Much like how people grow out of jeans, homeowners grow out of their original homes. Maybe it doesn’t happen until 5, 10, or 15 years after purchase, but it happens. When homeowners are faced with adding an addition or selling, they reach this common dilemma: “add on, or move out?”.
Simply put, adding a home addition is always a better decision than moving and finding a new home to fit the desired needs. Here are 3 expert tips to consider when deciding if adding an addition or selling is right for you.
Moving into a new home requires an extraordinary level of planning:
You can probably see where we’re going with this. For just merely deciding that a new home is necessary requires a well-thought-out plan of how it solves the problem. Granted, every major life decision should be carefully thought out, but for this instance, it’s beneficial to see how these two decisions drastically differ.
Money aside, there is a lot of personal values that go into a home.
There’s the emotional attachment from starting a new chapter of life, not wanting to pull the kids from school and move them to a new district, or even not wanting to give up that enjoyable 20-minute commute to work. Moreover, maybe you’ve grown to know and love your backyard as a sanctuary of peace, that is before the kids wake up and turn it into the set of their newest fantasy.
These are all things that maybe weren’t previously thought of at the start of the process.
Whatever it may be, money is more than just the reason you decided to purchase the home in the first place. And while it may seem like a new house is the only option, some emotional values just can’t be replicated anywhere else.
Despite the intangibles, money is important. Selling a home involves all sorts of costs that could add up a rather large number by the time the process is finished. Moving costs, real estate fees, making improvements to your new home, making improvements to your old home so increase your probability of selling. These can be costly. It can even reach a point where the total cost associated with listing, selling, and buying a new home is more expensive than an entire home addition.
Whatever the reasoning, there needs to be some sort of introspection. Is a new house an absolute need, or is it more of a want? I.e., are you quite literally unable to move freely around your kitchen without knocking over random appliances and each other, or do you just feel that a bigger kitchen would be nice to have?
If there were only one thing to take away from this answer, it’s this: finding a home improvement company that works with you to satisfy every single want and need is key.
You may think there’s no possible way to satisfy your needs with home additions when it’s just that you haven’t found the right company yet. Do the planning to pinpoint every reason for the job and convey those reasons to your builder.
At the end of the day, we can’t decide for you; but we can hopefully make the decision-making process less stressful.
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