Whether you live in a more expensive or less expensive neighborhood, you can differentiate your home from others by incorporating nice finishes and design elements which give the home style and personality. Be creative with the space you have.
Finishes which add to the home’s value and personality include solid, high-quality windows and doors and higher ceilings, as well as interesting exterior details such as pergolas, awnings and landscaping. One of the hottest trends right now is the outdoor room. It’s generally a room that is open-air and substantially covered. Many people are using fire pits and water features to create a charming outdoor environment. What’s fueling the popularity of the outdoor room is that people are entertaining at home again.
Another tip: Create a great backyard space with a “pavilion”. How about a very modern structure for your backyard?
I came across this idea today when reading a post about the Pavilion by Richard Schultzon on EquityGreen blog, “Definitely cool looking…done right, you could even add a little value to the house.” Americans are spending more time outdoors, and it’s a trend reflected in our outdoor spaces. So leave the dinosaurs in storage and make that backyard the upscale, up-to-date, uptown gathering place it should be. It may mean a big raise in neighborhood social status and, if that doesn’t convince, a jolt in your home’s resale value. Easy to set up pavillions are available from high-end designers like Schultz, through his company. No pavillion? Let hedges, water features, or flowering vines climbing lattice define your space, and your furniture will do the rest. Then, when your indoor summer gathering gets too heated up, just tell your guests to take it outside.
Another key central home area for entertaining is the kitchen. Seeking to modernize and personalize their kitchens, homeowners are adding new flooring, solid surface countertops, cabinetry, appliances and center islands.
It doesn’t make any difference how large or small your kitchen is, people who come into your house will hang there. It’s so important that the kitchen be a warm, inviting place. Tip: The rule of thumb if you’re remodeling kitchen space is fifteen percent of the value of the home. That figure is approximately ten percent of the home’s value for master bath renovation, according to national guidelines.
When it comes to updating flooring the trend has been away from carpet. Most people are choosing hard wood flooring, tile and laminate. Laminate is like the third party because it’s durable and has the look and feel of wood but none of the maintenance problems.
With the change in the economy over the last few years and the appreciation of home values in the market, people are either trading up or remodeling their homes. People are upgrading their homes by about 25% more. When you look at the values of the homes, you can understand why they’re choosing to maximize their values.
Tip: When you’re redoing a home and putting money into flooring and furniture, use a neutral palate because if you get bored you can add splashes of color in other ways. Neutrals include greens and beiges and not only the walls but the main piece of furniture should also be neutral but very textured, and then you can easily change the look with new accents and accessories.
The trend in tile flooring is large tiles. People are under the impression that small tiles should be used in a small room; but less grout lines are easier to keep clean and the look is more spacious. Tip: The rule of thumb is a minimum of three tiles across an area should determine the size, and putting tiles on the diagonal visually expands the space.
Other tips include using paint colors ranging from deeper to lighter in the same spectrum such as cool colors (water colors or blues and greens) or warm colors (earth colors like reds, greens, tan and khakis) and de-cluttering before you show your home.
Tip: If you have collections, put them in one spot like a table, shelf or mantel, and use different frames for photos.
Tip: Warp Your Room
The wallpaper you see in the above picture is not an artist’s rendition of a hallucinogenic experience; it’s actual wallpaper from a German company called Surrealien. I read about these magic wallpapers on Inman’s blog yesterday in the following post and decided to add it as a tip for those who is looking for maximizing home’s value. So how it works. German custom-made warping wallpaper technology accounts for fixtures and frames in the room and then warps the wallpaper pattern around it. You need to send them a detailed technical plan of your room, including doorframes, hangings and outlets, and the company then sends you back specially designed wallpaper. The patterns wrap around objects in the room, giving your crib a unique look. How wicked is that? You decide.
