Buying A Home
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Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Granite countertops .. are these necessary?
In watching HGTV I am noticing how many buyers have granite countertops on their wish list and many people turn away if the house doesn't have them. Are granite countertops really that important?
We are going to do a small kitchen remodel in the next month to add more cabinets, counter space and add a tile backsplash around the entire kitchen. In 06 we painted the cabinets white (nice cabinets with raised panel doors), added new hardware, crown molding to top of cabinets, new ceramic tile floor, new Wilsonart HD laminate countertops. It looks so much better than before.
We would like to sell our house within the next year so I'm wondering if the updates we have done so far and plan to do will be appealing to buyers? WDYT?
Re: Granite countertops .. are these necessary?
I always groan at that... there are plenty of homes being sold without granite counters and stainless steel appliances.
I would take a look at your neighbors' homes, and see what they have done. You don't want to have the "best" house on the block. On the other hand, you should do what you like--just realize that you probably won't recoup the expense of putting granite in. Almost no renovation will yield a 100% ROI.
Your renovation and plans for remodeling sound lovely, btw. Counter and cabinet space almost always trump materials. But definitely get a look at your neighbors' homes (or even a new home community in your area) and see what they are doing for an idea of what is usual in your area.
Also, keep in mind that those TV house hunting shows are staged. They have to pick a few they don't like, so they can have one they do like.
I'm an agent and if one of my buyers told me they were turning down an otherwise fantastic home because it didn't have granite countertops, I'd tell them how easy it is to get them put in! Real-life people don't walk away because there's no granite.
I'm with audra, the look was a factor but not the material. Our kitchen is beautiful, with stainless steel appliances and nice countertops but they are not granite. I feel like the amount of counter and cabinet space and the fact that we liked the look of it was way more important than the material.
At the time I thought that I would have preferred granite, but now I'm thinking that when we redo the kitchen in the future I'll stick with the type we have.
Life and Love at #16 | our married life blog
We weren't going to rule out any house based on countertops. Those are not that difficult to change, especially for us since my brother works at a company that does countertops so we could have replaced anything we didn't like at a pretty good discount.
We definitely preferred granite or quartz to laminate, but it wasn't going to be a deal breaker for us. Nor would appliances ... appliances are not that expensive (unless you get the super high end ones) in the scheme of things. I would rather have a house with the right amount of space, a good layout and a good location and put a few thousand dollars into kitchen upgrades than get a house with the kitchen upgrades already done but is lacking in size, layout or location.
I'm not sure if buyers in real life are as picky as those on House Hunters, and I know those shows are staged anyway, so perhaps those buyers don't care about granite counters as much as the editing of the show leads you to believe.
Mr. Sammy Dog
It's all about the price. As a current house hunter, granite does not make or break my decision to put in an offer. What does, (and I see this a lot around our area) is when sellers take an old, outdated kitchen and slaps in some granite counter tops. I HATE when they do this. Then these sellers think it's okay to put an over inflated price on their homes, and it's labeled as an "updated kitchen." I don't think so. These type of homes are sitting on the market for six plus months.
I would much rather an outdated kitchen I can gut out and make my own, that is priced right, rather than an old kitchen with granite.
BUT if I do a complete remodel, I will put in granite countertops.
I'm not a huge fan of granite counter tops, especially the thought that they are a 'must have'. But, that being said, they have become much more affordable. The cost has actually dipped below many other options. And, they are a quick and easy selling feature: 'updated kitchen with granite counters'.
Just my two cents worth
Lighthouse State Beach, Santa Cruz.
With all due respect, most people can't afford to pay $500k for a house. I don't think these people are that crazy. 150K is still a huge amount of money. I understand if you're in a HCOL area. BUT, there are a lot of small towns across the country, that if you're paying $150K for a house, you better be getting granite counter tops and an updated kitchen.
I agree with this. We are in a pretty low cost of living area, and the economy is still burning the housing market. If you are paying 200K or more, you would expect updates, especially kitchen and bath.
if you're in HCOL, you can't expect granite nor an updated kitchen will automatically be in a house going for 500k. quite a few houses i've seen just under that in my area have the original, 1950s kitchen cabinets (usually painted and in decent repair) and sometimes really old laminate, tile done 20-40 years ago, or something else that isn't granite. you also cannot buy a SFH for 150k around here. they don't exist.
so it depends on not only the price but your market.
We just looked at 20 houses in 2 weeks and while I preferred an updated kitchen, we ended up buying a home that we will do the kitchen upgrades ourselves. I am kind of excited to choose the granite myself!
So I would say you will definitely make your money back on your upgrades because not everyone wants to deal with putting in new counters and tile and new cabinets.
I love tile backsplash, fyi!
We used HD laminate in our kitchen when we remodeled it. It looks fantastic, and a lot of people walk in and say "Oh, I love the granite!" lol
FWIW, we had no mentions of it during the selling process.