Craven Academy: Real Estate

So what should you do to make the house as valuable as possible? It is common knowledge that kitchens and baths are the primary selling points of almost any house, so you should start there. What you do should depend on the other houses in the neighborhood. The ideal situation is for your property to be a little nicer than the competition. What you do not want is for your house to be so good that you are not able to recover your costs. If other houses have cheap laminate cabinets then yours should be a nice oak or maple. If other houses have low-grade wood cabinets then yours should be a nicer grade. If the neighborhood standard seems to be low quality you do not need to blow your budget on high-end cherry cabinets.

Sometimes you can get away with painting the existing cabinets and upgrading the hardware. There is also the possibility of re-facing the old cabinets to make them look new. If the cabinets do not have handles or knobs, you may be able to achieve a much better look by adding them. Older hardware can be upgraded as well; a new set of handles can make an older set of cabinets appear fresh. Instead of automatically ripping everything out, look to see if the existing cabinets can be refreshed.