Grand Designs: Improving Your Home’s Value with Luxury in Mind

Renovating your home is a major undertaking, and not one that should be taken lightly. With so many directions you could go in, you need to make some serious decisions before you start on the road to renovation – particularly if you’d like your changes to add tangible value to your property in a healthy market. One such direction is a road-less-travelled in today’s economy, but one which could be transformative: luxury.

Financial Considerations

Naturally, use of the word ‘luxury’ when describing home improvements and upgrades brings additional connotations, and specifically with regard to budget, finances and affordability. While luxury ‘feel’ is not necessarily dictated by expenditure, any home renovation will be somewhat costly – and more so for being grand in nature.

As such, you need to think carefully, not just about the kind of works you’d like to undertake but also about the size of your budget. What can you afford in the short term, and what are you comfortable investing in the pursuit of eventual returns? 

There are also many different ways to bankroll home renovations, which can make the process far more accessible depending on your situation. For instance, over-55s may be able to avail of a lifetime mortgage to re-invest their existing equity into renovation works – though this might not be especially viable if you are after a swift sale. Either way, you cannot properly define the limits of your expenditure until you identify which parts of the house you’d like to luxur-ify. 

The Kitchen

The kitchen is a strong and obvious candidate for luxury-aligned renovation, being at once a practical and social space; we either have to spend time in it to cook, clean and do our washing, or we choose to spend time in it for dinner, with or without company. The luxury treatment can make this space infinitely more enjoyable to exist within, let alone transformative to cook within. Even simple changes like swapping a tired composite worktop for a natural stone one can utterly elevate the space.

Conversion and Extension

The concept of luxury is inexorably tied to space when it comes to interior design. Larger spaces simply feel more opulent than smaller ones, which can feel cramped and messy even it stuffed with the trappings of wealth and comfort. As such, adding space to your home is arguably the most effective and tangible way to increase its luxury potential. 

An outward extension allows you to increase the floor space in an existing room, or even add an extra bathroom (an addition which would secretly be a luxury for many). Loft conversions are cheaper and can often come with less administrative hassle, but you are somewhat hamstrung by the existing bounds of your house.

Tech-Future Luxury

Finally, to luxuriate is to indulge – and indulgence at home means more than enjoying nice-looking things. Technology can be an indulgence, particularly where ‘work’ is removed from the simple act of being. Smart-home features like app-controlled thermostats and built-in voice assistants can be incredibly useful features to add to a house, and can bring value just on account of the luxury they imply.