Do you imagine your home or apartment would benefit from some alterations before you list it for sale? As you prepare for such a home renovation project, you may be about to launch yourself into uncharted waters. Perhaps you are an old hand at changing up the configuration of your home, but according to our friends in the business of styling properties, it often happens that the reno-brigade can be a bit on the inexperienced side.

Some homeowners understand their limitations and bring in experts at the beginning. Other, more adventurous types, prefer to fly by the seat of their pants, which creates a potentially expensive voyage that can be fraught with error. The sales person at your local purveyor of timber and home improvement supplies can tell nightmare tales of demolition, destruction, and expensive lessons learned by people who didn’t take the precautionary steps of consulting with experts ahead of time.

We intend here to supply a few tips and words of wisdom to preserve your cash and your casa from permanent damage. Don’t just take our word(s) for it, though. If you take nothing else away from today’s blog, please understand that every project is different and each can be potentially dangerous financially.

Plan carefully: Your first task is to imagine how you want your finished project to look and what new function it will serve. You need to have a clear idea of what you want in order to pull the whole project off. The old travel adage tells us that if you don’t know exactly where you’re going, you’re bound to miss the mark. Once you’re clear on your destination, you’ll need a navigator.

Plot a course: You will need to consult with a minimum of two types of experts before you begin. First of all, your real estate sales team includes the selling agent you’ve chosen as well as the home stylist who will put the finishing touches on your home before the property goes on the market. The second team is comprised of construction experts. These, at minimum, should be an architect and a builder.

Once your vision is complete and your teams are in place, you will need first to consult with your selling team to determine whether or not the project will add sufficiently to the value of your home to justify the expense. The selling team, most especially the professionals at styling properties, can also advise you whether or not the changes will make your home more marketable to a larger pool of prospective buyers.

Remember, the goal of this entire exercise is to sweeten the pot in terms of the ultimate sale. People who are in the home styling, or house staging, business make knowing who will buy your house part of their particular expertise. They study data that delineates characteristics of different niches within the larger real estate market, and can narrow the information down so closely that they can tell you just how much income your buyer will enjoy in a year’s time, as well as what colours they prefer in the kitchen and bathroom. This “inside information” makes it easier to style a home to meet the expectations of buyers and, ultimately, drive the sale.

Your construction team can let you know if the project you plan is, first, even possible given the local building codes and the nature of the existing structure. Removing walls, for example, can be lots of fun, but if the walls you take out are the ones that hold up your second storey, you are in for big trouble. They can also help you in the task of breaking the project into manageable parts that can be better articulated for the purposes of the quoting process, which we’ll discuss in another edition of this blog.

Styling properties for sale is all about planning and management. By knowing what you want from your renovation, ensuring that your vision is a profitable one, and following through with assurances that the project will be done within your budget, and then taking steps to manage the costs in real-time; your renovation plans may result in many thousands of dollars in unexpected profits. When you’re ready to take on this voyage into the deep blue sea of renovation possibilities, we would be delighted to become a part of your crew. Call Urban Chic Property Styling first.