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Little projects go a long way
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January 16, 2002: 11:07 a.m. ET
With a $5,000 budget and some elbow grease, you can improve your home.
By Annelena Lobb
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NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - The back-to-basics lifestyle embraced by many Americans following the Sept. 11 attacks has had an unexpected effect.
Experts say homeowners, who are spending more time around the house, are taking note of broken shutters and peeling paint -- home improvement jobs that went unnoticed during the bull market stampede.
"It seems that with mortgage rates down, many homeowners are refinancing and putting money back into their homes," says Vicki Bendure, public relations consultant to the Associated Landscape Contractors of America. "Since Sept. 11, many people seem to be forgoing lavish vacations and spending more time at home with their families."
Home improvement projects, of course, have been a phenomenon for years. How else to explain the mile-long lines at Home Depot?
But the trend has shifted gears amid a faltering U.S. economy. Whereas homeowners who were flush with capital during the 1990s tackled high-end renovations, they have now adopted a more conservative approach -- tackling low-cost projects they can start and finish on their own.
"One thing that we noticed is the amount people put into down-payments, which was about 20 percent during the stock-market boom, rose to 22 or 23 percent [when the economy declined]," says Lawrence Yun, a senior economist at the National Association of Realtors. "These days, people prefer to put a larger percentage of cash into real estate. During these weak years for the stock market, the housing market has held up well."
Indeed, do-it-yourself (DIY) home improvement jobs can yield a significant bang for your buck.
A 20-year-old well-maintained home, say about 1,500 square feet, could fetch $40,000 to $50,000 more when resold than the same home with no updates, says Nancy Knott, a real estate agent with ReMax of Rancho Bernardo in San Diego, Calif.
Pick your battles
But some DIY projects deliver higher return than others.
Says Gene Hamilton, co-author of Home Improvement for Dummies, "Home improvements in the kitchen and bathrooms typically give you the best returns on home value. You could do a superficial face-lift of the kitchen, for example, for less than $5,000, and it could offer great returns."
Professional kitchen renovations, by comparison, can cost anywhere from $15,000 to $100,000.
One project in particular that yields a healthy return on the resale market, and more importantly, that can be accomplished on your own for less than $5,000, is "refacing" your kitchen cabinets -- replacing the doors and hardware, rather than replacing the entire unit, said Roy Barnhart, a contributing editor for Handy magazine.
"When it comes to cabinets, a box is a box," he said. "If the design of your kitchen is sound, you can get a new kitchen look for a third of the cost of replacing it entirely."
Joan Eisenberg, a certified kitchen designer in Baltimore, MD, adds that refinishing your cabinets yields a similar result -- and doesn't require special tools.
"You'd have to be skilled, but it's very inexpensive," she says. "In fact, you'd need little more than some kind of paint or varnish stripper and either enamel paint or stain."
Refinishing cabinets requires removing the laminate, sanding and then applying the new stain or paint. Although the project is labor-intensive and takes several days, materials could cost less than $100.
One other low-cost option in the kitchen that yields a fresh, clean look is to replace old countertops with new ones. You may not be able to tackle the entire project yourself, Hamilton says, but you could certainly do the demolition work involved in removing the older countertops, and that could save you 10 to 15 percent on installation costs.
Corian countertops, a high-end product, cost about $120 per linear foot, Hamilton said, so a 10-foot counter might run about $1,200 for materials. "It might take a contractor 5 or 6 hours to rip out the old counter," Hamilton said. "You could save about $200 on labor if you were to do it yourself."
Formica counters, of course, can be had for a fraction of the cost.
Curb appeal
If your interest is purely resale value, don't forget that smaller projects are of great importance, as well, notes Knott. Newly painted shutters, for example, might not drastically increase the value of your home in and of itself, but buyers judge books by their covers -- a pretty face makes them more likely to bid up the price they're willing to pay.
"If the details are taken care of, a buyer will know that you've probably maintained your property in major areas as well," Knott said. "The buyer sees what they see, not what can be."
Improving curb appeal is as simple as planting flowers, fixing rusted faucets, repainting the garage door and ridding the house of dry rot on patio areas and windowsills. Even simple tasks like getting a new doormat and cleaning the porch light go a long way.
Basic landscaping -- including new flowers or a new lawn -- will cost about $3 a square foot, says Rob Littlepage, public relations chair for the Association of Professional Landscape Designers (APLD), including materials, irrigation and installation.
According to LandCareUSA, landscaping can add up to 14 percent resale value to your property and speed its sale by as much as 6 weeks. (In case you were wondering, keeping up with the Jones's does matter -- a house with poor landscaping in well-landscaped neighborhoods will fetch 8 to 10 percent less, according to Clemson University's Department of Agriculture and Applied Economics.)
Changing your bathroom
If you're not prepared to replace the tub and toilet fixtures in your bathroom, you can still make a big improvement by swapping older faucets for new ones, Hamilton said. New faucets are sold at hardware stores and start at less than $100.
A new medicine cabinet with more mirrors and lighting is also easily done and can lighten the entire look of a bathroom. Cabinets cost anywhere from $100 to $1,000, and the project won't take more than an afternoon.
Another way to modernize your bathroom without breaking the bank is to retile an area -- either the floor or wall. The tile itself could run from $3-4 per square foot to as high as $30 per square foot or more. You'd also need adhesive and grout, available at your local hardware store or Home Depot. A retiling project in a small bathroom would take a couple of days, and many of the skills required for such a task are taught in free courses at home improvement stores.
"It's not difficult, but you need to be precise and grout it well," Eisenberg said. "Retiling a small bathroom would be a two-day project, only because you'd do the setting of the tile one day, and the grouting the next."
Upgrade your patio
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A brick patio can enhance your property. | |
Another DIY project with a solid return on investment is installing a brick patio or walkway, says Ray Godleski, a spokesman for Boral Brick in Atlanta, GA. Unlike concrete, brick patios and walkways can be removed and replaced in sections if you need to install utilities in that area. They also create a "warmer" and more inviting look than concrete.
"When you're talking about a patio, it's usually 500 square feet or smaller. If you worked 2 to 3 hours a day, building it would take about a week," Godleski said. If you do it yourself, building the 500-sq. foot patio would cost $1,000 or less -- but hiring a mid-priced contractor to do it for you could run costs up to about $3,500, according to Godleski. 
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