Maximize Your Home's Value

July 25, 2011 — -- Many projects can help improve the sale value of your home. These include replacing or shampooing carpets, Painting exteriors and interiors, landscaping, updating the kitchen and bathroom and repairing plumbing and wiring.

According to a recent survey by Homegain, the three top ways to improve your home's value based on average price and Return on Investment are (1 being the best):

1. Cleaning and De-cluttering

This includes your basic organizational tasks like washing exteriors, cleaning interiors, removing clutter and piles from all surfaces and cleaning mirrors and glass. Basically, you want your home to not look too lived in when showing it. This can be a cheap project and also can be very effective.

2. Lightening and Brightening

You want natural light in your home. So, remove old curtains or buy new ones. Also, make sure your artificial light is working and appropriate for your space and make sure all windows can open easily and are also very clean.

3. Staging

Staging is basically adding little things to your home to improve its appearance. Try adding new flowers outside, rearranging furniture to create the best aesthetic, adding artwork or other props to optimize the room's appeal, or even playing calm music while showing homes can improve the value of the home.

Tell us what projects have worked to increase the value of your home at Ally Straight Talk Blog

SOURCE: http://blog.homegain.com/homegain/homegain-2011-home-improvement-national-survey-results/