Thoughts on spending money on landscaping properties (specifically SFH). Does anyone specifically budget for landscaping, or is it just an afterthought is you have a little bit of money left over?
Obviously a little dressing up of the exterior can go a long way in the general appearance of a house, but I think there’s a lot more priorities when rehabbing…What do you other rehabbers do? You could do it pretty cheap I would think, trim the bushes, throw down some mulch, etc…
I always landscape.If the outside is’nt clean/nice they’ll think the inside is’nt any different.It’s just as important as the exterior of the house.Most of the time I’ll do this myself and get a proffessional looking job for a fraction of the cost.But check around if you don’t have a day to spare,you should be able to get good prices since new construction has slowed.
I rehab for rental and don’t do a thing to it but everyone I know that rehabs for flips does some landscaping. The ones I know who are doing well do a nice job on the landscaping and everything inside keeping it within the realm of what is to be expected of the particular neighborhood.
Landscaping is so important to a good quality rehab, curb appeal presents the good quality and value a buyer expects and recieves by looking at, contracting and buying your property.
We generally put between ten and twenty percent of our rehab budget into landscaping.
A good combination of grass, hardscape with varying textures and contrasting color and a good variety of plants anchored by a couple of trees.
We plant young plants, saving money on more mature varieties but achieving a great look.
We install full irrigation systems to insure minimum maintence landscaping.
Low maintenace landscaping, but enough that makes it look pretty compared to the other homes in the neighborhood. Would you want to live there? is always a good question to ask yourself when looking at it.
Hooch hit it right. When rehabbing for a flip you should spend some money on the landscaping. But, keep in line with the neighborhood. Especially the front yard. We get pallets of sod for 100 bucks each that cover 450 s.f. and lay it. Also we go get mulch for the beds at a lsndscape supplyt and pay cheap prices like 17.00/yard which is a truck load. If you avoid Lowes and Home Depot also for plants you can do all this for relatively cheap and get a good product in the end. Check the landscape job we just did on my new blog post if you want to see how we do it. A totally rehabbed house with nothing done outside just doesnt make sense!