Which Home Updates Actually Add Value, and Which Ones Don't

By Lori Webb  ·  June 12, 2026  ·  8 min read

One of the questions I get most often from homeowners in Orlando, especially those who are thinking about selling in the next year or two, is some version of: "What should I update before I list?" It's a great question. It's also a question that gets a lot of bad answers, usually from people who are enthusiastic about renovation but fuzzy on what actually moves the needle in real estate value.

Let me share how I think through this, and what the data and my experience tell me about which updates are worth the investment and which ones will cost you more than you'll ever recover.

High-ROI Updates Worth Prioritizing

These are the updates that consistently return a high percentage of their cost at resale, often close to or exceeding dollar-for-dollar in the right markets.

Kitchen Minor Refresh

A full kitchen remodel is expensive and often doesn't return its full cost at resale. But a minor kitchen refresh is one of the highest-returning investments you can make in a home. Painting existing cabinets in a fresh, neutral color, replacing outdated hardware with something current, updating the faucet, adding under-cabinet lighting, and replacing a dated light fixture can transform the entire feel of a kitchen for a fraction of what new cabinets cost. In many cases, buyers respond as well to a clean, refreshed kitchen as they do to a new one, especially when the bones (cabinet layout, countertop material, appliance placement) are already solid.

If the countertops are truly outdated, quartz is worth considering. It's durable, easy to clean, and widely appealing to buyers. But if your counters are already granite or a neutral stone, don't replace them just because they're not the exact current style.

Bathroom Updates

Bathrooms return well, particularly primary baths and the primary guest bath. Again, the refresh approach often outperforms the full remodel on a per-dollar basis. A new vanity light, fresh grout, re-caulked tub and shower, new mirror, and updated hardware can feel like a renovation to a buyer without the cost of one. If the toilet or faucet is genuinely old, replace those. They're not expensive and they signal care for the home in a way buyers notice.

A dated, pink-tiled bathroom is a different story. In those cases, some level of renovation is often worth it, because the alternative is buyers mentally deducting far more from their offer than a retile would have cost you.

Paint, Interior and Exterior

Fresh paint is consistently one of the best returns in real estate. It's relatively inexpensive, it photographs well, and it signals to buyers that the home has been maintained. Go neutral. This is not the time to express personal color preferences. A warm white or soft greige on the walls will serve you far better than anything more personal, regardless of how much you love the color you chose.

Exterior paint matters as much as interior, sometimes more. Curb appeal is the first impression, and a home with peeling or dated exterior paint is fighting an uphill battle from the moment a buyer pulls up.

Lighting

Outdated lighting fixtures are one of the easiest things for buyers to notice and one of the cheapest things to fix. A builder-grade brass ceiling fan from 2002, a dated chandelier with plastic candles, fluorescent kitchen lighting: these things date a home immediately and cost very little to replace. New fixtures, especially those with a clean transitional or modern style, can make spaces feel significantly more current.

Curb Appeal

Fresh mulch, trimmed landscaping, a painted front door, a new door handle set, and power-washed walkways are all high-impact, low-cost improvements. In Florida specifically, landscaping that's tidy and tropical-appropriate reads very well. Overgrown or neglected landscaping creates a perception problem that affects how buyers feel about the whole home, not just the yard.

Medium-ROI Updates: Worth It in the Right Context

These updates can return well, but they're more dependent on your specific home, neighborhood, and buyer pool.

New Flooring

Replacing dated carpet with LVP (luxury vinyl plank) or hardwood returns reasonably well, especially if the current flooring is in genuinely poor condition or if it's a strong disincentive to buyers (heavy staining, strong odors, very outdated color). But if your carpet is clean and in decent shape, buyers can overlook it. Flooring is something buyers can budget for and do after purchase. It's not always necessary to do it for them.

Master Bath Expansion

If your primary bathroom is genuinely small by the standards of the neighborhood and comparable homes have larger baths, expanding it can be worthwhile. But this is a capital-intensive project, and the return depends heavily on what your competitors (the other homes a buyer will see) look like. In a neighborhood where every home has a small primary bath, making yours larger doesn't command as much of a premium as it would in a neighborhood where buyers expect a spa-like primary bath.

Low-ROI Updates: Do Them for Enjoyment, Not Return

Some updates simply don't pay off at resale. That doesn't mean they're mistakes. It means you should do them because you'll enjoy them for the time you're in the home, not because you expect to recover the cost when you sell.

Swimming Pools in Florida (It's Complicated)

Florida is one of the few markets where a pool can actually be a positive factor at resale, but it's heavily dependent on the neighborhood. In communities where a majority of homes have pools, not having one can be a disadvantage. In neighborhoods where most homes don't have them, adding a pool often costs $60,000 to $100,000 or more and returns far less than that. Before installing a pool, look at what comparable homes in your immediate neighborhood are selling for with and without pools. Your real estate agent can pull that data.

Also factor in buyer preferences. Families with young children may see a pool as a liability rather than an asset. Older buyers often feel the same. The pool question in Florida is genuinely neighborhood-specific in a way it isn't elsewhere.

Hurricane-Impact Windows

This is the Florida exception I'll highlight specifically. In most of the country, new windows have a mediocre ROI at resale. In Central Florida and coastal Florida, hurricane-impact windows are a different story. They reduce insurance premiums significantly, they provide real security and safety value, and they're increasingly expected by buyers in Florida markets. If you're in a home without them and you're planning to list, the impact window conversation is worth having with your real estate agent. In many cases, the insurance savings and the buyer expectation make them genuinely worthwhile.

Heavy Customization

A wine cellar built to your exact specifications, a home theater with fixed seating, a highly personalized master closet system: these things appeal strongly to buyers who share your specific lifestyle and much less to everyone else. Custom projects that serve your particular needs tend to be poor investments for resale, because you'll rarely find a buyer who values them as much as you do.

Room Additions

Adding square footage is one of the most expensive home improvements you can make, and it rarely recovers its full cost at resale unless it's addressing a specific deficiency (a one-bathroom home in a market where buyers expect two, for instance). Most room additions are done for quality-of-life reasons, and that's entirely valid. But don't go into a room addition expecting it to be an investment.

Updates for Enjoyment vs. Updates for Sale: A Framework

Here's how I suggest thinking about this. There are two legitimate reasons to make improvements to your home: you want to enjoy them while you live there, or you want to improve the sale price when you list. These are different goals and they sometimes point to different choices.

If you're planning to stay in the home for five or more years, doing improvements for your own enjoyment is completely reasonable. Install the pool. Build the wine room. Create the primary suite of your dreams. You'll use and enjoy those things for years, and that has real value even if it doesn't translate dollar-for-dollar at resale.

If you're planning to list in the next one to two years, be much more strategic. Prioritize the things that move the needle for buyers broadly, fresh paint, clean and updated kitchens and baths, functioning and current-looking fixtures, good curb appeal. And avoid the large, personal, or expensive projects that won't return their cost.

The most useful thing you can do before making any pre-sale improvement decision is talk to a real estate agent about your specific neighborhood and your specific home. And talking to a designer about what updates will photograph well and appeal broadly isn't a bad idea either. That's exactly the kind of conversation I have with clients who are preparing to list.