When you are carrying out a renovation with the plan to rent your property out, you need to focus on what will best cater to the rental market and not to your personal taste. That way you will be assured of attracting a quality tenant and getting the best return out of the improvements you make. Here are my top 4 tips for renovating to suit the Perth rental market…
1. Choose Appropriate Floor Coverings
So often we get called into a renovated or new rental property and the owner has chosen a light coloured carpet and installed it in high traction areas. Experience has shown that even the better of tenants will find it difficult to keep this flooring choice at its best. To get the most life out of your flooring go with a hard flooring to the living area using tiles or a quality laminate, stay away from bamboo flooring and make sure you keep it neutral. For the bedrooms always use a darker, hard wearing carpet which will not show up stain and be easier to clean.
2. Renovate to an Even Standard
To maximise both your re-sale and rental value it is best to plan your renovation to raise the overall standard of the property so that no one area let’s it down. So instead of doing an amazing kitchen fit for Peppermint Grove and forgetting bathrooms, spread your renovation dollars out over the whole property. That way you are less likely to over capitalise and when it does come time to find a buyer or tenant, they will not heavily discount the price because there will be no major negatives on the property to point to.
3. Easy Care Outside
Make sure that you design the outside of your property to be as easy care as possible. Assume that your tenant will not remember to water and that they won’t look after your plants and lawn. Unless the property is a family home try to have as little lawn as possible, choose hardy plants suited to our climate and ensure that they are hooked up to a reticulation system with a timer.
The majority of prospective tenants will shy away from a rental with a big garden or lawn to take care of. If your property has a high maintenance outside, you are far better to include a lawn mower/gardener in the cost of the rent and know that it is taken care of.
4. Include Adequate Air Conditioning
In today’s rental market tenants will not take a property at almost any cost if it does not have air conditioning. Plus after they take the property if the air conditioning is not adequate in cooling the sleeping and living areas properly when the time comes it is likely they will not renew their lease. You will usually need a minimum of two split system units and if choosing ducted, make sure you go with reverse cycle. It may cost more than evaporative cooling but in our sticky heat evaporative is less than effective.
Specific renovation advice
If you are looking at doing a renovation to suit the rental market I am happy to give you my feedback on your specific property and the areas I think you should focus on.
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