When an owner is considering a house renovation Houston there are 5 important impactful matters that support and justify their investment.
These factors help us understand our justifications that motivate us for undertaking a major house renovation Houston.
These major factors should be considered independently as well as collectively. The house renovation Houston decision is a complicated process with many moving parts and scenarios.
It begins with asking yourself some basic questions like; Should you stay in your existing home and renovate or should you buy a new home or better yet, build a custom home?
These are indeed difficult questions that consider some serious deliberation. Let us discuss some of the relevant and most important factors in evaluating your options that often lead to choosing buying a new family home or a house renovation Houston for your specific needs.
Learn about the important factors that affect your decision regarding a house renovation in Houston
These 5 important factors for weighing your options;
- Your Current Neighborhood
- New House Prices
- Cost of Home Renovation
- Home Size Matters
- Economic Advantages of Buying or Home Renovating
Your Current Neighborhood
The importance of your existing neighborhood could be one of the most motivating factors in your housing matrix decision.
They influence our local school decisions, our location to work and even our favorite restaurants and shopping locations.
We also get attached to our neighbors’ developing friendships with them and playmates for the children.
Many times, your current neighborhood is so influential in making your decision that people will remain in their current house and seek a renovation solution to meet their future needs.
Such as expanding the envelope of the house to accommodate a growing family or reinventing the existing space as an empty nester.
Neighborhoods are also critical to the economic factors of decision making, which we will discuss later.
Many of the finer neighborhoods in Houston Texas are centrally located in the metro area. They have homes that commonly date 40 to 70 years old.
They are typically properties that rapidly increase in value over time and if not updated every 20 years become candidates for building sites for new replacement homes.
Many of these neighborhoods are in transition with a variety of newer 2 or 3 story homes dwarfing the mid century 1 story ranches.
This usually suggest that the land value is greater than the improvement values for the older homes.
These inner city finer neighborhoods commonly present a variety of purchasing options for families of all kinds.
From whole house renovations to tear downs for future homes and everything in between. Homebuyers seeking these neighborhoods have many important decisions to make.
One remaining option is always available and that is razing the existing house and clearing the property to build a new house. More on this option under cost of new house prices.
New House Prices
Newly built homes represent about 10% of the available single family housing industry in Houston at any time.
Although the percentage of newly constructed homes in these finer neighborhoods is far less than 10%.
Many owners’ reason that if they are going to buy a newly constructed house, they will buy a lot and design & build their own home.
This process takes time, patience and money and is not for the meek at heart. Process time from locating a lot through construction completion can easily be more than 2 years.
Building a new luxury “one of a kind” home can be a rewarding and often a thrilling adventure, but finding such a house that meets your lifestyle specifications for your and price range is no easy task.
Home builders will often buy older dilapidated homes for the sole purpose of developing a home site.
Once the property has been cleared the builder will market the property as a future house site to buyers with the understanding that the selling builder will sell you the lot and will also build the house of your choice.
This can be an issue for families that don’t make a personal connection with the property site’s builder.
Newly built luxury home prices typically range from $800,000 – $8,000,000. New house lot prices commonly range from $500,000 to $2,000,000, while existing house price range $800,000 and up.
As you can see there is a very wide range of pricing options available for families to evaluate for selecting a house to meet their budget.
Cost of Home Renovation
Home renovation Houston is an expensive proposition but is cheaper than building a new custom house in the Houston metro area.
The final renovation cost will be determined by the complete scope of work and the products that the owner select.
Depending on the areas of the house you are renovating will also impact the total cost of the home renovation.
A family can personalize their home renovation to reflect their lifestyle and create greater future home value for the coming years.
As is widely known not every dollar translates into a dollar of value in the short term, but the fact is that an updated house will bring a greater value in the future than a house that has not been improved.
The real value in home renovation is that you have all the control of the entire process of design and construction.
Substantial renovations that effect your daily lifestyle can take place without your family’s discomfort, such as removing walls to enlarge an area or replacement of flooring materials prior to the furniture placement.
Major inconveniences such as water interruption from bathroom or kitchen renovations or dust generating activities such as demolition and sanding of sheetrock can be completely avoided.
Even greater benefit lies ahead for you as you watch the home renovation Houston materialize into a dream home you always wanted.
This is not only gratifying but also produces enormous pride you and your family will feel when you have those family gatherings and entertain your friends.
There is great satisfaction in witnessing your visualization materialize.
Home Size Matters
The size of the existing house is an important factor in understanding both your personal renovating needs and the financial sense of expanding the homes envelope in a specific neighborhood.
If it can be avoided you do not want to expand a house that will be the largest house in the immediate area.
This is for several reasons; First, there is a price value relationship that appraisers and the market use to value property.
Larger homes tend to suffer at the expense of smaller house neighborhood pricing values.
The larger houses are the price leaders for the area’s values, but their value growth is often restricted by the dollar per sq ft factors of the average neighborhood prices.
Secondly, smaller homes have greater potential in value appreciation due principally to the fact that you can typically increase the size through an addition, provided the homeowners association will allow it.
One story home provides special options of adding a second story or converting attached garages into living space and building a detached garage, if the lot boundaries and setbacks allow for it.
Smaller one story homes usually sell for a higher price per sf ft than two story homes due to the inherent construction cost.
Economic Advantages of Buying or Home Renovating
The economic value of remodeling is well published. Most experts agree that if your area is experiencing annual price appreciation of above >4%, that for most home improvement investments, you will earn your renovation investment back in as little as 2 to 3 years.
What they don’t say is that in locations such as Houston’s finest metro neighborhoods, time has a compounding effect on values over the long run.
As construction cost and land values continue to climb, the value of your house renovation Houston investment dollars climbs as well.
This is the future value of money principle that comes into play. So as a proud owner of a newly remodeled home is not enough, you enjoy the steady financial growth of your investment dollars.
Even during the 2009 financial crisis, these neighborhoods held their values while the outlying areas dropped as much as 40% in Houston.
This brings to mind another important point, that if your family is forced to move due to a career opportunity of other compelling factors, the homes resale value will likely provide a higher sales price and shorter sales cycle if you have followed this advice.
Renovating a recently purchased house is a fantastic alternative for consideration of your future housing needs.
It is prudent and wise before emerging yourself in this kind of endeavor to consult a knowledgeable and trusted general contractor that has experience as a home renovation contractor.
A quality minded general contractor will more than pay for himself in cost savings and construction efficiencies introduced to your project.
Conclusion
Identifying and understanding these important five factors weighing your options to move forward with a house renovation Houston a much clearer decision.
They also will provide you the confidence that you have made the right decision without second guessing your decision in the future.
If you’re going to invest a large sum of money in your home, you most certainly want piece of mind that you have done your homework.
