See Green and Boost Your Home’s Value with Landscaping

By Ryan Dosen

 

The commonly held belief is that good landscaping can increase the value of your home by up to 15 percent. That’s no small chunk of change. TREND, our local MLS provider, reports that the year-to-date median sales price for a Chester County home in 2014 has been $320,000. 15 percent of $320,000 is $48,000.

So, how exactly is cutting your grass, pruning your hedges, and planting a few pretty flowers going to increase the value of your home by $48,000? The short answer is that it won’t. There’s much more to landscaping than trimming your trees and planting a ficus….

 

Landscaping Study and Survey Results

This week the website for the National Association of Realtors featured a Virginia Tech Department of Horticulture study by researcher Alex X. Niemiera about the benefits of quality landscaping. The study found that improving a home’s landscape from “average” to “excellent” can raise the home’s overall value by 10 to 12 percent. The study reported that consumers’ “preferred landscape included a sophisticated design with large deciduous, evergreen, and annual color plants and a colored hardscape.” Hardscape refers to the inanimate elements of landscaping, including masonry work, woodwork, patios, paths, decks, fountains, etc.

The Virginia Tech survey results “showed that relatively large landscape expenditures significantly increase perceived home value and will result in a higher selling price than homes with a minimal landscape.” The survey also revealed that “design sophistication and plant size were the landscape factors that most affected value.” Therefore, the study concluded that “investing in the services of a landscape design professional will optimize the value of a home.”

This is not a surprising conclusion coming from a school’s horticulture department, which has a vested interest in promoting the future profession of its students. That said, I think most of us would agree with the study’s finding that “the resulting increase in ‘curb appeal’ of [an excellently landscaped] property may also help differentiate a home” from similarly-styled homes, providing an “especially important” advantage in a competitive housing market.

 

Appraiser’s Insight on Landscaping

Richard Borges, II, President of The Appraisal Institute, America’s largest professional association of real estate appraisers, recently said that homeowners should trim growth regularly, replant every 5 to 10 years, and not “overwhelm” a house. Borges further advised homeowners to keep landscaping maintenance and improvements on par with neighborhood norms. Borges specifically stressed the fact that curb appeal is essential when selling a home and that landscaping is a key to making a great first impression.

Again, no startling revelations here, but appraisers are one of the keys to completing a transaction. If a home isn’t valued highly enough by an appraiser, financing could fall through and your deal could be dead. It is certainly worth noting that appraisers, who generally focus their home pricing work on a home’s raw specifications and comparable homes, still stress the value of landscaping.

 

Landscaping Pitfalls

Home improvement expert Bob Vila says on his website that landscape design can actually add up to 20 percent of value to your home. Vila, however, cautions that “perhaps the biggest mistake homeowners make is a piecemeal approach to landscaping. Homeowners begin projects, start to clear areas, put in a mix of plants, and proceed without a plan. The result is a hodgepodge of plantings and gardens that give the property a disorganized feel.” Vila recommends avoiding this pitfall by hiring a professional landscape designer to properly plan and budget your project.

 

Landscaping Can Be the Difference Maker

With inventories advancing past last year’s highs, we are seeing a buyers’ market and sellers having to compete in most areas of Chester County. Especially if you’re planning on putting your home on the market soon, think about addressing your home’s landscaping so that you can have every advantage when it comes time to sell. Top-notch landscapes usually result in higher sales prices and can be the difference between homes selling or sitting.

 

— Ryan Dosen manages The Wayne Megill Real Estate Team of Keller Williams Brandywine Valley in West Chester. Contact Ryan Dosen for buyer or seller representation or for more perspective on the local and national real estate market by emailing rdosen@megillhomes.com or calling 610-399-0338. Please also visit The Wayne Megill Team blog at www.PAHomesAndRealEstate.com.

 

This article was published by 21st Century Media and the Daily Local News (West Chester, PA). To read this article on the the newspaper’s site, please visit the Daily Local News.

 

 

To view all of Ryan Dosen’s 21st Century Media real estate columns, visit http://www.dailylocal.com/search?text=dosen.