Friday, June 7, 2013

Add uniqueness to your home

How to add uniqueness to your home

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by The Dawn Thomas Team on June 6, 2013

This week we have a great article by Tara Nelson of Trulia entitled, 6 Affordable Champagne Features for Your Beer Budget Home. While these tips are great for home owners or even new buyers, it’s a fantastic resource for Sellers! Are you thinking about selling your home but you would like it to stand out from the others? These are some great tips that not only will get Buyers talking but also will help them know that you care about your home, even better incentive. If you’re thinking about selling your home, contact The Dawn Thomas Team today!
1. Automation- ”For your home to automatically anticipate your preferences and living habits, and conduct itself accordingly, is a serious luxury that no longer requires a serious investment. Easily programmable thermostats and smart home systems are now available at very low prices. Check out the Nest “Learning” Thermostat for one of the most simple-to-use, inexpensive alternatives around. Created by the man who designed the iPod, it “learns” the temperatures you prefer without any complicated programming process, it can detect when no ones home and change the temperature accordingly and it is even remote controllable via wi-fi and mobile app.
In some areas, home cable companies are now bundling temperature automation and smart home features like remote-controlled lighting, temperatures and security systems and even smoke and carbon monoxide monitors right into the same online dashboard you use to pay your bill or order a movie on-demand.

2. Nature’s Niceties-
The range of cost for landscaping and creating what many now call outdoor rooms is vast. But there are also dozens of inexpensive projects that can level-up your own home’s nature factor:
  • installing raised vegetable beds in your backyard
  • hanging a vertical garden on your kitchen wall
  • putting in window boxes or outdoor seating
  • installing a bird bath or planting a new treeLush, green anything is a luxury that can cost very little to enjoy for years on end.
3. Delicious Details- Walk through your place and see where you can add, improve or tweak the details – consider projects like:
  • Adding crown moldings or baseboards
  • Adding interior or exterior shutters
  • Painting moldings, baseboards, mantles and door trims a contrasting color to the surrounding areas
  • Replacing doors and lighting fixtures
  • Replacing dated faucets, sinks, toilets and hardware – even recessed lighting soffits and door handles
  • Painting exterior eaves, doors, trims and fences.
4. Solar. A recent survey by Sunrun revealed that over 40% of Americans believe a solar system cost more than $20,000. And get this: eight out of 10 homeowners said they would install a solar system at home if cost wasn’t a factor. Solar is not for everyone, and not even for every home, but in states with sunny, hot summers and energy bills to boot, installing a solar system can create the double luxury of allowing you to run your home on renewable energy and reduce your energy costs in one fell swoop.Truth is, in some states, cost isn’t a factor.
There’s a new generation of companies – solar power service providers – who will pay for a solar system, install it on your home for little or nothing, and pay for its maintenance. In turn, you pay them for the power you use, at a rate that is generally lower than what you were paying the utility. These arrangements are not available everywhere, but if you’ve always thought you’d go solar if you could afford it, it’s certainly worth investigating whether you can find a solar service provider in your neck of the woods
5. Built-ins (or faux ones)- Built-ins like desks, book shelves, closet systems and even kitchen recycling centers feel particularly luxurious because they offer a polished approach to efficient use of the space you have, and often eliminate the need for bulky pieces of furniture.
6. Dedicated spaces- The idea here is to simply dedicate a space to an activity, painting it, installing the appropriate furniture and carving out a place for all the supplies that are involved in that activity.
At your house, this could include:
  • carving out a mudroom with storage racks for your family’s sports equipment
  • doubling-down on kitchen area entertaining by putting up a pot rack and adding extra seating and serving spaces
  • turning a corner of your great room into a screened meditation spot or homework area for the kids
  • creating a 2-, 3- or 4-person office space out of your dining room, so every member of the family has a place for all their study, work and bill-paying tasks.”
This blog is courtesy of The Dawn Thomas Team who is an award-winning Real Estate Agent team at Intero Real Estate Services in Los Altos 650-701-7822. We help nice people with selling and buying homes from Palo Alto to West San Jose!

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