When you’re looking to improve your home, one of the most important guiding principles is to make sure that you keep your purpose in mind. Are you improving it so that you feel more comfortable and at home? Because you want it to meet your changing practical needs? Or because you’re looking to sell and want to get the most money that you can? If it’s the latter, then certain improvements are going to be much more in sync with those goals. Here, we’re going to take a look at a few that you should keep in mind.

Start with the kitchen

There are two rooms that dominate the attention of the viewer when they come into the home. The first is the kitchen (because that’s usually the first of the two that they come across.) You don’t need to entirely remodel your kitchen. Even a few simple, cheap upgrades or updates can make a huge difference. This might be as simple as updating or painting your cabinets or having a new backsplash put in. Of course, larger projects such as adding a whole kitchen island or replacing the countertops are likely to add more value, but you have to make sure that your costs aren’t exceeding the value added.

Move onto the bathroom

The other room that matters just as much as the kitchen is the bathroom. Both are areas where practicality is essential, but comfort is almost as important, and both are areas shared by the whole family, so getting these right is vital. For the bathroom, making it look clean and comfortable is the biggest focus. If you need to make repairs to the fixtures, clean out the mold, or even to add some lighting to give it a warmer, more welcoming feeling, then you should do that. A bathroom that is showing its age and looks like it hasn’t been cared for properly can scare people away from a property that they otherwise really like the look of, so don’t let your house make that mistake.

Creating a gorgeous garden

Usually, when looking at home improvements for the purposes of attracting buyers and driving up prices, it’s the practical that takes precedence. However, the one area of the home that’s less practical but just as valuable is your curb appeal. Restoring an old fence, repainting older outside facing materials, and even learning how to landscape for a great yard can do a lot to improve the value of the home.The more attention and appeal your home gets, the more people will check it out, and the more you can prop up the price based on its popularity.

Give it a good welcome

It’s not just the garden and the surrounds of the home that can add curb appeal, of course. The exterior fixtures of the home itself can make a big difference, as well. Take a look at where the home might show its age, whether it’s paint peeling off the doors, cracks in the gutters, or a facade that’s starting to fall apart. Whether it only needs a few light repairs or you might even be looking at installing new cladding, think about what needs to be done to really make the home shine. Even a little exterior lighting can add a lot of charm to a home.

New flooring can do a lot of good

The floor is one part of the home that takes a lot of damage over the years so it’s only natural that it begins to lose its luster. If that’s the case, updating it can be a relatively cheap way to make sure that your home looks fresh, comfortable, and welcoming. The costs of a new floor are going to depend largely on the type of floor that you choose. A new hardwood floor is going to be significantly more expensive than a new laminate. As such, you need to consider the market that you’re selling to and whether or not homebuyers in the area are likely to accept the price hike that comes with specific floor changes.

Little fixes can matter

You might not be too worried about a squeaky floor when you’re actually living in a home but you had best believe that they can harm your ability to sell. One piece of badly fitted flooring isn’t likely to jeopardize a good deal, but when little issues start to add up, they can start to really bring down the mood of a house viewing. This can include paint peeling, any dirt on the walls or doors, dripping taps, moldy sealant between the bathroom or kitchen tiles, lightbulbs that aren’t working, and so on. Most of these require very inexpensive fixes so it’s worth taking the time to simply inspect the home for little issues that can be quickly solved.

Adding new space

This can be one of the most expensive improvements to make to a home, so you need to consider what, exactly, is going to be required to add extra space or even an extra room. An extension is likely not to pay for its own expense, for instance. However, converting a loft or a garage might be a lot easier, so it could be even easier. Creating usable space in the basement can sometimes take a little more work if you need to do work to seal that basement and keep it safe from moisture issues. Square footage is the largest driver of price in any home, but it’s often only worth doing if you’re likely to make use of that extra space yourself, in the meantime.

A little furniture

This is not likely to apply to everyone reading as, in most cases, you might be selling your home while you are still living in it and, as such, you’re likely to already have furniture in there. In those cases, one tip is to try to make your style more subtle if you have very distinct tastes, or even to hide some of the more personal effects as it can make it easier to viewers to imagine the home as their own without your face or specific style all over the home. Otherwise, if you have already started moving out, you should look at home staging services that can help loan you the furniture to make sure that the home doesn’t look overly bare. 

Don’t add water features

While we have otherwise been covering the improvements that can really help you drive interest and value up for your property, it’s important to cover at least one of the most common mistakes. Adding a pool, fountain, pond, or any other water feature is only likely to drive up value in your home in very specific circumstances: if the buyers have the money and time to maintain it. This is usually only true in luxury or high-end housing markets. Water features are very attractive, there’s no denying that, but they also come with a lot of maintenance needs and costs that many home buyers aren’t going to be excited about. If you’re selling in the higher end of your town or city’s housing market, however, it might just work. Still not widely recommended.

When you’re looking to improve the sale value of your home, doing the calculations in your mind is always vital. How much is an improvement likely to improve the price and how much does it cost? That balance needs to work out to make it worth going ahead with it.