After 11 years selling homes all across Chicago I've watched people light serious money on fire on pre-listing renovations that did nothing for their final sale price.
If you’re thinking about spending $30k or $40k gutting a kitchen before you list, this is for you.
The person buying your home has their own taste and their own contractor. In a market where serious buyers are still waiving inspections to stay competitive, they are walking through fast and making mental decisions on the spot.
A kitchen renovation based on your taste is not the asset you think it is.
What IS affecting your offers right now is the stuff that tells buyers whether this building is going to cost them money after closing.
Your parapet walls. Chicago's freeze-thaw cycle is brutal on masonry and experienced buyers know it. When buyers are moving fast and waiving inspections, they are not walking through blind. If they see fresh mortar slapped over crumbling brick on the parapet wall, they know what it means. Water is already inside.
They don't need an inspector to tell them that. They can see it. And the offer reflects it. A proactive tuckpointing job runs $3,000-$5,000 on most north side buildings. The return on that specific spend is hard to match.
Your mechanical room. Buyers who've lost a few offers and are coming in without contingencies go straight to the basement. Furnace date, water heater date, electrical panel.
Your listing photos. Buyers are scrolling at 11pm on their phones. Bad photos of a great home are just a home people skip. Professional photography runs $300-$500. The impact on showing volume is not small.
Spend $8,000 on the right things and you'll recover it and then some. Spend $$ gutting a kitchen and you might break even if the buyer happens to share your exact taste.
Fix the stuff that keeps the water out. Let the buyer pick the paint colors.
Curious what other people have seen on this. Happy to answer any questions in the comments