painting your home

How to Increase the Value of Your Home

If you have plans in the future to sell your home, you will do all you can to make the most money from the deal. You not only want to impress all potential buyers who step foot on your property but you also want to keep the house in tip-top condition so basic repairs and upgrades don’t discourage potential buyers and they lower their offers.

And while there are dozens of projects you can complete around your home, a handful of them will actually increase your home’s value and help you receive more money on the sale of your property. Let’s talk about several things you can do to increase the value of your home.

1. Focus on the Curb Appeal

When selling your home, you want to make an instant impression the minute buyers pull up to your property. You want them to fall in love right away and be anxious to see what the interior of the home has to offer. You do this by improving the curb appeal of the property.

There are many ways that you can improve the home’s curb appeal. Little things like keeping the grass short, planting fresh flowers, and even trimming the trees and bushes will all make a difference in the look of your home. Additionally, take the time for small exterior details such as paint the trim, sweep the balcony, remove all clutter such as yard toys and bikes from the side of the home, etc.

If you truly want to make a difference to the exterior of your home, enhance the front entryway. Sweep the porch, lay down a new welcome mat, and place a planter of fresh flowers near the door. If the door is old and worn down, you may consider replacing or painting it.

In fact, a study by Zillow found that by painting or choosing a black front door, you can improve your home’s value up to $6,271.

2. Transform Your Kitchen Area

No matter if you have plans to sell your home in the near future or you just love to cook and have family around, you want an open, bright, and functional kitchen area. Kitchens that are cramped, have little counter space, and are outdated are going to detract and turn away potential buyers. Plus, if there are a substantial number of upgrades needed in this space, you may receive even less than you desire for your home.

A kitchen remodel in your Toronto home is one of the best things you can do to increase the value of your home. However, it can also be very costly if you are not prepared. A luxury remodel could cost you over $100,000 while a more basic upgrade could cost a few thousand dollars. However, you can work closely with a professional contractor to transform your kitchen area and stay within budget.

One of the benefits of completing a kitchen remodel is you can create the space that you want — the space you want to spend time in each day. Consider replacing items such as cabinets, countertops, flooring, the layout, lighting, and even paint colors. Work with your contractor to create a customized and gorgeous space for your family to gather in each day.

3. Finish a Basement

If you have an unfinished basement in your home, finishing this area should be a priority. Unfinished, this turns into unusable living space, but when completed, it adds significant, usable square footage to a home. Additionally, there are many uses for this area of the home. A few ideas that you can implement include:

  • Home office
  • Large living room
  • Theater room
  • Guest room
  • Apartment for family members or to rent out for additional income
  • Laundry room

4. Add More Square Footage

One way to immediately increase your home’s value is to complete a home addition. You may consider adding a living room, a laundry room, or even just expanding a bathroom or the kitchen area. The project you choose to complete will affect the cost and even the time required to complete it, but it can produce large results. By adding more square footage, you increase the amount of usable space in the home, the property feels and looks larger, and it can improve the home’s traffic flow as well.

Similar to other projects, what you choose to do with this added space and how you complete the project will affect how much your home’s value will increase. For example, adding another bathroom to the home with have a big return on your investment — an average of 86%. Consider why you want to add more square footage to your home and make sure your plans fall within your budget.

5. Update Bathroom Features

The bathroom is one area of the home where potential buyers will pay particular attention. This is because this is a room that is visited multiple times of the day by household members and guests alike. If the bathrooms have features that are outdated such as pink toilets and tubs, it can quickly turn away potential buyers and hurt your chance of a great sale.

While a bathroom remodel in your Markham home may be advisable, simply updating some areas of this room may be more plausible. For example, replacing old and faded vinyl flooring, updating the vanity, and refurbishing the tub and shower area may be what you need to give this room a lift. Even small details such as upgrading light fixtures, swapping out hardware such as faucets and showerheads are all going to make a difference as well.

If your bathroom is small, dark, and has little counter space, it may be worth your time to consider a full bathroom remodel with a contractor. Expanding this area, updating its design, and bringing in more storage options are just a few of the ways that you will totally transform this area and drastically increase your home’s value.

6. Paint!

One of the most simple and effective ways to increase your home’s value is to grab a paintbrush and begin painting. A fresh coat of paint can actually increase your home’s value by several thousands of dollars — if you choose the right colors. Plus, painting is a project that can be done in a weekend, and a few gallons of paint and several painting supplies can be acquired for less than $100.

If you are considering painting your home, a few projects you may consider that will increase your home’s value include:

Kitchen cabinets: By painting two-toned cabinets in your kitchen area, you can see a price increase of up to $1,500.

Bedroom walls: By choosing neutral and light colors for the bedroom, such as a light blue,  you can see an increase of almost $1,800.  

Living rooms: For living rooms, you also want to choose very neutral and light colors. A living room that is painted a light beige or taupe tone can increase your home’s value up to $1,800.

Unfortunately, just like there are many paint colors that can increase your home’s value, there are also many that can lower it and hurt your sale. These include:

  • Brown color on both the interior and exterior of the home. According to Zillow, brown or stucco home exteriors can reduce your home’s sale price by up to $1,900.
  • Red kitchen and dining rooms can also have a negative effect. While you can certainly use red in these areas, you want to make sure that these bold colors are more as an accent color, not the main color in the room.
  • White rooms such as bedrooms, living rooms, and even bathrooms can make you feel calm and peaceful, and that the area is clean, but they can decrease a home’s sale price by more than $4,000.

If you are ready to transform your home and increase your home’s value, contact The Renovators of Canada today. They can help you determine the best projects to create a living space that you can’t wait to come home to every night and potential buyers will immediately love.

Simple Steps to Follow When Painting Your Room’s Walls

Is the paint on your walls peeling, cracking, or showing wear? This is not a big problem; to get perfectly painted walls follow these basic steps.

 

Clean the Walls

Before anything else, make sure that your walls are clean. No grease, dirt, or dust must be sticking on the wall. Do note that skipping this step will ruin your paint’s finish.

 

To clean your wall, just get a sponge, water, and mild detergent. Lather the detergent on the water, dab the sponge, and rub the sponge on the wall. After that, rinse the walls with water, and let it dry.  You can also use a product called TSP which is specifically designed for cleaning walls prior to painting.

 

Patching

When preparing your walls use drywall compound or a product called Drydex to cover any holes or blemishes.  Drydex goes on pink and dries white.  Sometimes these marks can be very difficult to see, it largely depends on the light in the room.  If you are very keen on details you can take a flashlight and slowly go over the walls from end to end.  You should be able to see all marks and blemishes using this process.

Once the patching material you use is dry, be sure to sand it with a flat surfaced sponge sander.  If you use a piece of sandpaper and your hand when you sand it is difficult to get a smooth wall.  Once you have completed sanding, clean all of the dust and debris by wiping down the walls with a damp cloth.

Once all of the dust is cleaned, it is time to caulk the gaps, cracks that may be showing between the trims and the walls.  When applying caulking use a damp cloth to wipe away the excess.  Using your finger doesn’t work as well and can leave an uneven finish.

Do Not Skip on the Prime

Depending on the colour you are painting, the walls may need to be primed.  You can have the primer tinted to reduce the number of coats of paint you may need to get an even finish.  There are also products that have the paint and the primer in one can – a great innovation for the painting industry!  Prior to coating the whole wall with primer, go over each of your patched areas with primer and a brush.  New compound needs the extra primer or the spots may show once you have completed painting.

Taping

Once all of the caulking and patching is dry.  To prevent a painting mess, make sure that you use painter’s tape (the blue or green tape you see in hardware stores). Tape the places you do not want to get painted (e.g., door frames, window, trim, etc.). It is very important to remove the tape before the paint dries.  If you wait, the new paint and the tape will stick together and when you remove the tape the paint may peel off with the tape.

Cleaning, Patching, Priming Complete – Time to Put on the Colour

Once you have the trims and ceiling taped off, complete all of the edging with a 2 – 2 1/2 inch brush.  For those tight to reach areas have a small brush handy.  If you can, work quickly so that you can roll the walls before the edging paint is completely dry.  This will help to reduce any potential lines.  Prior to rolling the paint on the walls remove all painters tape.

When rolling on the paint be careful not to put on too much paint at once.  If you do put on too much paint it may “run” or show drips.  A key to having a professional painting finish is to back roll all of the walls.  This means that once you have completed the wall or area you are painting, go back to the beginning and re-roll the wall without any new paint on your roller.  Be sure to have the part that connects the roller to your handle leading.  When you apply pressure with your roller, there will be more pressure on the side that is connected to the handle.  If the high pressure portion of the roller is trailing you may leave streaks.

Do Not Forget the Trim

Once you are done painting the walls and removing the tape it is time to paint the trims, and doors. This is the job that really counts – a quality paint job shows up the most on how well (or straight) you can paint the lines between the trims and the walls.

All done!  Time to step back and enjoy your handy work!

 

Painting Your Interior Walls Successfully

When working on the walls of your home you must decide between two options for your walls. You can choose wallpaper or if you are willing to take on a slightly more difficult job, you can paint your walls. Using wallpaper

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