Adding a new roof, replacing windows, or pulling up carpet to install hardwood floors are all things you think about when considering adding value to your home.
We all know that a cosmetic rehab on the inside of the house can up your resale value, but how important is the outside of the property?
The team at Michigan Bulb surveyed over 1000 Americans on their landscaping and gardening practices and preferences to better understand how important the exterior of your home really is when it comes to value.
It turns out that the outside of a house was largely important for the majority of the surveyed respondents. Over 90% said landscaping plays a role in their decision to rent or buy a home. More explicitly, 57% of people wanted a large yard they could landscape. The most likely generation looking for a large yard were Millennials, while Baby Boomers wanted a smaller yard with less maintenance.
If the inside of a house wasn’t up to par, an alarming number of respondents would still consider purchasing the home anyway, so long as the yard was landscaped. In fact, 69% of Americans will still consider an outdated or rundown home if the yard is already landscaped.
If you found that number alarming, think again. A lawn is a special part of a home that often can’t be altered nearly as much as the inside of the property. While walls can be replaced and floors can be reinstalled, the perimeter of a property is rigid and fixed. This often means that potential homebuyers have to be satisfied with the property’s lawn from the start, because they can’t go back and change it.
There are also other reasons why more homebuyers are wanting a large, landscaped lawn despite the inside of the house being rundown. According to Michigan Bulb, “it’s possible that a year spent outdoors for safe social distancing and a change of scenery has impacted Americans’ thinking about what truly makes a dream home.”
This could be very well true. In fact, plant sales skyrocketed during the COVID-19 pandemic, and a large number of Americans participated in gardening activities while they were stuck at home.
Landscaping preferences change according to your age but, according to the survey, also between men and women. When asked if they preferred a landscaped yard with trees, shrubs, and perennials or a large, grassy lawn instead, the differing preferences were evident. Most men chose the grassy lawn (55%), while most women preferred the yard with trees, shrubs, and perennials (67%).
Despite the differing opinions on lawn sizes and landscaping, mostly all respondents agreed on one thing: Landscaping provides value to their house, and they’ve spent a lot of money throughout the years working on it. In fact, 97% of Americans say a landscaped yard adds value to a home, and more than 40% of Americans say they have added thousands of dollars to their home’s value through landscaping.
When it comes to the garden elements Americans most preferred, it came down to healthy plant life as well as colorful plant life for most respondents. Most agreed that patchy, dead grass and dying plants were the least attractive lawn elements overall.
So what does this mean for the everyday homeowner? Well, maintaining a landscaped yard isn’t just for looks. It can have a huge playoff for your home’s value in the long run, and the more you put into your lawn, the more you will get out of it.
You can check out the full survey here.
