By most accounts, the housing market is bleak. Home sales were down more than 25% in July. Declarations are being made that we have witnessed the end of the era in which homeownership was a path to wealth, and also, perhaps more welcomed, the end of ever-bigger McMansions.
A new survey from real estate search site Trulia reveals that a surprisingly large percentage (27%) of renters do not want to own a home ever, and of the renters who are interested in homeownership, a whopping majority (68%) say it’ll be at least two years before they’ll even think about pulling the trigger and buying a house.
The fading interest or outright disinterest in buying real estate means bad things for the economy as a whole, but at the more personal level, it means really bad things for somebody trying to sell a house right now. And whether you’re trying to sell a property or not, it’s always a good time to add value to your home via some strategic, manageable DIY home improvement projects. Here are a bunch of suggestions, starting with …
Kiplinger’s 8 DIY Projects to Add Value to Your Home, all of which can be tackled in a day, two days max. What kind of projects are we talking about here? Adding a backsplash, installing crown molding, or replacing the front door, a win-win explained here:
As the first thing prospective buyers will see upon entering your home, a new front door will more than recoup your investment. Expect a fat 129% ROI on a steel door, according to Remodeling magazine’s 2009–10 “Cost vs. Value Report.” (Note that fiberglass models, which can cost three times as much, recoup only 65% of their cost.)
Bonus: Buy a qualifying energy-efficient door and reap a tax credit of 30% of your cost (up to a maximum of $1,500 in 2009 and 2010 combined).
A Simple Dollar post, meanwhile, suggests 22 projects to take on a few hours each night over the course of a week. Not all are strictly related to the home (one recommendation involves finding a bank with great terms and opening an account), and the home projects tend to be more appropriate to the owner who wants to lives affordably and comfortably in his house rather than unload it to the top bidder. But the suggestions can make your home and your life (and your home life) better in one way or another. Such as:
Clean out all of your closets, decide what you actually ought to keep, and sell the rest. If you’re like most of us, your closets are full of clothes and other items that you’ve stuck into storage with the good intention of using them at a later date, only to find that that later date will probably never come. Clean out those closets and sell off the stuff jammed in the back that you haven’t seen in years, because if you haven’t seen it in years, you probably don’t need it.
Good advice whether you want to sell your home or not—because stuffed closets and attics and other forms of clutter turn buyers off, or at least make them more likely to lower their offers.
Are you a Knee-jerk Outsourcer, scared to death of the letters D-I-Y strung together? There are plenty of free resources to help you along. A WalletPop post (highlighted in a previous tip round-up) lists 10 Options for Training and Advice on DIY home improvement projects, such as reading DIY online forums and blogs:
One of my favorites is DIYorNot which helps you decide, based on project difficulty and costs, whether or not to do it yourself. Following personal blogs of people with similar housing styles to your own is another great online source for advice, photos, and ideas.
Finally, because of the awful state of the housing market, it might be a better idea to take your house off the market and make due with your current home, perhaps with the addition of an addition or some in-depth home improvement renovation. Such a project will probably require a contractor, and helpfully, another Kiplinger story reveals What You Need to Know About Hiring a Contractor. Like that you must be precise in what you say, and especially with what goes into writing:
Don’t just say you want windows — specify that you require, say, Andersen Tilt-Wash Double-Hung windows — and eliminate any “or equal” clauses in boilerplate contracts. Such language gives contractors wiggle room to select materials you may not like. If the project is big, such as building an addition on to your home, get a lawyer to draft the contract.
Lawyers? Additions? Big money? On second thought, maybe it’s smarter to hunker down in your home as is, small and cramped as that may be. The McMansion era is over, remember.
Related:
‘How a DIY Home Improvement Project Almost Destroyed My Marriage’