When you’ve outgrown your living space or feel like your home isn’t meeting your requirements, choosing whether to move or remodel is a big decision.
There are many compelling reasons to look at opportunities to upgrade your property, expand the number of bedrooms, or go for a loft conversion or extension, particularly if you love where you live.
Let us explain the benefits of home improvements and provide some suggestions from decades of successful renovation projects to solve your property dilemmas. If you’d like tailored advice about the options available within your home, please give us a call, and we’ll be happy to make some recommendations.
Reconfiguring Your Home Rather Than Relocating
One of the most significant challenges, if you’re considering selling up, is that a lot rides on the property market, which is notoriously turbulent. Currently, we’re seeing volatile demand, with peaks in some areas and dips in others.
Selling while the market is flat will undoubtedly mean either:
- Accepting a lower offer than you’d like.
- The stress of waiting for months for a buyer.
- Breaking a property chain if you are unable to sell.
Another issue is around mortgage rates. Interest base rates are expected to rise steeply in 2022, which means that mortgages will become more expensive, in addition to the need to raise a large deposit, usually of at least 10% of the new property value.
Remortgaging to extend your current home loan or even short-term finance may be far cheaper than taking out a brand new mortgage on a different property. As lenders increase mortgage interest charges, it can also mean that homeowners cannot pass stricter affordability assessments to raise enough finance to purchase a larger home.
Costs aside, there are lots of other reasons to explore the renovation opportunities you have and rethink how you use your home to make it better fit your family.
The Best Home Improvement Projects for Investment Returns
Investing in home improvements does more than enhance your living standards – you can drive up the market value of your property if you later decide to move and retain a bricks and mortar asset that will likely grow in value in the meantime.
Some home investments deliver exceptionally high returns, depending on your region. A good example is off-road parking, which can cause no end of hassle for families in busy urban areas struggling to find parking spaces close by. Fitting a driveway or constructing a garage solves the problem while making your home appealing to prospective buyers in the future, and you don’t need to budget for the cost of moving.
While these are averages, the statistics below reflect how you can often double the value of your investment in a home improvement project:
| Home improvement | Average UK cost | Average return on investment |
| Extending into loft space | £21,000 – £44,000 | 170% |
| Adding a bedroom | £15,000 – £40,000 | 115% |
| Building a single story extension | £30,000 – £48,000 | 108% |
| Outdoor landscaping | £100 – £125 per m2 | 100% |
| Installing a new bathroom | £6,500 – £7,000 | 93.2% |
| Installing a new kitchen | £5,000 – £14,000 | 91% |
| Replacing entrance doors | £850 – £1,500 | 90.7% |
| Adding a deck, patio or porch | £15 – £80 per m2 | 90.3% |
| Converting a basement | £800 – £1,500 per m2 | 90.1% |
| Replacing windows | £500 – £3,200 per window | 89.6% |
In comparison, moving from a three-bedroom house to a four-bed to acquire an extra bedroom will typically cost an average of:
- £142,400 in the property value
- £1,700 in removal costs
- £11,300 in Stamp Duty
- £800 – £1,500 in legal fees
Unless there is a tangible benefit in selling your home and moving to a larger property, it is hugely more cost-effective to expand or reconfigure your existing home. Eco-friendly improvements, such as replacing an old boiler, will also mean that your utility bills drop and your home achieves a better energy efficiency rating if you choose to put the property on the market at a later date.
Benefits of a Home Improvement Project
There are countless ways to change your property, from a complete remodel, removing internal doors, repositioning walls and building extensions. If you have an existing space that isn’t used, for example, an empty attic or a redundant side return, this space is perfect for extending into.
An experienced contractor, such as Pinnacle Works, is helpful since we can recommend the best solutions based on your existing home and the key aims you have for your home improvement, for example:
- A rear single-storey extension doesn’t usually require planning permission. It could enable you to create a new living room, playroom, home office, sunroom, or increase the size of your ground floor.
- If that might eat into your outdoor garden space, a side return extension is often a great option for semi-detached or detached properties.
- Standalone home offices are ideal for professionals needing a dedicated working space but without the capacity to build extra rooms within their property layout. A separate office at the end of the garden can be fitted with complete plumbing and heating or used as a home gym or studio.
- If you want to improve natural light, you could contemplate replacing old windows with energy-efficient double or triple glazing, installing roof lights or a dormer window.
- Rooms that feel cold and draughty can be easily updated with a suspended ceiling.
Modern materials and efficient installations often mean your renovation or extension will be finished in a matter of weeks, creating a new way of living in your house with minimal disruption and heavily reduced costs.
Making your home a home and one that is suited to your tastes and preferences will ensure you feel truly comfortable in your property, with custom-designed spaces aligned with your family’s needs.
If you’d like more inspiration for ways to modernise your home, please get in touch with Pinnacle Works, and we’ll discuss some ideas to improve your living standards – and property value – for the long term.