The obvious options are not always the best options and certainly not always the most economical options. We have learned this lesson over and over in our Sweet Tea Properties adventures. Today I want to address the curb appeal of the exterior of your home. If someone is visiting you for the first time and they are driving up in front of your house, what are they going to think? “Ooops, they forgot to water their flowers,” or “Is that paint chipping around the windows?” or “What a beautiful front porch!” Sometimes it helps to drive up to your own home with a critical eye to see what might need a touch up.

At the Coastal Cottage we did quite a bit of work on the exterior of the house. We painted the brick and the shutters which updated the look of the house. We removed old landscaping and added fresh new plants with a splash of color. We painted the concrete on the front porch, changed the front door, added new lights, window boxes and adirondack chairs. Even with all that work, Levi called me one day to tell me about the sagging gutters that were gonna need fixed.

The obvious option was to replace the gutters and we did look into what that would cost. But Levi brainstormed with our contractor one day and came up with a plan that fixed the problem without the cost of new gutters, which was not in our budget for this house. Our contractor knew we could reattach the sagging places in the guttering with some clips from Home Depot for about $1 each. That made a repair costing several thousand dollars into a job costing $32 plus labor. Wow, were we ever happy we didn’t jump on the obvious option, but kept looking for a workable solution! Home renovation is full of those moments so don’t let a setback ruin your day. Anything that is sagging can be fixed!

Looking past the obvious,

Karen Conrad