All home sellers are concerned with justifying spending money on home improvements when they are just about to move. Some of my clients need a lot of convincing that you need to invest money to make money when it comes to maximising the return on your largest investment. So it is always a bonus when you can quantify the return on your home improvement investment.

I certainly measure all the results I get with my clients using “as is” appraisals before any renovation and home staging improvement begin. Then after the house is sold I compare the gain that has been made – usually in the tens of thousands!

I recently came across a survey that had been done by HomeGain.com that measures the average cost of a range of home improvements done pre-sale, the average increase in sales and finally the average return on investment for that particular home improvement. The survey demonstrates that you don’t need to spend a large sum of money on improvements to get some really great returns.

HomeGain 2009 Top 11 DIY Home Improvements For Sellers (National)

The first step to successful Home Staging is to cultivate the right mindset. As a Home Seller, you are about to cash in on one your most valuable assets – your home, and it is imperative that you start thinking of your house as an investment your are selling, rather than your family home.

If someone asked you for $5000 and gave you back $50,000 in two months time, would you do it?? Your return on investment would be a whopping 1000%. Unbelievable you may say. Well we can guarantee you that is typical of the returns we achieve for our clients.

Case Study:

We recently worked with a client whose house was tenanted prior to going on the market. It was a very large 5 bedroom home located 7 km from the city in one of the best streets in the suburb.  Once the tenants moved out, it was obvious that there were a few minor repairs that needed to be addressed which required the services of a general handyman for about 3 days. He repaired some small cracks in a few walls and repainted those areas as well as doing a general yard tidy up.  Of course we never recommend showing an empty house so the whole property was staged with furniture and soft furnishings and hired pot plants to jazz up the outdoors.

Our client’s investment was $5000. The house was appraised by the agent prior to the makeover at $615,000.  During the 3 week marketing campaign prior to auction there were large amounts of people that viewed the property and one keen buyer put in an offer for $640,000.  By auction day there was definitely a buyer frenzy with over 30 people cramming the family room where the auction took place.

The house sold for $690,000!! – An increase from the appraised value of $75,000. That is a 1500% Return on Investment. What was also extraordinary was the auction clearance rate in May 2010 in Adelaide was very low at 40% and a lot of properties were failing to sell on Auction Day.  Naturally our client was absolutely delighted with the results.

So if you are thinking of selling your home I recommend you change your mindset and go for Gold! You deserve to make Top Dollar for your biggest investment.

See some of the photos of the property below