How to Add Value to Your Home & Get a Quick Sale

If you’re planning to sell your property within the next year or so, you’re probably thinking of making some home improvements that will add extra value and increase your profit.

You’ve no doubt noticed many television programmes covering this topic and showing you how it’s done. Don’t be fooled – it’s not always as simple as they make out!

It’s important to do some research before getting involved in a project such as this. Adding value to your property needs careful consideration and in order to make a profit there are a few key concepts you should think about beforehand.

Ceiling Prices

The ceiling price is the maximum amount of money a prospective buyer is realistically going to offer for a home in your street before he can spend the same amount on buying a similar property in a better street.

Location

When selling a property to make a profit, it’s much better to begin with the worst home in the best street rather than the best home in the worst street.

In order to understand what this means and why it’s so important, let’s look at a few situations involving these concepts.

Situation 1 – Selling a home that is in a prime location

The aim in a situation such as this is to make the property one of the best in the area. You’ll always find a buyer willing to spend a little extra on a property such as this all because it is ‘the best’.

It’s worth spending money turning a property like this into a modern, hi-tech dream home. Add a touch of luxury to the interior with a quality kitchen and bathroom, designed to appeal to a sophisticated taste. Hire an architect. The money you spend now improving the property will have a large effect on the final value.

Situation 2 – Selling a home that is in an average location

The idea in this situation is to improve the property, keeping the standard similar to the other homes in the area. You can make the property a little better than the others but don’t go overboard.

In this type of area, don’t waste time, effort and money turning the property into a palace if the other homes are average semis. There’s no need to invest in expensive kitchens or bathrooms. If you’re hoping to sell for a profit, you’re going to need a buyer willing to spend and someone with this type of money will more than likely want to spend his or her cash on a much better location.

Know your buyers before selling a property

You need to spend some time researching – finding out the likes and dislikes of potential buyers for your property. What a buyer is looking for will vary depending on which town, city or street you live.

Once you know what the preferences are for your type of property, you’ll know which home improvements to concentrate on to make a tidy profit. Remember too – it’s the buyers’ tastes that matter, not your own!

Important points to consider are:

• What home improvements are popular in the area?
• How much do these improved homes sell for?
• How much cash do you need to spend making these improvements?

Keep a close eye on the property market in your area to see what is selling and how much for. It’s likely you’ll already have a fair idea of this but if you don’t a visit to a few local estate agents will be very worthwhile as the knowledge you’ll get from them will be invaluable.

Just talking to the office staff won’t be enough so make an appointment to see the boss. Ask for the branch manager if it’s a corporate or the owner if it’s independently run. He’ll be more than willing to share his expertise if he thinks you’re soon going to be a client of his.

A good estate agent will spend some time going through past sales of improved homes and how the current properties he has for sale match up.

The aim of the meeting is to get the estate agent to prove to you that improving your property will result in a profitable sale.

What improvements are worth carrying out?

It’s important to choose home improvements that will add value to your property. In the current climate of built up and overpopulated cities and towns, the trend is for more space. This will involve getting the builders in but the end result is a real money-spinner.

If you can stand the mess and disruption caused by the builders, can spend time on planning and can find builders and architects who you can rely upon and work with, then the chances are good that you will make a tidy profit by improving your home.

Some improvement projects that will always add value to your property are:

• Converting a single bedroom into a double. This means increasing it in size to at least 2.7 x 2.7sqm.
• Adding an en-suite bathroom or even a second bathroom to a 2-bed property.
• Adding to the floor space of a 2-bed property, converting it to a 3-bed / 2 bathroom.
• Adding to the floor space of a 3-bed property, converting it to a 4-bed / 3 bathroom.
• Converting the loft area into an additional bedroom and bathroom in a 2 or 3-bed home.
• Introducing an off-street parking area to a property without.
• Obtaining planning permission for any of the home improvements listed above

If you require any further information on adding value to your property by making home improvements, Internet research may help.

Some companies conduct market research annually on the topic and their findings are published, making an excellent source of information. It’s a great way of finding out just exactly how much a project can add to the value of your home.

If you’re selling your property for profit, research such as this can prove invaluable and will give some general guidelines to go by.

Follow this up by visiting some local estate agents and identify which projects are the best for making you a profit.