12411 North Pennsylvania Street, Suite 300, Carmel, Indiana, 46032
Real Estate
Traci Garontakos REALTOR® | Neighbor | Listing Specialist
STONEGATE For the month of March 2019
317.741.0861
E: Traci.Garontakos@EncoreSIR.com W: www.LiveInStonegate.com
IN THIS REPORT: Featured Listings | Smart Home Upgrades | Market Report Update
SIX SMART HOME UPGRADES TO HELP SELL YOUR HOUSE Johnathan and Angela-Marie, The stock advice for homeowners putting a house on the market used to go something like this: Give the exterior, or the front door, a fresh coat of paint, tame unruly shrubs, and swap out a few light fixtures. Today’s home buyers expect a little more. According to Consumer Reports, smart home features can boost your home’s resale value by up to 5%. Research also shows that home appraisers are beginning to factor in the value of tech features. Most potential home buyers want smart home tech included in the deal. The level of interest varies by the type of device. The good news for sellers? You can handle many of these upgrades yourself over the course of a weekend without spending a lot. The relatively small investment may speed the sale of your home or help you snag the asking price. Below, see six do-it-yourself smart home upgrades that can give your house an edge—and won’t cost much more than $1,000.
1. SWAP IN A SMART THERMOSTAT To upgrade your home’s thermostat without breaking the bank, I recommend the Honeywell Lyric T5. It’s a CR Best Buy with intuitive manual control and plenty of smart features, including voice control and geofencing, a feature that enables the thermostat to automatically adjust the temperature as you leave and return home.
2. SMARTEN UP YOUR SMOKE DETECTOR Give your home’s future owners some peace of mind with a smart smoke/CO detector, such as the Nest Protect. These detectors send alerts to your phone if they detect smoke and will even tell you when the battery is running low, saving you from those startling chirps at 3 a.m.
3. ADD SECURIT Y WITH A VIDEO DOORBELL Video doorbells add a sense of security to any home by putting a camera at a prime location: right at the front door. When it detects motion or someone presses the doorbell, the video doorbell sends an alert to a smartphone and saves a video clip of the activity to the cloud.
4. SECURE THE ENTRANCE WITH A SMART LOCK Another way to add security to your home’s front door (and value to your home) is to install a smart lock. To save on installation time, we recommend installing the August Smart Lock Pro, which replaces only the interior part of your existing dead bolt. The August Smart Lock offers a wealth of smart features that potential homeowners will appreciate, including an auto-lock and unlock function when you leave and return home, as well as the ability to create electronic keys for guests and handymen.
5. BRIGHTEN UP WITH SMART LIGHT BULBS An easy and affordable way to offer smart lighting is through smart LEDs. Try a starter kit, which offers multiple bulbs, so you can add smarts to a few lamps and fixtures. A few options include the $80 Ikea Trådfri Gateway Kit and the $50 Sengled Element Classic A19 Kit.
6. NEXT GENERATION APPLIANCES www.bit.ly/2FqUeUX
Smart appliances win big in the ROI game, expected to bump the average ROI up 11% more than standard appliances. In the 2017 Concept Community study conducted by MFE, 18.2 percent of people listed appliances as the smart home feature with the highest ROI.
PR EPAR ED ESPEC IALLY FOR
Johnathan and Angela-Marie Williams Presented by Traci Garontakos
YOU R STONEG ATE R EAL ESTATE SPEC IALIST AND N E I G H B O R
www.LiveInStonegate.com
Market Report