I don’t see many question here about the design element of our business. So here’s one…
We purchased a 50’s style, square, small, brick home with NO features. I mean other than the concrete steps and the windows, there is nothing. It is single story and just looks…squat. We plan on slating the porch and steps and white wood railings. That is a start but need to add some depth to the look. Any suggestion?
Howdy Big River:
A beautiful stained wood front door will always help. I have found them at second hand stores cheap enough. Shutters with color will help too. One idea from a friend is to add a small gable end over the front porch or door area to give it some height especially if you are re-roofing anyway. Landscaping with curves and circles helps too.
If you have the room and are able to do it, I recommend a wrap around proch with your 1x4’s as your flooring (on top of a foundation of course) on a 45 degree angle, when finished it looks really nice.
John
The problem is that it is a neighborhood where every house is the same and creates a cap on what your asking price. EVERY house in the area go for 85-100k, even if it had a gold toilet. I love the idea of a wrap around porch but would like to do it in an area that will allow a much higher asking price. I talked to one of my artistic friends (he’s straight) and he recomended landscaping between the house and the street. That would give a certin “depth” to the front. This, inaddition to flower boxes and the upgraded porch should do the trick. I also want to do the shutters like Tedjr recomended. We should pull in about 15k after all is said and done. Not a bad flip for a first timmer.
For any new guys reading this…a little advice… Do a VERY good walk around the property before you go any further. In the last 2 weeks we have ran across 2 other properties that we thought had good potential. We got into the repair estamate before we noticed major problems. A rotten roof and separated sill plate in the basement (water damage). It was all stuff you can easily miss. I just thought I’d mention it because we got pretty excited and were about to make an offer. That could have been bad. :
We now use a check list.