What was the best (and worst) improvements you made to your house?

DH and I are in the process of doing some work on our new house. I'm interested to hear what were the best (and worst) improvements you made to your house? For instance, what was really worth the time and money in terms of aesthetics or functionality, and what just wasn't worth it?

I'm thinking that one of the best things we'll be doing (but haven't started yet) is adding some landscaping. Our new backyard is like a field--no trees, flowers, shrubs at all in it. Additionally, our front walkway area looks a bit tired and could really use some flowers and landscaping. I'm going to be studying up on gardening, b/c I've never had the opportunity to garden before (we've always been in rentals with no yard).

Would love to hear your thoughts.

[MarissaNicole]

Our home had 25 year old carpet. Best thing we did was tear it up before we moved in and had new carpet and hard wood floors put in. Love, love, love them, makes the whole place seem new, clean and more like home!

[ladymoreta]

We haven't sold a house before, so I'm not sure how these will affect resale, but the things we've done that we appreciate the most are landscaping and custom master closet. The flowerbeds in the front yard were overgrown and had a bunch of random stuff in no particular design. We ripped them all out and started over, and (when I've weeded, which I really need to do right now) it looks fantastic from the road.

We have a friend who used to work for The Container Store, and she helped us design an Elfa master closet. It gave us so much more storage, and the wire stuff doesn't collect dust like the wooden shelves that were in there before.

I would love to replace our kitchen countertops, but I doubt we'll be able to afford that before we move again. We're definitely not in a granite countertop kind of neighborhood, but these scream 80's, so a newer design would be nice.

[SuzySunshine]

We will sale ours next year so we'll see about the value - but we had new windows put in, new carpet, all linoleum torn up and replaced with tile and we tore out the hideous purple vanity in the master bath and had it replaced with a beautiful one.

Would have loved to redo the kitchen but there really weren't many options with this layout and we decided it wasn't worth the money.

[McPants]

I put a rug in which really tied the room together.

[MrsK]

I replaced the 1974 harvest gold bathtub in my condo with a big white soaker tub. Huge improvement. And I'm all about hardwood floors. I hate hate hate wall-to-wall carpeting.

[Deebs]

It surprises me how much little improvements can make a big difference. In our residency house, we added $300 worth of landscaping (it was all grass before) and it made a huge difference. It also really taught me how to start from scratch and make a big impact. In our last house, we had granite transformations come in and do new counter tops and a back splash, making a huge difference. In this house, I have a ten-page, five-year plan of improvements. We've already replaced all the doorknobs on the second floor (everything on the first floor had been changed to oil rubbed bronze, but the second floor was still brass), changed out most of the faucets, redone a guest bathroom including ripping out the oak vanity for a white one, repainting a guest room, and replacing the knobs and locks on the front and garage doors. We'll work on changing out flooring one room at a time, which will necessitate painting before the floors are replaced. I basically find one thing that is making me crazy and must be changed, which creates a snowball effect (for example, our master toilet is always clogged, so we are replacing it. Of course if DH takes out the old toilet, I have to paint while it's out. If I paint the bathroom, I'll have to paint the bedroom, then I'll have to replace that flooring - and so on). I have a love/hate relationship with home improvement. Have fun!

[DCJenn]

I had the master bathroom redone- after the bathrub leaked and ruined the cork floor. (who DOES that? Cork in the bathroom is the dumbest thing ever) It looks so much better and now has two sinks and a shower, too. I moved the pedestal sink that was in the bathroom to the other bathroom and had them take out the standard fake oak vanity that was 50 bucks at Home Depot and the gawd-awful mint green sink that I'm pretty sure came from the Habitat for Humanity ReStore down the street.

and of course painting.

the yard will look good once it's done, which will be never at this rate.

Jenn

[moonlight]

While my inlaws were here last April I had FIL replace the useless and ugly living room ceiling fan. I also had him put in fan where we didn't have any (master and the guest bedroom). The fans look good with the dark wood furniture we have. I love the way it turned out. The second thing we did was make use of a empty alcove space in the laundry room. FIL installed a outlet and we put a small deep freezer. I shop at Sam's and stockpile food when I drive to the Raleigh Trader Joe's. DH's grandfather came a few weeks ago and put in shelving above the deep freezer. It's such a small thing, but it really has made me happy. Next up is changing out the cheepo faucets in the bathrooms.

Wow, we have done so much to our house. I think all the tings we have done to the inside-updated floors,granite,hardwoods, and custom closets, were all good decisions. I think all the outside landscaping we did was a little overboard. We probably put in over $100K over the 9 years we were there, half of it easily in the landscaping. It's now on the market for less than we originally purchased. I can only hope it brings a quick sale at the price and we will just take a loss. If anyone is interested:


http://www.realtor.com/realestateand...701_1120356311

[diggitydot]

We've done a lot of work to our house. DH kind of always has this mental list of things he wants to change/move/fix/whatever so when he gets the time, he has something to do. The best project we've undertaken is installing a 6' privacy fence along the back property line of our backyard. A lot of prospective buyers passed over this house before we purchased it because it didn't have that fence. It cost us about $1300 and we should see most if not all of that back when we sell.

The worst project we've done (in terms of taking on more than we thought we were and it taking far longer to complete than we anticipated) was our downstairs bathroom remodel. Previous owners performed some ridiculous plumbing that needed to be ripped out and repaired. Ridiculous, as in they decided that using yarn to hold a pipe to the ceiling was a better choice than using appropriate fasteners. It's gorgeous and functional now, but it was a giant pain to get to that point.

[Meenah]

Worst: The $6000.00 we are paying to have our sidewalks repaired. On top of the $12,000 we pay in property taxes. This really bites.

[Phoebe]

In our old house we finished our basement, updated the kitchen by adding a tile back splash and new counter tops. We put built-ins in our office and replaced all the fixtures with brushed nickel. We also added some landscaping. Three years ago we moved to a brand new home. We have added a fireplace to our bedroom which we love and are in the process of doing some landscaping in our backyard.

[SoonerTexan]

Worst: The $6000.00 we are paying to have our sidewalks repaired. On top of the $12,000 we pay in property taxes. This really bites

Yet, if someone slips and falls in the winter, they sue you, not the city, correct? My mom got a little PO'ed at the city a few years ago when she found out that the city technically owns our sidewalk, but we have to repair it and take the liability for it. Obviously not too big of a winter risk in Texas, though!

Trisha--your home is gorgeous

[Vishenka69]

I put a rug in which really tied the room together.

LOL!

I love all the changes we made to the house because each of them made it fit our lifestyle more. I don't regret doing any of the renovations but the things that still bug me are too impractical to fix. If I had to pick top 3 - painting every single wall inside and out, putting in hardwood everywhere, doing granite countertops.