How to Get a Return on Your Remodel

There are many benefits to remodeling your home. You can get that exterior look you have always wanted, increase comfort inside your home and improve your homes safety and health. Obviously there are downsides associated with remodeling. Remodeling requires a time investment for owners, headaches from managing contractors and, of course, the cost required to perform upgrades.

But what about the return on your remodeling investment? There certainly are opportunities to get a return on remodels. Returns can bring decreased utility bills, lower cost of repairing old equipment and utility rebate incentives. The biggest return homeowners can leverage is the increase in home value associated with remodels.

Hanley Wood, a construction research firm, publishes annual data on the average cost of a remodel vs the value that remodel adds to your home. For us in the greater Seattle area, the good news is that returns on our remodels are much higher than national averages! For example, replacing your old windows with new vinyl windows in the Seattle area should result in about 90.8% of the cost of the project going directly into the value of your home! The national average is 73.4%. To get the full findings visit https://www.remodeling.hw.net/cost-vs-value/2019/pacific/

If increasing your home value is important to you then focusing on exterior improvements is a wise choice such as a new front door, window and siding replacement. This improves the “curb appeal” of your home which, consequently, has a higher impact on the resale value. Compare that to something like crawlspace insulation which only an inspector and the pest control company might see.

Another great return for both the home value and your personal comfort is adding air conditioning to the home. According to the US 2017 Census Bureau’s American Housing Survey, Seattle is the least air conditioned metro market in America with only 18.8% of homes having the benefit of full home central AC! https://www.census.gov/programs-surveys/ahs.html. Your home will stand out when it comes time to sell because you will have the benefit of AC, which 4 out of 5 other homes will not.

The truth of the matter is remodeling can be challenging, stressful and time consuming. Doing the hard work so the next person does not have to can have great benefits for your personal home enjoyment and your pocketbook. At Washington Energy, we have been committed to being the contractor that makes the remodel process pain free and, dare I say, even enjoyable! This is why our craftsman installers are all in-house team members and we minimize sub-contractor work as much as possible to ensure we have total ownership of the remodel outcome.