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Home remodeling tips
Pick renovations and improvements that pay off

Jay MacDonald

If your remote control is stuck on Home and Garden Television, if you recognize Bob Vila's voice sight unseen, and you're on a first-name basis with the clerks at Home Depot, chances are you've caught the home-improvement bug.

You're not alone. Today, Americans are sprucing up everything from Arizona tract homes and New England saltboxes to Florida condos. About half of you prefer the challenge and savings of doing it yourselves, while others prefer to watch as contractors give new life to old rooms.

But when it comes time to sell, will you recoup the cost of that new master suite, state-of-the-art kitchen or dormered attic loft? The time to find out is before you pull out the power saw or contract for a home makeover.

Should you stay or should you go
Both remodeling and relocating can be expensive. The difference, of course, is that the money spent on remodeling is reinvested into your house, and if you finance correctly, the interest on your payments can be tax deductible.
The American Homeowners Association estimates the total cost of moving to be at least 10 percent of your home's current value. In other words, if you can make things right with your home for less than 10 percent of what you could sell it for, it makes sense to stay put and fix it up.

If you have little choice but to move (to a new job, for example), rule of thumb suggests you put the money just as carefully into your new house, not your old.

Remodeling Tips that pay off

What can you expect to recoup for renovations to this old house?
According to the 2004 survey by Remodeling magazine that compares the cost of construction to likely return on investment (ROI) at resale, minor kitchen remodels rule, returning 92.9 percent of your investment, followed closely by new siding at 92.8 percent.
Here's what's hot in remodels, room by room:

"The younger buyers, especially the baby boomers, want a modern kitchen with the cooktop stove and nice cabinets, not to mention wine coolers and subzero refrigerators," says Mary Johnson, residential specialist with Premier Properties of Naples, Fla. "I think it does make a difference. Even if it's just a cooktop stove, they walk in and say, 'Oh, it's a remodeled kitchen!'"

Bathroom additions ranked high in the survey as well. A midrange addition (approximately $20,000) returned 86.4 percent; an upscale addition ($40,000-plus) fetched an 80.1-percent return. But finding space to add a bathroom can prove tricky; for best results, consider a contractor.

"You can't lose by adding a bath," says Johnson. "If you're remodeling, his and her dressing rooms, even his and her bathrooms, are big. Then the husband can shave and the wife can fix her hair without the shower steam. If money's tight, just replacing the water fixtures helps."

Getting it right
Try as they might, the hardware superstores have thus far failed to teach what architects and designers have to offer: taste. Your return on your remodel will likely depend as much on how well it fits the period and scale of your house as how much it adds to its functionality.

"Anything that is sensitive to the character of the house should have the same sense of proportion and materials," says Kay Miller Boehr, an interior design professor at Park University near Kansas City.

"If the house originally had molding, it should be there. If it didn't, it won't help to go out and do it at Home Depot."

Boehr says the things that most grate on her are faux replacement windows, kitchens where "miles and miles" of cabinetry have run amok, and rooms that "scream '70s or '80s."

Her advice: Refinish all hardwood floors, don't scrimp on the details that define the house's style, and hire a designer if you don't know a Cape Cod from an English Tudor.

"I believe in doing a house for yourself, not just for resale. But then I like those things that are consistent with the character of the house," she says. "Older houses where the owners have done a good job remodeling them sell quickly, even in neighborhoods where there's still a lot of rehab to be done."

Johnson agrees. "People can see past the decorating a lot of times, but if they see that a house hasn't been taken care of, they wonder what else is wrong that they can't see."