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My wife and I have been living in the same house for the last 33 years in Dumfries, Va. It is 3000sq ft, on 1/3 acre. We bought it new in 1978. Colonial, finished basement, with full bath and bedroom, plus two other rooms in basement. 4 bedrooms on second floor. 40'x10' covered front porch. Pink cement driveway that looks like stone. I want to sell it in 3 years from now and retire. Bank says it is worth $350K. I want to spend the next 3 years having it fixed up. I am working at a demanding job full time, so I will be paying contractors to do some of the following:
--- Paint interior of house
--- replace about 1/2 of carpets with hardwood
--- Upgrade kitchen countertop to granit or quartz
--- Redo bathroom (Master bath has only one sink, but it needs 2)
- Declutter the house. (Since I have 2 PhDs and a Law degree, I have over 3000 books in 20 bookcases. My plan is to go through all the books and give away about 2/3 of them.
QUESTIONS:
1) Should I have 1 contractor do everything, or a series of different contractors for each type of work?
2) If I spend a max of 100K in improving house, will that increase the value to at least $450K so that I recover my money.
3) My furniture is distressed dark mahogony, bought when we moved into the house. Should I put all my furniture in storage, and rent more modern stuff.
4) Neither my wife or I have any design talent. We would love to have some help from some design expert (that does not cost us an arm and a leg.)

Norm,
Unless your furniture is in bad shape I don't think you should show an empty house. Declutter, definitely. Remove excess furniture yes, but don't have an empty house. The real estate board might be a good place to post your question as it really has more to do with real estate and the opinions of people involved in real estate. There are several agents that post over there.

No one here can say if you'll recover $100K in improvements. You'll need to talk with a real estate agent to know what the house is worth today on the market (not the bank or tax records) and what comparable homes are worth. If you're on the low end for comparable homes improving should help the resale value of your house. Painting the house is a good idea. Hardwoods are in vogue right now so replacing the carpet with hardwoods will probably pay off. But again, you need to talk with a real estate agent that knows your local market and comparable homes.

In addition to Sparky's response:
I think you need 4 separate contractors, unless you wish to pay extra for a general contractor to hire and oversee the others.

Painting over carpet that is to be replaced is a good idea. One painter I worked with in SoCA would cut the carpet back about a foot from the wall and then have a go at it. Then the flooring people can take over.

Kitchen remodel could be done before the painting or after; let the contractor decide. Same for the bath remodel. If the two remodellings are done after the new floor is in place, it will have to be protected.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: Bob Fleming,

ask friends check out local people and are you doing this to retire and sell the home and how long before you do that .Remember fresh paint and fresh new 2 years or 3 years later does not look fresh and new .Cleaning and declutter now and you may end up doing it again in 2 or 3 years it adds up fast . Best bet is to hire a home inspector also and make sure the bones of the house are up to date and working also .Before I sold my house I paid for a home inspection and a bank appraisal .1978 house make sure the wiring is not aluminum .You don't want surprises when you sell if that is what you are planning.Friends co-workers are your best resource and then before you hire any one check them out ,the BBB and your local building department will know if they are reputable and thrust worthy .

Excuse me for being blunt, but have you really thought this through?

First the value that your bank places on your house does not necessarily correlate to the market value of your house. Second, you are not adding square footage to your house but just making cosmetic changes which buyers may or may not like. To spend 1/3 of the value of something to sell it seems foolhardy.

The first thing that you need to do is talk to a couple of real estate agents and get their input on what does and does not need to be done. Then you can come here and we will be glad to answer your questions.

Norm,
On the painting repainting the exterior is a good idea. If you have paintable siding and windows a buyer coming into your house knowing that a exterior paint job is in their immediate future is going to be a big expense. Interior painting should be done closer to the sale and in generally neutral tones. If you have an "interesting" color palate that works with your furnishings you might want to go with something that will work with anyone's furnishings. For a buyer coming into a house with clean neutral walls they can ease into painting the rooms the color they want.

Otherwise, my advice earlier and metwo's advice about consulting a real estate agent stands. Personally unless your house is way at the bottom of the price range for houses of its size I would not put $100K in updates to it to prepare it for sale. I doubt you'd recover 50% of it.

Also, there are certain things that a buyer expects and probably won't pay extra for but may help make the sale. Buyers expect the furnace, water heater and AC to be in working order. They expect the electrical and plumbing systems to be working and safe. They expect the roof not to leak. Repairing/replacing these items are normal maintenance for a house. Knowing that the furnace was replace 2 years ago will give the buyer peace of mind that they won't need to replace it soon. A 10 year old water heater says, "you'll be replacing me within 6 months of ownership, most likely on Christmas day when you have a house full of people" :-D