[Kirk]

The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

[Todd H.]

"Kirk" writes:

The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

The smell and look of new carpet will definitely show your house
better and eliminate another reminder that folks aren't looking at a
new house.

As to whether you'll recoup it, if you find a local independent low
overhead carpet installer that works directly with a mill, you should
be able to do well with it with a higher sale price and shorter market
time. An installer like this can install great looking carpet for
less than Home Depot will even sell the raw carpet to ya! $20/sqyd
installed shouldn't be too difficult to get. If you have furniture to
get out of their way, might have to add a buck or so for that.

--
Todd H.
http://toddh.net/

[Kirk]

On Feb 16, 10:08 am, (Todd H.) wrote:
"Kirk" writes:
The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

The smell and look of new carpet will definitely show your house
better and eliminate another reminder that folks aren't looking at a
new house.

As to whether you'll recoup it, if you find a local independent low
overhead carpet installer that works directly with a mill, you should
be able to do well with it with a higher sale price and shorter market
time. An installer like this can install great looking carpet for
less than Home Depot will even sell the raw carpet to ya! $20/sqyd
installed shouldn't be too difficult to get. If you have furniture to
get out of their way, might have to add a buck or so for that.

--
Todd H. http://toddh.net/

Thanks for your help Todd! I'm new when it comes to this stuff. I'll
start checking around locally. Again, I appreciate the advice.

-Kirk

[John A. Weeks III]

In article .com,
"Kirk" wrote:

The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

In a slow housing market like we have now, the issue is not so
much recovering your money, but rather, making any kind of sale.
Anything you can do to make your house show will is critical.
You don't want to give someone an excuse to move on when there
are so many other houses on the market and so many of those are
cutting their prices trying to make any kind of sale.

-john-

--
================================================== ====================
John A. Weeks III 952-432-2708
Newave Communications http://www.johnweeks.com
================================================== ====================

[Tracey]

"John A. Weeks III" wrote in message
...
If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

It depends on the buyer. You could spend the money on new carpeting, and
have a buyer purchase the house who has no intention whatsoever of keeping
the carpeting...Some buyers plan to rip out carpeting and replace with
hardwood, so in that case it wouldn't matter.

When we were looking at houses, we totally ignored things like the colors of
walls and carpeting because we knew that we could easily replace carpets and
that we would definitely be painting the entire house asap no matter what
colors there were.

However some or probably MOST buyers can't seem to get past cosmetic things
like that when considering a home purchase (at least if any of the shows I
see on TV are representational).

[Sandra Loosemore]

"John A. Weeks III" writes:

In article .com,
"Kirk" wrote:

The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

In a slow housing market like we have now, the issue is not so
much recovering your money, but rather, making any kind of sale.
Anything you can do to make your house show will is critical.
You don't want to give someone an excuse to move on when there
are so many other houses on the market and so many of those are
cutting their prices trying to make any kind of sale.

OTOH, some buyers might not have any interest at all in new carpet, or
prefer to choose their own -- maybe they want something other than
neutral cream color, for instance. Or hardwoods. If it were me, I'd
just get it cleaned and tell potential buyers that replacing the
carpet before closing or giving them a cash credit at closing to do it
themselves is negotiable.

-Sandra the cynic

"Todd H." wrote in message ...
"Kirk" writes:

The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

The smell and look of new carpet will definitely show your house
better and eliminate another reminder that folks aren't looking at a
new house.

As to whether you'll recoup it, if you find a local independent low
overhead carpet installer that works directly with a mill, you should
be able to do well with it with a higher sale price and shorter market
time. An installer like this can install great looking carpet for
less than Home Depot will even sell the raw carpet to ya! $20/sqyd
installed shouldn't be too difficult to get. If you have furniture to
get out of their way, might have to add a buck or so for that.

What is under the carpet? If it is hardwood, and the finish isn't too
trashed out, just pulling the carpet out and doing a good wax job may be
plenty. (Carpet over hardwood is a sin, in my book.) When I was house
shopping, new carpet was like new front tires on a used car- what are they
covering up here?

aem sends....

aem sends...

[[email protected]]

On Feb 16, 3:36 pm, Sandra Loosemore wrote:
"John A. Weeks III" writes:





In article .com,
"Kirk" wrote:

The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

In a slow housing market like we have now, the issue is not so
much recovering your money, but rather, making any kind of sale.
Anything you can do to make your house show will is critical.
You don't want to give someone an excuse to move on when there
are so many other houses on the market and so many of those are
cutting their prices trying to make any kind of sale.

OTOH, some buyers might not have any interest at all in new carpet, or
prefer to choose their own -- maybe they want something other than
neutral cream color, for instance. Or hardwoods. If it were me, I'd
just get it cleaned and tell potential buyers that replacing the
carpet before closing or giving them a cash credit at closing to do it
themselves is negotiable.

-Sandra the cynic- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

It's probably worth replacing. There are definitely many buyers, like
me, that would prefer to get a few thousand off and get the kind of
carpet they want. But even they are very likely impacted by how the
house looks when they see it. I don't know if any study has ever
been done, but I wouldn't be surprised to find that even those that
think they are just discounting the house $3K for new carpet, may
actually be discounting it more than they realize. In other words,
they see your house with the old carpet and say, lets offer $300K,
minus $3K to cover new carpet, and make an offer of $297. However,
if they had seen the place with the new carpet, even if they wanted to
change it to a different color, they may have that much better overall
impression that they offer $305- $3K, or $302K, so you come out $5K
ahead.

If the carpet area is limited to couple of rooms, and you don't have
to necessarily do the whole house, that would make it a no brainer.

[Banty]

In article . com,
says...

On Feb 16, 3:36 pm, Sandra Loosemore wrote:
"John A. Weeks III" writes:





In article .com,
"Kirk" wrote:

The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

In a slow housing market like we have now, the issue is not so
much recovering your money, but rather, making any kind of sale.
Anything you can do to make your house show will is critical.
You don't want to give someone an excuse to move on when there
are so many other houses on the market and so many of those are
cutting their prices trying to make any kind of sale.

OTOH, some buyers might not have any interest at all in new carpet, or
prefer to choose their own -- maybe they want something other than
neutral cream color, for instance. Or hardwoods. If it were me, I'd
just get it cleaned and tell potential buyers that replacing the
carpet before closing or giving them a cash credit at closing to do it
themselves is negotiable.

-Sandra the cynic- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

It's probably worth replacing. There are definitely many buyers, like
me, that would prefer to get a few thousand off and get the kind of
carpet they want. But even they are very likely impacted by how the
house looks when they see it. I don't know if any study has ever
been done, but I wouldn't be surprised to find that even those that
think they are just discounting the house $3K for new carpet, may
actually be discounting it more than they realize. In other words,
they see your house with the old carpet and say, lets offer $300K,
minus $3K to cover new carpet, and make an offer of $297. However,
if they had seen the place with the new carpet, even if they wanted to
change it to a different color, they may have that much better overall
impression that they offer $305- $3K, or $302K, so you come out $5K
ahead.

If the carpet area is limited to couple of rooms, and you don't have
to necessarily do the whole house, that would make it a no brainer.

Depends on the market. In suburban Houston where my father sold houses, the
emphasis was on move-in ready, current, and neutral for all the cosmetics.
People generally lived in their homes for only a few years. Up here in upstate
New York, it's mostly locals buying intending to live longer times in the house,
and it makes less sense to fix it up as far as cosmetics. I bought my house in
a definite buyer's market - and it had old brown, animal-damaged carpet. But I
had seen few houses with new carpet, and when I did, it would be some cheeep
ivory colored stuff that would be hard to live with in a snowy climate with a
definite mud season. So replacing the carpet was pretty much a given anyway.

Banty

[[email protected]]

Just get it cleaned. If you have nice wood floors I'd reomve carpet
and fix the wood. The house I bought had carpet and the first thing
we did upon moving in was to remove it! Used caroet is kind of skanky
and new is not impressive enough for me to buy a home unless it is
EXACTLY the type/color/quality I would buy. Remember you cant fool
many buyers into thinking a used house is new. Most buyers are
looking at design /flow and style of a house. The family room was red
in the house I bought. May be trendy but is ugly as heck. It was
nothing a gallon of paint couldnt fix.
Dont try to be like the TV shows. I would stay clear of any of those
"flipped" houses as most work was shoddy and a quick coverup.


On Feb 16, 10:24 am, "Kirk" wrote:
The carpet in our current house is not great, but not horrible
either. It is a neutral cream color, but is worn with some
imperfections around vents, bannister, etc. We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell, but not great. If we plan on
selling withing 6-12 months and we replace the carpet soon, will we be
very likely to recoup that money in resale value?

[v]

On 16 Feb 2007 07:24:44 -0800, someone wrote:

.... We could have it cleaned
and it would look good enough to sell

To me, that says it all.

"Good enough to sell" is all you need.

If you replace it with cheap crap, you will not impress anyone.

If you replace it with good carpet, you won't recover the cost.

You could also give the Buyer an option; get a carpet replacement
priced. If they want it, either you can have it done and add it to
the price, or you add it to the price and then they hold it back in
escrow at the closing since you (intentionally) didn't do it and so
their bank holds back the approved figure so they can have it done.
Some low money down buyers will prefer this since they will be able to
finance it as part of the purchase price.

As Seller, I once did something like this with a roof. The existing
one didn't leak but it was old. The Buyer was worried about how soon
he would have to re-roof. We made a deal so he could finance it with
his purchase money mortgage. It was all worked out in advance. He
bought the house (for a higher price) on condition that the roof be
replaced, but it wasn't so at closing they held back the agreed price
of the roof (that had been added in to the purchae price). Then I was
out of there, and his bank released the extra money as soon as the
roof was done.



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