Whether you are doing a full home remodeling or just want to work on certain parts of your house, you can always way improve your home value without sacrificing sustainability. Below, we discuss six of the best eco-friendly methods for adding value during your home renovation project.
- Improving insulation and sealing using sustainable materials like cellulose or sheep’s wool reduces energy costs and environmental impact.
- Installing low-flow fixtures and water-efficient landscaping significantly conserves water and lowers utility bills.
- Upgrading to modern HVAC systems, such as heat pumps, decreases your carbon footprint and monthly overhead costs.
- Switching to ENERGY STAR-certified appliances improves efficiency and adds value to the home, especially during kitchen remodels.
- Choosing sustainable flooring like reclaimed wood or bamboo creates a healthier indoor environment by reducing hazardous VOC emissions.
- Integrating solar panels provides long-term savings and serves as a major selling point for eco-conscious buyers.
1. Insulation and Sealing
Improving insulation and sealing is a great way to reduce your energy usage while also reducing the cost of heating and cooling your home. It is much easier to keep your property at a consistent temperature if it is well-insulated, because the materials you install will help hold onto heat during colder seasons and stay cooler as well during the warmer months of the year.
Although improving your home’s insulation in general is itself an eco-friendly choice, you can enhance that sustainability by choosing to use certain materials. Using cellulose from recycled newsprint, sheep’s wool, hemp fibre, cork, wood fiber, and other more natural and biodegradable options are your best bet.
As part of your insulation improvement, you should also seal any minor gaps where air is leaking out. A simple way to go about sealing your house is replacing any old gaskets on your doors and/or using high-quality sealants to close small gaps around your home’s window frames.
2. Water Conservation
Water conservation is another area to focus on when sustainably renovating your home. A basic way to conserve water is to install low-flow water fixtures so that your faucets and shower heads are producing the same strong and steady streams while using significantly less water than older hardware systems.
If you are planning to fully redo or update your bathroom, you can replace all of the basic hardware so that water is more efficiently pumped into and used throughout your property. This will help lower your water bills and also decrease the stress being put on your home’s water heater. In addition to improving your home’s water infrastructure, you can also install water-efficient landscaping so that watering the lawn and other parts of your property is completed in a more sustainable manner.
3. Efficient HVAC Systems
Making your HVAC system more efficient will also go a long way to make your home more sustainable. Older systems especially do not meet modern efficiency standards, so you should focus on switching over to better contemporary systems. A heat pump or a new geothermal system will totally rework your energy footprint, and these changes will also lower your total operating cost in a way that is very attractive to prospective buyers (if you are looking to sell soon).
Modern heat pump systems are so eco-friendly because they create heat by moving existing thermal energy from one place to another instead of burning fuel. Installing these new systems will be a more expensive and intensive project than just replacing a standard AC system, but it is still considered a smart investment due to the significant decrease in your monthly overhead.
4. Eco-Friendly Appliances
Switching to eco-friendly appliances will also add great value to your home while emphasizing sustainability. If you were thinking of a full kitchen remodeling, first look into how much energy your fridge and other kitchen appliances are pulling. Most of them will be running constantly or semi-constantly, and the amount of power can be much more than you expect.
Across both kitchen and non-kitchen appliances, you should do what you can to reduce utility use by shifting out older models for ENERGY STAR-certified appliances. In addition to improving your energy efficiency, these modern units tend to have better technical features so that you get better results while still maintaining a lower carbon footprint.
5. Sustainable Flooring
One of the most common home renovations is getting new flooring installed, and there are several sustainable options you can choose from. For example, you could use materials like reclaimed wood, bamboo, or recycled glass instead of using high-impact raw materials that have a harsher environmental impact.
In addition to being more sustainable, these more natural flooring materials are also better for your or your tenant’s health. High-impact raw materials have been known to release hazardous chemicals known as VOCs into the air, so using organic or at least repurposed materials will automatically create cleaner air than the alternatives.
6. Solar Panels
Solar panels are one of the most sustainable choices you can make while renovating your home. Much like with more efficient HVAC systems, this is another major upgrade that requires a large initial investment but will ultimately save you money over long periods of time while giving you more control over where you source your energy.
You can start your solar panel installation small and have the system power just your lighting fixtures and other small appliances, but you can also go big and power your entire HVAC system using solar energy. Feel free to start small and slowly add to your energy infrastructure as needed. Like many sustainable home renovation choices, adding solar panels can be another major selling point if and when you decide to sell your property.
Summary
There are many different renovation methods through which you can add value to your home in a sustainable manner. Six of the most common ways are by adding more insulation and sealing, conserving water, improving HVAC systems, installing eco-friendly appliances, using sustainable flooring, and integrating solar panels. Eco-friendly home renovation is doable in both small increments and massive overhauls, so do whatever feels right to make your home better and more sustainable.
Author Name: Dalip Jaggi
Author Bio:
Entrepreneur, technologist, and passionate business leader sum up the core of Dalip Jaggi, co-founder of Revive Real Estate, a PropTech company with a goal to democratize house flipping. Since its 2020 inception, Revive has become the smartest solution for homeowners across the nation to maximize their home’s value.
