People spend thousands of dollars on home upgrades. They might be thinking of selling the home right now or are looking to sell the home in the future. They think they can get the money back when they sell the house, but they rarely do. Some renovations are not worth the money. For example, Readers Digest listed 32 home improvement ideas that are a huge waste of money.
Included on their list were items such as:
· New HVAC systems
· New decks
· Sunrooms
· Swimming pools
· New faucets and fixtures
· Built-in swimming pools and hot tubs
· Expensive, out of the ordinary landscaping
· Murals and wallpaper
· Built-in fishtanks
· Home gyms
· Saunas and steam rooms
· Fireplace mantles
· Solar panels
· Over renovating bathrooms and kitchens.
Many home improvements provide a rotten return on investment
For example, a basement renovation typically only returns less than half of the money spent on it. The same with a major kitchen remodel. They say kitchens sell homes, but what good is that if you only get back fifty percent of the money spent.
Seven things you can do inexpensively
There are several things you can do inexpensively: 1. For a few hundred dollars, companies such as Rustica can set you up with fabulous interior Dutch doors between your living room and the kitchen. For your front door, you can add a little paint, preferably black or smokey grey, the colors Zillow says to add to get the most return on investment, and you’ve made a terrific start. 2. Buy one quality appliance instead of remodeling. According to keenlykristin.com, buying one quality appliance makes a ton more sense than remodeling an entire kitchen and losing thousands of dollars in resale.
3. Use tile or high-grade linoleum over hardwood. Both tile and modern linoleum are fantastic choices over hardwood. They are infinitely cheaper, yet even linoleum looks terrific in the modern styles available.
4. Think about refinishing the deck. If you sand down your original deck and re-stain it, it will look like a million bucks for perhaps $200 or less.
5. Think about revamping your kitchen cabinets. If you sand and repaint your kitchen cabinets then repaint them, you’ll wonder if you are even in the same house. True, it takes some elbow grease and a creative touch, but you can have a completely new looking kitchen for around $100.
6. Repaint old faucet fixtures. Modern paint companies such as Rustoleum make modern spray paints in metallic look gold that looks fantastic and runs around $7 a can. This will save thousands on a bathroom remodel. Add a new rug and a shower curtain, and you are gold.
7. Consider stenciling a custom floor. You can give any room in your home a thousand dollar look with ordinary wall paint. Check out this YouTube video, Stenciling Floors, to learn how.
Saving money
Search the internet and you will find literally dozens of home remodeling sites. If you look further, you will see the vast majority of them treat home remodeling like money is no object.
While it’s true that if you plan on living in a house for another 20 or so years, a home remodeling project may make life more livable. People are moving out of their homes and relocating or staying in the same city, but they are either downsizing or upgrading at an increasing rate. The average is around 11 years in one home in most cities, but in that span of time, some people will have moved in and out of their home three or four times.
With rapid relocation, in many cases, it makes sense to do as little as possible to renovate your home. Instead, it makes financial sense to cut loose with the old and buy new. This is particularly important advice for those in transition periods such as when an elderly parent dies or their children grow up and go to college.
Still, to sell quickly and at a good price, a home needs to look modern. So it’s a great idea to investigate inexpensive ways to renovate a home.
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