Should we spend 500K on a renovation?

[Anonymous]

1950s midcentury modern house. Small kitchen renovation 10 years ago but not much else done other than maintenance (roof, AC). Kids will all be in college within 4 years and their tuition is nearly 100% covered. We have 4mil+ in retirement funds and 1.5 mil in short term inherited investments. Does it make sense to put 500K into a renovation? Our neighborhood has homes from 1mil to 5mil and I'm guessing the renovation could add 1.3 mil to the home value more or less based on comps.
Does it make sense to do this now, and given our area is that a typical budget for adding a floor and general upgrades to the whole house?
Thanks for any advice, we are at the very start of this daunting process, but love the house and don't want to buy a newer one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:1950s midcentury modern house. Small kitchen renovation 10 years ago but not much else done other than maintenance (roof, AC). Kids will all be in college within 4 years and their tuition is nearly 100% covered. We have 4mil+ in retirement funds and 1.5 mil in short term inherited investments. Does it make sense to put 500K into a renovation? Our neighborhood has homes from 1mil to 5mil and I'm guessing the renovation could add 1.3 mil to the home value more or less based on comps.
Does it make sense to do this now, and given our area is that a typical budget for adding a floor and general upgrades to the whole house?
Thanks for any advice, we are at the very start of this daunting process, but love the house and don't want to buy a newer one.

What do you think? Why do you think we would know better than you would?

[Anonymous]

No, just move away, downsize, whatever. Don’t spend the last few years your kids are living at home stuck in a renovation. That’s a nightmare.

[Anonymous]

If kids will all be in college within 4 years do you really need to add a floor?

Also color me sceptical that a $500k renovation will add $1.3 million in value but maybe I am wrong.

Basically it’s a huge amount of disruption and it’s hard to know if you are budgeting for overruns and the costs of living during it (and what tuition nearly being covered means) but if you really want to do it and have the budget….

[Anonymous]

No

[Anonymous]

We did. We don't plan on moving, and we were tired of our tiny bed and bathroom. Very happy with everything we did.

[Anonymous]

No, just move. Or knock down and rebuild.

We did a smaller reno (added a floor over part of the house; originally budgeted $250k, ran way over), we had to project manage the whole thing, and the result is still not better than if we had a house that was all built at the same time.
Your 50s house has 50s foundation, walls, wiring, etc., and the walls aren't square because they've shifted over time. When you add a room or a floor, things will not tie together perfectly. Nothing fixes that except a scrape renovation.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We did. We don't plan on moving, and we were tired of our tiny bed and bathroom. Very happy with everything we did.

It's good to read this. Did you do it while the kids were still home, and is this in the ballpark of what it cost?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If kids will all be in college within 4 years do you really need to add a floor?

Also color me sceptical that a $500k renovation will add $1.3 million in value but maybe I am wrong.

Basically it’s a huge amount of disruption and it’s hard to know if you are budgeting for overruns and the costs of living during it (and what tuition nearly being covered means) but if you really want to do it and have the budget….[/quote

The math is right when we look at square footage and bed and baths added. Full tuition means 4 years each at the highest private school.
House is currently at around 1.6 mil and based on sq footage and increase in rooms, neighbors houses are selling for at least 3mil upwards.
We want to do this to have more space, larger living areas, offices and bigger bedrooms. We don't plan on moving anytime soon and want to have space for the kids to come with friends and eventually families.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No, just move. Or knock down and rebuild.

We did a smaller reno (added a floor over part of the house; originally budgeted $250k, ran way over), we had to project manage the whole thing, and the result is still not better than if we had a house that was all built at the same time.
Your 50s house has 50s foundation, walls, wiring, etc., and the walls aren't square because they've shifted over time. When you add a room or a floor, things will not tie together perfectly. Nothing fixes that except a scrape renovation.

We've done renovations of homes in the past but its been a long time, a different time. We don't want a newly built home, many neighbors have them and they lack character. We love the midcentury modern look and feel. We used to live in a 1920s house in DC so compared to that this is modern!

[Anonymous]

OP, which neighborhood are you talking about? If you love it, have the money, and it's not too much house for your area, I think you should do it. We're considering the exact same thing. Even though our kids will be gone, someday it'll be "grandma's house" where we'll gather. And we have constant out-of-town guests since we both come from large families.

[Anonymous]

I don’t think your budget will go as far as you think.

[Anonymous]

No way you’re doing this for $500k

[Anonymous]

We also have a midcentury modern. Ours was built in 1960. We just spent $300k - renovations started on Labor Day in 2024 and finished right around New Year's Day. The first estimate was $500k and we decided that was too much so we scrapped the addition (we'd hoped to add a new master bedroom/bath plus additional space in the basement) and just went with the rest of the project which was renovating all three bathrooms and our kitchen, adding a home gym in our basement (finished a previously unfinished space), all new landscaping, painting the entire interior, wrapping our exterior trim in fiber cement, new front stoop, etc.

No regrets but my kids are 20 and 17 and we did not need more space. We also love our lot and did not want to move.

[Anonymous]

I wish my parents had renovated our house my freshman year in HS so I could have enjoyed it for 3 years. Instead they renovated when I left for college and I didn’t get to enjoy it nearly as much!