Sell Your Home Faster with these Small Remodeling Ideas

If you are remodeling to help sell your home, you need to pay special attention to the kitchen and bathrooms.  These are the most expensive remodeling projects, but if you plan to sell your home, they will be the most important to do right.

There are smaller remodeling projects that can improve your bathroom, add style and help you sell your home.  A few inexpensive improvements include changing the knobs or pulls on the vanity or installing a new and updated light fixture.  If your vanity is really outdated, painting it could be the remodeling trick that can bring it back to life.  All of these simple improvements can be done by yourself, further reducing your investment.

A good way to find new looks for an older bathroom is to attend a home improvement show, look in magazines, or tour model homes in your area.  If you’re only planning minor remodeling, don’t get worked up about the amazing spa tub in that model home.  Instead, use your time to look at the smaller items such as lights, pulls, and faucets.  All of these smaller things will also help you sell your home.

In remodeling in an effort to sell your home, it’s really important to pay attention to detail and to put your money into the rooms that matter to buyer most.  With a couple hundred dollars, you can’t add square footage to your master bedroom or add a bathroom, but you can update the look and feel of your house.

Kitchen Remodeling: Reface the Cabinets if You Plan to Sell Your Home Soon

In the Process of Refacing

Refacing kitchen cabinets is most often done as a kitchen remodeling project if you are planning to sell your home in the next 5 years.  The look and feel of the kitchen is one of the most important features buyers consider, and therefore should be high on your list when you want to sell your home.

Refacing your kitchen cabinets can make the cabinets appear new and the kitchen will feel updated, without the cost and time required for installation of new cabinets as part of a larger kitchen remodeling effort.

Before deciding on refacing over replacing, ask yourself whether your existing kitchen layout works and if you have enough storage and counter space.  If the answers are yes, and if your cabinets are in good structural shape, then refacing may be the answer to this kitchen remodeling question.

Refacing means that you will cover the existing cabinet surfaces with new laminate.  Door and drawer fronts are also replaced to match the new laminate.  Side panels of end cabinets are also refaced.

When you reface your cabinets, you can completely change the style and feel of your kitchen, which is at the core of kitchen remodeling.  You can go from a dark walnut wood to light oak with glass doors, for example.  Adding new hinges will put a spring back into those cabinet doors and new handles and drawer pulls can be chosen to finish off the desired look.

The reduced cost of refacing cabinets makes it easier for you to see a return on your investment when you sell your home, but it is also a substantial enough kitchen remodeling project for you to enjoy in the meantime.

If you aren’t planning to sell your home soon and want to invest in new cabinets, an upcoming blog will give you some ideas.

(Photo Credit:  http://www.flickr.com/photos/donabelandewen/4105718749/)

Sell Your House: Turn Your Home into a Model

When selling your house, you want to make sure that it appeals to buyers. The number of bedrooms, bathrooms, and floor plan isn’t enough to sell your home. It must have a shock value to it when a potential buyer walks in, and when I say, shock, I mean it in a good way.

The last thing you want people to think when they enter your home is how much of a mess it is. If the first thought a buyer has when entering your home is a negative one, it will dramatically decrease the chances someone will want to buy it. Instead, you want someone to walk in and think, “Wow, I would love to live in a home like this…”

How do you achieve that reaction? One of the best ways is to make your home into a model home. Have you ever seen a model home in a new neighborhood? Everything looks so perfect. It’s decorated just right and it just seems so inviting.

Don’t think you can make your home into a model home? Here are some tips on how to achieve it no matter what your house looks like right now.

• Unclutter

Take everything that you don’t use regularly and box it up. You’ll be moving anyway so this will give you a head start. Don’t leave boxes all over your house, though, instead rent a storage unit to put them in.

• Clean

The dog nose prints and the sticky jelly countertops may not bother you, but they will pop out to potential buyers. Take time to clean your house top to bottom. You’d be amazed at what people will notice.

• Pick up before showing

Before a showing, vacuum all carpets so they look like you just vacuumed. It’s also important to make your beds, pull shower curtains across and pick up things haphazardly thrown throughout the house. The idea here is to make it as perfect as a model home but at the same time, livable.

(Photo Credit: http://www.flickr.com/photos/jeremylevinedesign/3197502527/)