RENOVATING TO SELL
Always put yourself in the shoes of your potential buyers. Are your buyers going to want to buy a renovator or a renovated home. By all means, tidy up the small things, but don’t spend excessive money upgrading prior to sell, especially if you don’t have the skills or training to do it yourself.
Keeping it simple is always best, if it’s a quick fix, then by all means paint over the patched or marked wall, tidy the garden with some extra mulch or add some edging and garden beds with some plants. If your house is neat and tidy, then people still may want to come in and change the paint colours, change the flooring, and change the gardens more to their taste. So if you can avoid investing in big dollar items, please do.
If you’re planning on living in a house for longer than 18 months, renovate to your hearts content – you will not only enjoy it, you will add value doing as much yourself as possible. Please use the correct trades for Electrical and Plumbing work, and Asbestos removal.
It’s amazing what some hard work, a coat of paint, updated furnishings, and styling can achieve when it comes to those extra dollars. Which of these would you prefer. If you’re unsure what colour to paint a room, why not do it digitally first, upload a photo into the Dulux Colour Visualizer to test it out.
If your roof is looking a little tired, it’s amazing what a clean and paint can do.
Flippers Beware: I have heard of a 10% rule for renovating, spending no more than 10% of the value of a house to make money i.e $50,000 on a $500,000 house. I believe that with Transfer Duty and costs associated with selling, unless you are a skilled renovator with all the trades at your side or buy in the right suburb at the right time you may not get this 10% back in the sale price and the final sale will probably be the price you paid, plus the cost of the repairs/renovations.
When it comes to big dollar items, here are 5 Features that rarely add value when you sell.
- Swimming Pool
- Extravagant Fittings or Fixtures
- Things you cannot see
- Fancy Landscaping or No Landscaping
- Sub-par DIY work
Be careful of asbestos when doing any work. For more information on Asbestos click here.