DIY home decor is a common project for many people to take on, either as a hobby or because they want to see something changed or fixed in their homes but don’t have the budget to hire someone.
If done correctly, a DIY project can look quite professional. Frequently, however, the lack of know-how can lead to damages to your property which, in time, will affect buyers’ perspective on it.
These are some of the most common mistakes we’ve seen sellers make over the years.
1. Using paint to fix everything
A fresh coat of paint can do wonders in terms of bringing a fresh feeling to your home. While it is definitely one of the most common and “easier” DIY projects, it also has the potential to greatly damage your home’s perceived value when done haphazardly.
Painting over cracks, gaps and chipped paint won’t fix them. They will show right through the new tones and make your painting job look lazy and amateur, defeating the purpose of impressing the potential buyers.
Properly preparing a surface for painting takes some time and knowledge, so getting it done by a professional will save you the money and the trouble of getting it redone when it’s time to sell your house.
2. Crown molding that defeats the purpose
When applied with skill, crown molding is one of the best ways to give your home an elegant look with relatively little effort and cost.
A poor job, however, will turn all the potential elegance into comical crudeness.
Buyers won’t think twice and will skip to the next house if they can see all the nails and cuts on your moldings. These minor details will definitely be noticed, and sloppy attention to them usually translates as sloppy care with the entire property in a buyer’s mind.
3. Partially renovating your kitchen cabinets
The kitchen is the heart of your home. Buyers will judge not only based on looks or functionality, but both. There’s no escaping both of them, since the kitchen not only drastically impacts daily life, but is also hard to renovate on the move.
So when you’re preparing your home for selling, it’s most important to get all the needed renovations in order before hitting the market.
It’s not uncommon for sellers to aimlessly paint over an old cabinet and change the hardware only to make it look presentable in the pictures. But this grave error might just cost you thousands of dollars when buyers make their offers.
Every crack and every sloppy hardware will be noticed once the visits begin, and you can expect the value of your home to decrease. There’s no getting around – if it’s old, it’s time to change.
4. Careless mortar job
There is no doubt that a cracked mortar joint is one of the fastest ways to scare off buyers – especially in places like the front door.
In a hurry to get it done, you might be tempted to run to the closest supply store and patch up the joint by yourself.
But doing it without carefully planning and removing the old mortar will damage your home’s aesthetic and leave a disappointing first impression on buyers.
By now, it is probably very clear that even if they’re intended to lower the costs for you, DIY projects can actually cost you a lot in terms of perceived value, offers and time spent in the market when you’re selling your property.
Hiring a professional Home Staging agency will help you not only save a lot of money on rework, but also increase your home’s value and selling prince. To get the most out of all the years and money you invest in your home, get in touch with us!
Tricks For a Luxurious Living Room
Decorating a living room can be tricky. As one of the most used and public rooms in your home, it has to be properly planned to stick out and compliment the rest of the house.
Here are a few tricks that will help you turn your home into something straight out of a designer’s catalog.
1. Keep it Neutral, Keep it Flexible
Let’s start with paint colors, since that’s usually where most people start when redoing a space or freshening up their home. If you stick with a neutral color palette, you will end up with a more high-end luxurious looking space.
It also gives you flexibility to add in different colors and textures with rugs, furniture, and decor. Warm white paint is great for giving a cozy and luxurious look to your walls. You can accent it with a crisp white for all of your trim doors and molding.
White paint is absolutely timeless and will brighten up your home and make it look new and fresh, as well as a lot bigger!
2. Styling Over Price
When thinking about luxury, most people’s minds will go to expensive items. Even though quality materials make a huge difference, a price tag alone isn’t enough to build an elegant living room.
Placement and styling should always come before price. A good trick is to stick with the rule of three: use items of different sizes, shape, color, and texture together in groups of three. That’s a key rule in home staging which can also help you design your inner space.
That will give you dynamic angles and layers and create an easy styled space. For example, if you have a vase with stems going really high, have something flowing lower and then throw in a decor piece that’s in between. This helps you get that designer look no matter what you’re using to decorate.
3. Get Creative With the Furniture
There’s some subtle but tangible elegance about a well put together space. It might be instinctive to push your couch and the rest of the furniture against the walls to utilize all of the available space, but it isn’t always the best choice.
You should always aim to make your space organized in a way to facilitate conversation and create focal points to really build an experience inside of your living room.
Be creative with your furniture layout – afterall, it’s something that can always be changed up and moved around in your home.
Remember: it’s not always about buying the most expensive furniture, but how you integrate, style and set them up in the space.
4. Lamps, Lamps, Lamps
We’ve already talked around here how lighting and layers of light can make a huge difference when styling your home. Setting lamps with different heights in different places around the living room will help you achieve this.
Having only ceiling lights (especially cold and white lamps) can make your home feel stark and cold as it gets darker outside. Also, a single light source won’t let you accent different aspects of the room.
Again, prices are not as important as styling. You can stay well within your budget by using simple but quality lamps and dividing them around the room in order to get every level well lit.