4 Ways to Update Your Kitchen

It’s often said that the kitchen is the heart of the home. So in regards to your kitchen, you want to make sure it’s always beating with vibrancy and life, keeping you moving and inspiring you, your family and your guests to create great memories there.

There are lots of ways to update your kitchen, and your need will depend on the space itself, what you want for it and the budget you are working with. For some, a new paint job may be in store to liven up the space or create a certain feel you’ve been waiting for. For others, out of date appliances may be #1 on the list.

Read on for inspiration on how to update your kitchen.

Paint: You may not be overtly disappointed in the paint colors in your kitchen. But do they excite you? Do they give you a feeling of, “This is what my kitchen should feel like”? Is there a rhyme and reason to them, a palette that comes together to give a “soft” feel or an “elegant” feel or whatever it is you want your kitchen to feel for family, friends and guests?

If the answer to any of those questions is no, you may want to find yourself an interior paint consultant. Speaking with a paint color expert can help you put your thumb on something (paint color) that can be a very difficult thing to pin down. These folks have handled not only all kinds of kitchens, but all types of interior and exterior settings with the intent of helping to give them a purpose. Paint can really bring a room together — or not. What is your paint doing for you?

Flooring: This will depend in large part on the flooring in other rooms of the house — though it doesn’t necessarily have to. So this is to say that while you don’t need to have the same flooring you have in adjacent rooms, you do want to make sure you are at least complementing them somehow as you update your kitchen. Going from a marble foyer to a linoleum kitchen probably won’t make the most sense. A dark hardwood to a white marble can create a sense of class. Examine the rooms around the kitchen so everything flows nicely.

Countertop: Always a main focus of upgrading a kitchen, your choice of countertops has the ability to make an impression like few other choices you’ll make about your kitchen. Your countertops, along with your colors, will set the tone for your kitchen. Butcher block? Country feel. Granite? A smooth, updated feel. Quartz? A more elegant touch — but watch out for spills from the kids!

Furniture/Appliances: The appliances you choose are a big factor in deciding to upgrade your kitchen. On the other hand, though, they have a much less permanent feel than a countertop or floor or color palette that you’ve designed everything around. Lots of people prefer stainless steel across the board. That means stove/oven, fridge/freezer, microwave. A set of really outdated appliances can make updating the rest of your kitchen seem fruitless — a few thorns among a set of roses, if you would. But they can be quite the investment, and if you’re selling your house, buyers typically understand purchasing new appliances can be part of the process — as long as the rest of the kitchen fits their taste.

You’re likely not going to be able to update everything in your kitchen at once. But knowing what to update and how it works into the larger picture of your vision for your home — or knowing how to market it for a sale — is important to creating the best value.

3 Ways to Make More Curb Appeal

If you’re getting ready to put your house on the market, one question most real estate agents are bound to ask is, “How can we make more curb appeal here?” There are lots of ways to do it, and a lot of times the answer will depend on what your home needs the most rather than a catch-all answer for every home on the market. In addition, budget will obviously play a role as well.

Adding curb appeal can run from adding a fresh coat of paint to planting sod to adding a few new bushes and more. Read on for a few ways you can add some curb appeal to your home.

Fresh Paint: When you pull up to a house, few things say “dream home” more than a fresh coat of paint. If you’re looking to sell, you don’t have to stick with the same outside paint colors you’ve had on the house for years. And if you’re not sure where to start, it’s never a bad idea to contact a paint color expert.

Fresh paint, no matter the color, always improves curb appeal. It shows a place is well kept and that whoever lives there respects their home well enough to invest in one of the biggest things they possibly could — the exterior color of their home. And the right paint colors for your home are ones that tell a story, and put you in exactly the right place. They don’t just look good. They make a place feel like home.

Landscape Design: Landscape design comes in all different shapes and sizes. It can mean a row of bulbs next to your walkway. It can mean a row of arborvitaes along the side of your yard. It can mean a fish pond next to your back patio. Or it could mean a whole new yard full of sod (hopefully your yard isn’t that big if that’s the need).

What landscape design offers in the curb appeal department is two main things. First, for potential homebuyers, it means being able to move in to a brand new yard without having to think about what they need to do with a space. If your back yard or front flowering is lacking, that might seem obvious upon pulling up. Rather than having to think about what should go where (and who should do it), that’s already done — a value add. The second thing landscape design offers is an extremely obvious and customizable “pop” when approaching the home and taking a look at it from the outside. Depending on the size and layout of your property, you can scale your landscape work in all sorts of directions.

Smooth surface: One more thing that gives a property great curb appeal is working to literally smooth out any rough corners. What this means is giving your property a nice finishing touch by resurfacing the driveway, walkway leading up to the front door, or a patio. If a set of stairs are in disrepair, make sure they’re cleaned up and painted or stained appropriately to create a fresh and clean look.

Keep these tips in mind and before long, people will be pulling up to your home and seeing the curb appeal they want to see in their future home.