Landscaping Can Make or Break Curb Appeal for Homebuyers
By admin | June 10, 2008
Homebuyers love an inviting home even before they see the interior. Home sellers can take some easy steps to turn a drive by or Internet photo of their home into a showing appointment. Mark Nash author of 1001 Tips for Buying and Selling a Home offers easy tips for your readers and viewers to prepare their home for spring market.
-Purchase a seasonal wreath for your front door.
-Place a pair of planters that match the style of your home on the front porch. Fill with blooming flowers or loosen frozen soil with hot water and fill with evergreen boughs and red or yellow dogwood available at your florist or garden center. If you have window boxes duplicate flowers or evergreen look.
-Don’t put silk flowers or plants into any exterior landscape.
-Give buyers a glimpse of your summer gardens when selling a home in the winter. Display a collage of photos of your landscaping in spring, summer and fall.
-Clean up any tree branches, leaves, trash and pet droppings in front and rear yards.
-Position spotlights from home center stores at the base of ornamental trees to up light branches for a dramatic effect.
-Spread decorative bar mulch over flowerbeds and around tree bases for a manicured and professional look.
-Take down any leftover holiday decorations. Resist using clear Italian lights to accent trees or shrubs. Kitsch is out.
-Clear away snow and ice from sidewalks and driveways immediately, to illustrate pride of ownership.
-A fresh application of driveway sealer on asphalt can give it an update.
-Edge sidewalks and driveways, irrigate and mow lawns and prune shrubs and trees. Well-maintained homes attract buyers.
-Spread new decorative gravel to freshen up driveways. Bare spots and irregular levels can distract buyers from the overall look upon arrival.
-House numbers should be easily visible from the street. Make sure they’re lit at night.
-Limit yard ornaments to a favored few. Excess ornaments can make yards look busy and buyers might want them included in a purchase contract.
-Make sure your barbecue grill is clean and operational, especially if you plan to leave it.
-Clear gutters of debris and make sure there are no weeds growing in them. Look for clogged and dented downspouts. Place splash pads or gutter extensions to move rainwater away from the foundation, a typical home inspector complaint.
-All soil should be graded down hill away from foundations. Do it before an inspector red flags it.
-Trim trees and shrubs back around air-conditioning condensing units. Remove covers for home inspection testing.
-Take a good look from the street or road at the front of your home. Look for shrubs that are over grown or dead and remove and replace with shrubs that are to scale to your home. Small inexpensive bushes send the wrong message.
-Add annual flowers in home foundation beds. Select one or two colors to create visual uniformity. White and purple are a good choice to add color punch to a landscape.
-Paint and refresh yard lights, flagpoles, mailboxes, window boxes, fences and trellis. Don’t forget the swing set or play equipment.
-Have pool bottom painted and any deferred pool maintenance performed. Keep water crystal clear and inviting. Keep pool temperature on the warm side when buyers stoop to test the water.
-Lay sod or bare spot grass seed in lawn areas that need attention, near play equipment, dog runs and non-paved pathways. Unkempt lawns are the number one landscape turn-offs for buyers.
-Replace broken bricks on terraces, cracked concrete patios and steps. Eliminate trips and falls on property showings.
-Restore screens on porches and lanai’s. Dirty, rusty and ripped screens limit functionality to homebuyers.
-Have irrigation systems flushed and checked. Don’t overlook outside water spigots.
-Verify that drains in exterior basement stairwells and garages drain properly and are free of debris.
-Hire a landscape designer to make plan to perk up a tired landscape. Professionals can provide a fresh perspective that can appeal to buyers.
-Plant low maintenance plants and shrubs that are appropriate to your area.
-Educated plant lovers are on the rise and they know which plants are winter hardy. High maintenance plants such as roses can overwhelm first-time buyers.
Mark Nash’s fourth real estate book, “1001 Tips for Buying and Selling a Home” (2005), and working as a real estate broker in Chicago are the foundation for his consumer-centric real estate perspective which has been featured on ABC-TV, CBS The Early Show, Bloomberg TV, CNN-TV, Chicago Sun Times & Tribune, Fidelity Investor’s Weekly, Dow Jones Market Watch, MSNBC.com, The New York Times, Realty Times, Universal Press Syndicate and USA Today.
Tags: 1001, buying, Garden, Home, hoses, improvement, mark nash, real estate, realty, selling, tips, trendsTrees in the Home Landscape
By admin | June 9, 2008
Trees add so much to the home landscape! They provide shade, clean air, habitat for wildlife, value to your property, and even memories.
If your yard does not have any trees at the moment, you may want to consider planting some. Studies have shown that trees and landscaping add value to your property. Even if you do not intend to sell your property, trees can provide years of enjoyment. If you have trees in your yard, check to see that they are healthy. If they are near the end of their life expectancy or show signs of decline, you may want to plant new trees that will become established before the old trees are removed.
If properly located and planted, trees can help control energy costs. A large shade tree planted on the southwest side of the house can provide cooling shade in the summer, helping reduce air conditioning costs. Once the leaves drop in the fall, the winter sun is free to warm your house on cold winter days. Evergreen trees, planted to block cold winter winds, can help reduce winter heating costs.
Have you wondered what you could do to reduce greenhouse gases and address global warming? Planting trees will help! One of the greenhouse gases causing the most concern is carbon dioxide. Plants take this gas out of the air and use it in photosynthesis. Carbon is stored in the wood and living tissues of trees. When leaves fall and are composted, carbon is added to the soil. This improves the soil for plant growth and stores more of the carbon in the form of soil organic matter. Carbon can be stored for hundreds of years in the trunks of trees or in the form of lumber, furniture, and other wood products. By planting trees in your yard, you can help reduce greenhouse gases.
Trees also provide shelter and food for a variety of wildlife. While installing bird feeders will help attract birds to your yard, providing them with nearby trees and shrubs to escape danger, build nests, and obtain food, will be even more effective. Squirrels and other small mammals use trees for nesting sites and food sources. When selecting trees, consider what food value they may offer to the wildlife in your community.
Trees can offer years of enjoyment. Planting trees and watching them grow can be part of your family’s memories. Consider planting a tree to commemorate a milestone in your family’s life. While raking leaves may seem like a chore as you get older, jumping in piles of leaves can be a treat for children. Hanging a swing, building a tree house, or simply relaxing under the shade of a tree on a hot summer day can be a memorable experience.
Paul is Head of Training for a major UK Charitable Organisation with a wealth of experience in personal development, management development, e-learning and operational management. In addition he owns PK eBooks (http://www.pk-ebooks.co.uk) and has just published a Home Owners Guide to Landscaping eBook which can be found at http://www.pk-ebooks.co.uk/home_landscaping.htm
Tags: Garden, Home, improvement, landscaping, trees, value