent throughout. So, ditch the shag carpets, get rid of the old linoleum, add some new fixtures instead and you can achieve a lot more to enhance the overall value.
