September 17, 2024 • 33 mins
We dive into the world of home improvement with a focus on increasing your property’s resale value. Discover why the Carolina Panthers are struggling and how that relates to your home projects. From simple DIY upgrades like painting kitchen cabinets to creating impactful curb appeal with strategic landscaping, we provide actionable tips to make your home not just livable, but lovable. And yes, these projects are all about getting results that look like they were done by a pro!
Finally, we tackle the ever-important issue of the return on investment (ROI) for home renovations. Are those high-cost upgrades really worth it? We challenge some popular but potentially misleading advice, emphasizing functional improvements like a new roof or an efficient HVAC system over flashy but low-ROI projects. With expert insights from Donnie Blanchard of SureTop Roofing, we aim to equip you with the knowledge to make smart, informed decisions about your home renovations. Plus, we answer listener questions, making sure you're getting the most out of your investments. Tune in for all this and more!
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Welcome to the Carolina Contractor Show with
your host, general ContractorDonnie Blanchard.
Well, welcome, boys and girls,children of all ages, to another
exciting, action-packed editionof the Carolina Contractor Show
.
My name is Eric Smith.
I do inside sales at HomeBuilder Supply in Wilson.
We also have a location inGreenville and a paint store
(00:21):
Across from me.
A General Contractor, owner ofBlanchard Building Company,
owner of Sure Top Roofing it'sMr Donnie Blanchard.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
How are you, Donnie, Doing great sir.
I haven't eaten all day, sodoing the show on an empty
stomach is kind of scary, but itgives me something to look
forward to.
How are you doing?
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Good, maybe it'll give an edge to the show, maybe
it'll make something different.
Hey no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
However, when the body cam footage came out, I saw
that he wasn't an antagonist.
But he told the guy hey, stoptapping, don't tap on my window,
don't tap on my window.
And he kind of made the guy madand the guy switch flipped,
which I don't think that was theright thing for the police
officer to do, and I think theyplaced him on administrative
leave after the body cam footagecame out.
(01:29):
But the fact that that hejerked this guy out on game day,
put him on the ground and whenyou saw him putting the cuffs on
him he was pulling his arms up,you know, very aggressively.
And I didn't, I didn't likewhat I saw.
I don't think it was warrantedat all, but, holy cow, I like
how you threw it to me and saidI was a passenger in the car.
But yeah, I don't know how doyou feel?
Speaker 1 (01:47):
about it.
Well, I agree with you.
Here's the thing when you getpulled over by the police, you
can make the encounter verysimple.
Yes, sir, do you know why Ipulled you over?
No, why Can I have yourpaperwork?
Sure, here you go, be pleasant,it's a five minute thing.
So did Tyreek throw attitude tothe cop?
Yeah, he clearly did.
Did the cop overreact?
Most definitely becauseofficers are trained to
(02:10):
deescalate, and someone said ifhe didn't want to roll his
window back down, you got his ID, run his stuff, issue him the
citations, give it back.
Say, hey, sweet ride, don'tknow why you're being so mean to
me.
You were doing 100 plus and a45.
It's part of my job, but goodluck with your game, man.
And this would have been nothingand it just would have been
another mark on Tyreek Hill,because I like him too.
(02:33):
He was a Kansas City chief fora long time.
He's been with Miami a coupleof years.
He's not exactly a stellarcitizen, shall we say, in his
personal life.
So we as citizens have a rightto be a-holes and it's protected
.
Why you want to do that to acop, or throw attitude, I don't
get that either, but I do think,all in all, the officer is at a
(02:55):
higher standard and he didn'thave to react that way.
He should have just let Tyreekbe Tyreek, issue him a ticket
and say get on out, Got anautograph and called it a day.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
And unfortunately it's hard to find law
enforcement folks these days andI totally understand why.
But yeah, I remember I wastaking my son to basketball
practice.
I was the coach, so I had tounlock the gym and I'm doing 75
and a 45 and I get pulled over.
And my son asked me Dad, whydidn't you argue with him?
Why didn't you plead your case?
I said because I was wrong.
I was wrong, I was guilty.
I said I took what I deservedand moved on.
(03:25):
So yeah, that should have beenhow it went down.
But you know the initial video.
I thought my word, what havethey done?
And after the facts came out,you know that was kind of both
folks at fault.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I do want to add another thing.
I used to drive to and fromRaleigh and I know you drive
probably more than I used todrive when I was doing a hundred
miles a day commute.
I would see North Carolinastate troopers on the side of
the road pulled up behind a car,dressed in their uniforms.
You know how sharp they look.
They always look like at anymoment they're going to kick
your A if they need to, but theydon't.
But I probably saw, in 20 yearsof going from Wilson to Raleigh
(04:01):
and back, 150 times a NorthCarolina state trooper, no
matter the weather, changing aflat tire on a car and they'll
never get the credit for thestuff they do.
Now, if I saw it that manytimes how many thousands of
times a year to state troopersand other law enforcement
officers do things like helpsomebody who's stranded, change
their tire, they could sit intheir car and say, call a tow
(04:22):
truck or call somebody to changeit, I'll wait here with you.
No, they get out there and doit because they don't want them
on the highway doing it, theywant them to be safe.
So video is very selective onwhat it shows and what trends on
.
Social media is very selectiveand again, not to rehash the
Tyreek Hill thing or the factthat you were in the passenger
seat too.
But it was easily avoidable bythe police officer to make
(04:45):
Tyreek look like a dork andpetulant child.
But he probably had a bad day.
He's human, you know.
He could have a crappy morningand decided screw this, I'm not
taking any crap from anybody.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Well, all in all side with law enforcement and we
love you guys and we got a fewfolks that are loyal listeners
to the show law enforcement andwe appreciate that and we
appreciate what you do for thecommunity.
So definitely got a lot ofsupport there.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Aside from that, did you catch any of the games last
week?
Well, of course I knew myChiefs would win, and boy you
know, it's gotten bad becauseeverybody's like, oh, the NFL's
fixed the Chiefs this, that andthe other Just cope better.
It's football.
And I went on record.
I predict them win the SuperBowl.
You predicted Philly.
So if the end of the seasonthey don't do it, go ahead, Send
me some stuff.
Make fun of me, I don't care, Ican take it, I'm a man.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Yes, you are.
The Philly prediction turnedout to be pretty darn good.
They looked awesome.
And AJ Brown, you know he cameto play.
That's their number guy.
He's not far behind.
He had a decent game.
But I think the Saquon Barkleyprediction that I said last week
it really came to fruitionbecause he's in a better offense
than he had with the Giants andhe really came to play.
(05:52):
I want to say he had threetouchdowns last week and pretty
much anybody who played againsthim in fantasy football took an
L my best friend from childhood.
He has him on his fantasy teamand he really laid the bragging
rights on Thick Sunday and Ihate when he wins, but that's
another story.
Aside from that, with Carolina,I know we got a lot of Panther
(06:12):
fans listening to the show andman, they got drugged Sunday.
It was an embarrassment.
I watched other games insteadof my favorite team play and I'm
almost not embarrassed to saythat because they just really
laid an egg on Sunday.
One big takeaway and you don'thear a lot of sports analysts
talking about this, but we'vegot guys that we cycled through
our team and got rid of thoseguys Sam Darnold he's a backup
(06:34):
quarterback for the Vikings and,of course the rookie that they
had, that was supposed to be asuperstar, got hurt in the
preseason and he's out for theseason.
So Sam Darnold found himself ina starting gig with Justin
Jefferson, the number onereceiver in the league, at his
disposal.
So you know, of course he had agreat day and they won Baker
Mayfield.
He passed through Carolina acouple years ago and basically I
(06:54):
thought he made a fool ofhimself, but of course he ended
up in Tampa Bay and had awinning season last year.
So two of our quarterbacks thatwe had previously, both are on
other teams getting wins outthere.
And we've got a rookiequarterback.
And you know the coach that Imentioned in Carolina.
He was Baker Mayfield'soffensive coordinator last year.
So supposedly and I said thislast week he's the quarterback
whisperer, but no dice.
This past Sunday, I think thevery first play of the game,
(07:16):
bryce Young threw aninterception and that was just a
gut punch for all of us loyalCarolina fans.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Yeah, it's only week one and you got to work out some
bugs.
Some of the teams that havelost this, like the Ravens, lost
KC.
Do you really think you'regoing to be crappy this year?
No, they're still going to be astrong team.
We're going to just go aheadand do this for the next few
months.
Anyways, we're going to talksports because it's a cool thing
.
(07:43):
But on the Carolina ContractorShow, wecarolinacontractorcom,
you can also go to YouTube.
We've got a page there.
We've got social media links upthat you can find again through
the website.
We also have a thing called Askthe Contractor and, unlike
Kamala Harris, donnie is notafraid to answer questions.
So if you have a question aboutyour house the inside, the
outside, the top, the bottom,roofs, attics, insulation,
electrical, things like that youcan submit your question there
(08:05):
and have a real licensed generalcontractor AKA Donnie Blanchard
, aka passenger and TyreekHill's car the other day.
He'll answer.
Those get back to you andsometimes we do questions only
shows that you can submitquestions to.
We just rattle off 10 questionsand stuff like that.
And also you can.
What was your thing I had?
Oh, download past shows.
(08:25):
We got hundreds of them.
Literally you can download andpodcast for them.
But let's jump into this,donnie, because we said, oh,
we'll just spend like twominutes talking about football.
We blew it.
Here we are.
What we want to talk abouttoday are return on investment
projects you can do on yourhouse ROI but we broke them in
two categories.
The first part of this showwe're going to talk about things
(08:46):
you can do yourself true DIYand what the return on
investment is.
The second half of the showwe're going to talk about
investments you can make on yourhouse that have really high
ROIs, but you're going to needsomeone like Donnie, a general
contractor, to do it, because itmight entail multiple trades or
permits or things like that.
But the easiest thing to do isstart off with stuff you can do
(09:08):
without having to call a Donnie.
And what's the first thing onyour list, donnie, of a DIY that
actually yields a respectableROI?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
I think the main thing that came to mind when I
put the list together was thatyou can refresh your kitchen
cabinets.
So this may not be anythingmore than just paint and cabinet
hardware and that's totally inthe DIY world Just changing the
color of your cabinets.
If they're darker, of course,go light.
If you have real wood cabinets,you can change the same stain
color.
But it's one of those thingswhere you know you may want to
(09:36):
tackle that in small bites.
You want to do maybe onesection of upper cabinets one
weekend and then the nextweekend take a little more on
and then switch to the basecabinet.
So this could be a four, five,six week project.
But the reason I say take yourtime is because you want to do
it right.
If you're not going to hire apro, you're going to use a lot
of painter's tape.
If you're not handy with apaint brush and you know, just
making this thing look like aprofessional did it is the end
(09:57):
game, because kitchens sellhouses and that's no secret
there.
But with the hardware, you know, I would say give yourself a
good half day.
If you change the hardware, youwant to make sure that the
spacing matches, because ofcourse you don't want to drill
new holes, but I'd sayrefreshing your kitchen, making
it look better, and you knowit'll be nicer for you while you
live in the house, while it isfor sale, so you'll get to enjoy
(10:17):
that upgrade and it will bringyou more money down the road.
Um, the next thing I would sayis create curb appeal.
When you pull up to a housethat's for sale, you know you
want to say hey, that, wow, likethis, the front of this house
looks amazing and, um, you knowyou can hire a landscaper, of
course, but if you wanted to doit yourself, I think landscaping
is DIY all day long.
But if you're not familiar withplants and um, and what is
(10:38):
seasonal and what looks good inthe front of the house, my
recommendation would be getonline and Google things.
Front elevation plants andfront elevation landscaping
would be what I would search,and you can take a picture to
your local landscaping supplyand they could probably line you
up with whatever grows best inour area here.
So some of the pictures youmight find could be from out
West, but you could certainlyfind a substitution and I think
(11:00):
the big thing is relying on alandscape supply for layers.
So when I built my house I putknockout roses in the very front
and that was what 15 years ago.
I had no idea they were goingto take over.
So I've got a beautifulJapanese maple that I have to
cut all my roses down just to beable to see the Japanese maple
every year, and one of thesedays I'm going to pull them out
of there.
But you know, I didn't layer mylandscaping in my personal
house correctly, and that's justsomething that a landscaping
(11:21):
supply can do and not charge youfor that service.
Moving on, I'd say the nextthing on the list would be a
front door makeover, which is asuper popular thing, and if I
remember right, didn't you guysdo this not so long ago?
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Yeah, a few years ago my wife wanted which is trendy
the red barn color of paint.
And it is easy.
I didn't take the doors off thehinges.
I take that back.
I just lied.
So there's the first lie of thenight.
I took our storm door offbecause that one we painted red.
It's a wood one, but the otherdoor that I painted is a solid
core.
You know your standard, 6p andall I had to do was take the
(11:55):
handle off and I painted it onthe hinges.
I was just careful when I waspainting that section of it.
But easy to do, a light sand Iwould recommend.
I'd also recommend a prime,even if you're going from a
light color to a dark, but goahead and prime it and then
paint it.
It makes a door look brand newand shiny.
You can put your handle on or,as you talked about, cabinet
fixtures, that's an opportunitymaybe to upgrade to a new
(12:18):
deadbolt and handle if you wantto do that, because even name
brands higher end brands likeSchlage or something, you can
get a really nice handle forunder a hundred bucks and a lot
of places will rekey it for free.
Easy to do, instant impact onthe eyes.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
I agree a thousand percent.
I think those door handles thathave the programmable code,
where if you forget your keysyou can punch the code in to get
in, they've come down a lot inprice.
I want to say they're about ahundred bucks.
But you know who uses the frontdoor.
I think the front door is kindof for looks only, because we
come in from the garage I'd say90% of the time.
But it definitely looks goodand that's something that would
(12:52):
be a good sales pitch.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Let me add to that.
You're right, because the bighandles with the very decorative
base on them that definitelygoes on the front entry door.
But the people that come intoour store they'll order those
and they love them.
But for their side door orgarage door, where they use
their primary, use it as theirprimary entrance they just get a
standard, you know, singledeadbolt and a locking entry
(13:18):
door, usually just a standardround one because that's not as
important.
So again, front door is forlook so big, shiny handle and a
new paint job looks great.
So we'll move on to your kindof your neck of the woods more
than mine because you like to doa lot of stuff outside.
But an outdoor living space isa big seller and you don't have
to invest a whole lot to get agood return on it.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Yeah, and usually decks are on the back of the
house and so sometimes theydon't get adequate sunlight,
especially if it's on the northside.
And I think the easiest thingto do and it's if you have a saw
you know you could.
You could go deck board by deckboard and replace those.
And if you have treated wood,that's one of those things that
it's guaranteed to wear out.
So either stain or coat whatyou have in place or, you know,
(13:59):
replace the deck boards.
We're always advocates forcomposite decking and the thing
to know there is that if you doget a lot of sunlight, then that
stuff gets really hot.
You can't walk on it barefooted.
But other than that, you know,I wear Crocs at home all day but
redoing the deck and adding,maybe, a fire pit with some
pavers, if you have an areabelow the deck and you have a
relatively flat surface whereyou don't have to change a lot
of elevations, you know that'swhere fire pits get tricky.
(14:21):
So if you're going to buildyour own fire pit and you don't
want to do it on a grade, inother words and you want to have
a seating area around it, butadding pavers for a seating area
, a few bags of sand.
You know, pavers will go in theback of your car, even if
you've got to make a couple oftrips, but pavers in a fire pit
or something that you can throwdown in a weekend, and that's
something you'll definitely geta lot of use out of Very easy
thing to do.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Moving down to your lower levels of your house, a
lot of people have a dark room.
Sometimes it's they don'trealize their living room or a
bonus room is kind of dark, andalso if you have a basement
that's got high enough ceilings,they tend to be dark, and
that's an opportunity to reallybrighten up that room with
lighting.
Paint something that will makeit look livable versus that
(15:02):
place that's under the house,and you can do that for cheap.
Even if it's like a block wall,you can paint it and dress it
up and get some lighting inthere.
Throw in a couch and all of asudden a potential home buyer is
going to go hey, look at this,we got all this room downstairs
too, cause you've got somethinglike that, am I correct?
Speaker 2 (15:18):
Oh yeah for sure.
I left my basement unfinishedand then I kind of went all out
and um I, um.
I think my wife wasn't speakingto me one Valentine's day, so I
just camped out in the basementand started the process and so
I framed up some walls and madethe best part of the day and we
have basically a half kitchendown there, refrigerator, ping
pong pool and a movie theaterroom and a workout room, along
(15:40):
with a mechanical room and toolstorage.
So I divided it off just likeit fit me.
I didn't have to ask anybodyfor permission or any questions
and we rolled with it.
But we did wood on the walls,tongue and groove wood on the
walls, did some stone archesgoing into the movie room and I
went to Appalachian State so I'mvery partial to the mountainy
look and turned my basement intoalmost like a cabin oasis.
(16:03):
So it is the favorite place forthe children to hang out and
basements, like you mentionedbefore.
Somebody might think aboutbuying that house and that is a
really good place to throw thekids, where they can't make too
much noise, and the alternativeis them hanging out upstairs
over your head, so it's a lotquieter than that.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
I also think any small repairs that you're
comfortable making are onlygoing to improve your house.
We talked about fixtures onyour cabinets and your drawers.
We talked about door handles,faucets in every room just
changing them out Little stuffthat you can do that is going to
improve your house Again, ifyou're selling it and you came
up with this quote, donnie it'snot just improving the look,
(16:40):
it's improving the markability.
And when someone pulls up onthe curb and the first thing
they see is the yard iswell-groomed, the windows look
nice, it's got a nice barn reddoor with a great new handle on
it.
They're already interested.
So little stuff can add upquick.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Yeah, I definitely think there's a direct
correlation between ROI andmarketability, because you know
if you want to get the max foryour house, then it has to look
good, and so no secret there.
And, like you mentioned tocomment on what you said last,
the small repairs that you feelcomfortable with.
There's no excuse for anythingnow that we got YouTube, because
they have so many short videos,long videos and on just about
anything you can think of, andso most people, if you're
(17:16):
decently handy and competentenough, I think, things like
faucet change-outs, like youmentioned.
One thing that I tell folks andthey'll call me no-transcript.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
The average DIYers hands and you've kind of got
this three.
I list that we kind of refer tothat.
We'll get to in a sec.
But you found a list of items.
You can have someone install,repair, reno on your house based
in the South Atlantic and we'regoing to kind of run through
some of them, give their opinionand then come back and give our
(18:17):
real world opinion on them.
But do you want to talk aboutthe three?
I's first.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah Well, the three I's are how we're going to.
We're going to compare this tothe real world, and the three
big issues that we have going onright now are inventory,
because inventory is stillpretty darn low, interest rates
are still pretty darn high andinflation is through the roof no
secret there.
But this list is basicallycategorized as a latest cost
versus value.
So what you spend versus whatyou make it worth is how this
(18:43):
list is supposedly based, and Ichose to talk about this because
it came from someone who has alot of street cred with
remodelingnet and that's a greatwebsite.
They have a lot of good ideas,but when it came to numbers and
I read what they wrote, it justdidn't sound right.
And one of the main reasons Isaid that and I chose to talk
about the list of categoriesthat they have here is because,
out of, say, 20 different thingsyou know, entry door
(19:06):
replacement, garage doorreplacement and manufactured
stone veneer, which is like ifyou have a brick house or you
choose to put a little bit ofstone on the outside of your
house to change the look of thefront elevation those were the
only three things that had apositive payback in the whole
list and everything else issaying, hey, if you spend
$10,000, you're only going toget $70,000 worth of value out
of that.
(19:26):
But I find that a little hard tobelieve.
And we're going to circle backto marketability and inventory,
because all those have adefinite impact on whether or
not somebody is going to buyyour house.
And if you spend the money toupgrade your house, of course
you want to get that money back.
So I think I'll let you runthrough the list and I'll just
comment on some of the items.
But entry door, garage door andstone veneer don't strike me as
(19:47):
the only things with a positivepayback.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Yeah, entry door replacement.
The steel type came first andit lists that your return on the
investment is almost 200%.
Entry doors are kind ofspecific on what someone might
like.
What I like in an entry doormight be a solid core, no
windows, no glass, maybe sidelights, where someone else might
want a big decorative frontdoor with a lot of glass and no
(20:11):
side lights, and I don't see howyou drop entry doors in and get
a big payback.
My other problem is the price.
They listed in this report wassaying it's like a $2,300
investment for a nice entry door.
Not sure where they're gettingtheir entry doors from,
especially if it's steel, but ifyou want a nice entry door
you're going to talk two orthree times more than that and
(20:31):
I'm sorry I'm not going to walkup to a house and go.
The entry door sold it for me,honey, let's go ahead and buy it
.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
What's your experience?
Yeah, absolutely, and I agreewith what you said.
Fiberglass or real wood, I knowthose are what's the most
popular in my world, and when Iestimate a house, I do it at a
minimum of $5,000 allowance forthe front entry door.
So yeah, them saying $2,300 andyou're going to get $4,600
worth of value out of that.
(20:58):
I don't think those numbers arecorrect at all All right.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
I've heard for a long time garage door replacement
has a high ROI.
This list has it returning atabout 190% on your investment.
I don't own one, but I've heardcommercials saying the same
thing.
I can't comment because I don'town a garage and I don't look
at them the same way maybe otherpeople do.
When they're buying a house,they see a garage and they think
the door is new and looks greator is fashionable.
(21:22):
That'll have a great impact.
Your experience.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Yeah, I mean, I just think garage doors take a
beating if you have childrenespecially, and the jam outside
of the garage, so that's thethickness of the wall, that area
If your child has a basketballor a BB gun.
I've got so many scars outsidemy garage.
My garage doors look fine, butI think that the weather
stripping and the trim coil allneed to be changed out as a
courtesy before you put thehouse on the market.
(21:47):
But I can't see just changingthe garage door out itself If
it's not insulated.
Yeah, go ahead and do that,because an insulated garage door
is well worth it.
But I just think that the priceof the garage door at $4,500,
that's pretty spot on for alarger door.
A smaller door should be abouthalf of that.
But I just don't see the ROIbeing double right there.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
All right.
The third thing that said,you'll get more than you put
into it.
Your ROI is it 150% formanufactured stone veneer and,
as you explained a few minutesago, donnie, a lot of people
they put it on around the frontdoor and maybe the front half of
their house and the rest of thehouse might be just traditional
siding.
It doesn't matter if it's fiberor something like that.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
I kind of like a mixed veneer and so I think
there's a classy way to do it,and sometimes they're just
downright loud.
It just rubs you wrong andpeople don't pick the right
color scheme.
So I think that depends on thehomeowner designer.
But this could go either way.
They have man-made stone andthey have natural stone.
Of course the man-made stone isa little cheaper, but is it
weather resistant?
(22:48):
You know you have to ask all theright questions before you
commit to a stone.
And then you know I have awonderful stonemason and he is
very just, efficient and veryaffordable.
But it took me about 12, 14years, something like that, to
find this guy, and before that Ialmost paid double for my stone
labor.
But this guy is a rock star.
He gets in and gets out and sohe can charge less.
(23:09):
But having the right guy forthe labor, that's half the
battle right there.
So choosing a cheaper stone theother half of the battle.
So there's so many factors thatplay into this that I don't
know how they came up with theirnumbers, but I think they were
right around $11,000 to do thisupgrade and said that you gained
over 17 grand from that.
But I don't know.
I think they pulled this oneout of thin air.
I think somebody's sitting inan office and just trying to get
(23:31):
an article, to get somepublicity, because those numbers
just don't make sense.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
And did you catch your?
You said your stonemason is arock star.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
I did not Look at me.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Brilliant, Even didn't you're so good, you don't
?
Speaker 2 (23:59):
you don't even know it yourself.
A few more things let's go over.
Would you agree, donnie, thatreplacing your siding especially
if it's higher end don'treplace your siding with
masonite but with fiber cement?
For example, they say it'shouse is in because higher end
homes kind of like good side oftown type thing.
If you want to put fiber cementon your house, you know there's
going to be a market for that.
There's going to be people whowould appreciate that.
You know fiber cement is kindof like your forever siding, so
you're never going to have toput siding on, but you are going
to have to paint it.
So take that into account and Iwould say that if you put the
(24:21):
money into it, I don't thinkyou'll lose that money.
But this one may be the onlyone that's kind of on target
that you're only going torecover 90% of what you spend.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
All right, we would agree the same with vinyl.
It's going to help.
Vinyl has its detractors, but alot of people like it.
It's very common and so we'llput that in the same kind of
area that it's beneficial to do.
It's not going to help, but Iguess when you go inside the
house it's a no brainer thatremodeling, if it's done right,
helps.
So a kitchen remodel is goingto help you get money back, and
(24:51):
that you've got to know fromexperience.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Oh yeah, and we mentioned this on the DIY.
But if you want to go fullscale, have the cabinets
replaced and everything, I thinkthey're saying you know, 27
grand looks like the figure theycame up with and you're only
going to get 26 grand worth ofvalue out of that.
I beg to differ.
And this is all situationalbecause of the square footage of
the house.
It's going to be one of thosethings where cabinets cost more
(25:13):
than they've ever cost and I'vewatched my cabinet budget pretty
much double since the pandemicand everybody that sells
cabinets they're charging a lotmore.
And cool side story there webecame a cabinet dealer because
we have so many in-house guyswho are wonderful carpenters.
I thought I'd take matters intomy own hands and try to bypass
the middleman.
So in light of doing morekitchen remodels, we can buy the
(25:37):
cabinets directly and we cutthe folks out who are adding the
markup that make thoseunaffordable.
So I still think at $27,000, ifit's a decent size kitchen and
you incorporate the cost ofcountertops, because nobody ever
wants to put new cabinets inand not put nice countertops on
there.
So I'd say that that number iskind of low.
For the full-blown kitchenremodel you do cabinets, tops
(25:58):
and floors, for instance.
It's going to be more in that$40,000 to $50,000 range, but I
definitely think the payback isway off on this one and I think
that you recoup every dime youspend in a kitchen because the
wife makes a decision on thehouse and the wife likes the
kitchen.
So there you go.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
I'm going to jump around here a little bit, but I
want you to bear with me here,Donnie, in the last few minutes.
So it lists a wood deckaddition to your house will have
a return of 80%.
But as we move HVAC 65 andgetting a new asphalt roof, your
(26:33):
return is only going to be 60%.
First of all, let's talk aboutthat.
Do you think putting lumber inthe backyard is going to make a
big improvement on your?
Speaker 2 (26:41):
house.
Yeah, this one's going to getme emotional.
No, I don't.
I do think that if you upgradethe deck to composite, I think
the payback is there for that.
Just changing wood for wood, Idon't know that.
It's there and, like Imentioned earlier in the show,
that's a DIY thing if you'regoing to go wood for wood,
because you don't have to beincredibly skilled to change out
your deck boards.
But no, I don't think so.
(27:02):
And for them to rank deckshigher than roofs, I mean, when
you pull up to a house, the deckis always on the back of the
house and it's one of thosethings where a brand new roof is
about the first thing you see.
So I think that the roof shouldcarry much more weight.
I think the figure we've thrownout there for years is that a
new roof adds 7% to the value ofthe house, and the numbers that
(27:23):
they're throwing out there fora roof, you know saying that
it's going to be what?
$30,000 for a roof.
That's crazy, and so yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Donnie, they said the deck.
You should budget $16,000 to$17,000.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
What kind of what do you have there?
I think that they mistookCalifornia prices for Carolina
numbers because you know itdoesn't.
The deck replacement, becauseyou don't replace the structural
components.
You don't replace the deckjoists, the deck band, the
columns, the support columns oranything.
You're basically just replacingthe rails and the top and I
(27:57):
can't see you hitting 16 grandfor that.
But anyway, those things looknice and if you spend a lot of
time outside then someone wouldappreciate that.
But I just think that thepayback numbers are all wrong
because a brand new roof willsell a house.
I mean, ask every realtor thatwe work for that can't get a
house to move.
They put a new roof on it andit moves within a week and so
and I just think that the roofnumbers.
The average roof doesn't costanywhere near $30,000, more like
$8,000 to $10,000 on an averagesize home and if you do that,
(28:18):
7% of what the house value isdoesn't equate to what they're
saying here on these numbers.
But to comment on the other twothings that you mentioned HVAC
and window replacement they'renot incorporating the fact that
if you replace all your windows,especially in an older home,
with a brand new window,especially in an older home with
a brand new window.
The worst window you can buynow is better than the best
window you could buy 10 yearsago, because the energy code has
gotten so much more strict andthe HVAC systems, of course.
(28:42):
The SEER rating minimumrequirement is up to a 16 now,
so they are just so much moreefficient.
An electric heat pump can doalmost what a gas system could
do in the wintertime.
That is 10, 15 years ago, sothey have gotten so much better,
cheaper and more efficient thatI think a new HVAC system
should carry a lot more weightthan it does there.
And what they're not accountingfor is that it's going to lower
(29:05):
your both of those incombination.
Especially if you do airsealing around the windows like
we preach, those are going tolower your monthly utilities by
a couple hundred, if not more,dollars every single month.
So when you multiply thatnumber times the end game of a
30-year mortgage dude, it's wild.
You know you're spending alittle bit now to save a whole
lot down the road and I justthink that they're taking in the
(29:25):
initial cost to do it and whatsomebody they think somebody
would pay on, you know anincreased sale price.
But I think this whole list isjust garbage and every number on
here is skewed man.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Well, I think somebody wanting to spend
$17,000 on lumber to improvetheir backyard is just.
They want people to go.
Hey man, you got a big deck outhere and they want to show off
their wood and I don't thinkthat that's worth the ROI right
there.
I see what you did there.
I gave an example before westarted the show.
I want someone consideringbuying a house to think this
(29:58):
which is more important, toprove that this list is kind of
junk If I were selling my houseand I said to you I have a brand
new wood deck out back and theroof is 10 years old, versus I
have a 10 year old wood deck outback, but I have a brand new
roof, which house are you goingto choose?
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Oh, the roof all day long.
I mean you've got a roof that'sgoing to be a 50-year warranty
and you've got a treated wooddeck that's going to be a
maintenance nightmare for yearsand years.
That's a yearly, if not everyother year, maintenance problem,
and so definitely, having thatroof we always talk about
roofing and heating and air arethe two big ticket items on your
house that are guaranteed towear out.
So I think those are the most.
(30:37):
I always tell people those arethe most two important things if
you're going to buy a house, tomake sure that the warranty is
documented or know when theinstallation happened, because
those are the two things thatare going to cost you down the
road.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
So if you have a house that you're thinking about
selling and you know your roofis due for a replacement or
maybe an inspection, it's agreat time to call Donnie,
because, again, he owns SureTopRoofing.
Or you can go to the websitesuretoproofingcom, get a free
inspection or get it on, because, as we just talked about, when
you have someone like Donniewho's a certified installer,
give you a new roof, you'regoing to get that money back.
(31:07):
If you're getting ready to sellyour house because, especially
with GAF, you have 50-yearwarranties the new buyer gets
that same warranty.
It comes along with the house.
Talk about a selling point.
Having a wood deck out back orhaving new handles on your front
door if you painted it barn redor bright canary yellow ain't
going to return a realinvestment on it.
But a roof will up-to-date HVACsystem, correct insulation, new
(31:31):
windows.
That is where your return is.
So this list is interesting butfor the most part I'm going to
give it a D minus for accuracyon the ROI Full agreement, man,
full agreement.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
So I just kind of wanted to burn through this,
because this is the stuff thatthe internet puts out there and
we live in the real world, andalso I filtered this list to be
tailored around our area.
So these are supposedly thehouse prices that would apply to
where we live, but I thinkthey're all out of whack and I
just anybody listening that wasthinking about doing a remodel
(32:03):
or improving their house or justanything DIY to improve the ROI
.
Don't go to the internet.
This is the real world stuffwe're putting out there.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Yeah, this would be a great question for Donnie.
If you want to go to thewebsite,
thecarolinacontractorcom, clickon, ask the contractor.
And if you have a questionabout one of these renovations
or one of these remodeling jobsor something for an increased
ROI, go ahead and ask him.
Hey, if I do this in my house,what do you think the ROI?
He's building houses and he'saround them all day.
He knows what moves them andwhat increases their value.
(32:32):
So go ahead and give him aholler there at the website and
if you have any other questionsor comments about the show again
, you can do it atthecarolinacontractorcom.
We want to thank everybody fortuning in to the Football Turned
Contractor Show and we hope youtune in again next week for
updated scores in the NFL andsomething to do with your house.
So we'll see you next week.
(32:52):
I'm going to eat.
Say thanks everybody.
No-transcript.
Welcome to the Carolina Contractor Show with
your host, general ContractorDonnie Blanchard.
Well, welcome, boys and girls,children of all ages, to another
exciting, action-packed editionof the Carolina Contractor Show
.
My name is Eric Smith.
I do inside sales at HomeBuilder Supply in Wilson.
We also have a location inGreenville and a paint store
(00:21):
Across from me.
A General Contractor, owner ofBlanchard Building Company,
owner of Sure Top Roofing it'sMr Donnie Blanchard.
Speaker 2 (00:28):
How are you, Donnie, Doing great sir.
I haven't eaten all day, sodoing the show on an empty
stomach is kind of scary, but itgives me something to look
forward to.
How are you doing?
Speaker 1 (00:36):
Good, maybe it'll give an edge to the show, maybe
it'll make something different.
Hey no-transcript.
Speaker 2 (01:09):
However, when the body cam footage came out, I saw
that he wasn't an antagonist.
But he told the guy hey, stoptapping, don't tap on my window,
don't tap on my window.
And he kind of made the guy madand the guy switch flipped,
which I don't think that was theright thing for the police
officer to do, and I think theyplaced him on administrative
leave after the body cam footagecame out.
(01:29):
But the fact that that hejerked this guy out on game day,
put him on the ground and whenyou saw him putting the cuffs on
him he was pulling his arms up,you know, very aggressively.
And I didn't, I didn't likewhat I saw.
I don't think it was warrantedat all, but, holy cow, I like
how you threw it to me and saidI was a passenger in the car.
But yeah, I don't know how doyou feel?
Speaker 1 (01:47):
about it.
Well, I agree with you.
Here's the thing when you getpulled over by the police, you
can make the encounter verysimple.
Yes, sir, do you know why Ipulled you over?
No, why Can I have yourpaperwork?
Sure, here you go, be pleasant,it's a five minute thing.
So did Tyreek throw attitude tothe cop?
Yeah, he clearly did.
Did the cop overreact?
Most definitely becauseofficers are trained to
(02:10):
deescalate, and someone said ifhe didn't want to roll his
window back down, you got his ID, run his stuff, issue him the
citations, give it back.
Say, hey, sweet ride, don'tknow why you're being so mean to
me.
You were doing 100 plus and a45.
It's part of my job, but goodluck with your game, man.
And this would have been nothingand it just would have been
another mark on Tyreek Hill,because I like him too.
(02:33):
He was a Kansas City chief fora long time.
He's been with Miami a coupleof years.
He's not exactly a stellarcitizen, shall we say, in his
personal life.
So we as citizens have a rightto be a-holes and it's protected
.
Why you want to do that to acop, or throw attitude, I don't
get that either, but I do think,all in all, the officer is at a
(02:55):
higher standard and he didn'thave to react that way.
He should have just let Tyreekbe Tyreek, issue him a ticket
and say get on out, Got anautograph and called it a day.
Speaker 2 (03:04):
And unfortunately it's hard to find law
enforcement folks these days andI totally understand why.
But yeah, I remember I wastaking my son to basketball
practice.
I was the coach, so I had tounlock the gym and I'm doing 75
and a 45 and I get pulled over.
And my son asked me Dad, whydidn't you argue with him?
Why didn't you plead your case?
I said because I was wrong.
I was wrong, I was guilty.
I said I took what I deservedand moved on.
(03:25):
So yeah, that should have beenhow it went down.
But you know the initial video.
I thought my word, what havethey done?
And after the facts came out,you know that was kind of both
folks at fault.
Speaker 1 (03:37):
I do want to add another thing.
I used to drive to and fromRaleigh and I know you drive
probably more than I used todrive when I was doing a hundred
miles a day commute.
I would see North Carolinastate troopers on the side of
the road pulled up behind a car,dressed in their uniforms.
You know how sharp they look.
They always look like at anymoment they're going to kick
your A if they need to, but theydon't.
But I probably saw, in 20 yearsof going from Wilson to Raleigh
(04:01):
and back, 150 times a NorthCarolina state trooper, no
matter the weather, changing aflat tire on a car and they'll
never get the credit for thestuff they do.
Now, if I saw it that manytimes how many thousands of
times a year to state troopersand other law enforcement
officers do things like helpsomebody who's stranded, change
their tire, they could sit intheir car and say, call a tow
(04:22):
truck or call somebody to changeit, I'll wait here with you.
No, they get out there and doit because they don't want them
on the highway doing it, theywant them to be safe.
So video is very selective onwhat it shows and what trends on
.
Social media is very selectiveand again, not to rehash the
Tyreek Hill thing or the factthat you were in the passenger
seat too.
But it was easily avoidable bythe police officer to make
(04:45):
Tyreek look like a dork andpetulant child.
But he probably had a bad day.
He's human, you know.
He could have a crappy morningand decided screw this, I'm not
taking any crap from anybody.
Speaker 2 (04:55):
Well, all in all side with law enforcement and we
love you guys and we got a fewfolks that are loyal listeners
to the show law enforcement andwe appreciate that and we
appreciate what you do for thecommunity.
So definitely got a lot ofsupport there.
Speaker 1 (05:10):
Aside from that, did you catch any of the games last
week?
Well, of course I knew myChiefs would win, and boy you
know, it's gotten bad becauseeverybody's like, oh, the NFL's
fixed the Chiefs this, that andthe other Just cope better.
It's football.
And I went on record.
I predict them win the SuperBowl.
You predicted Philly.
So if the end of the seasonthey don't do it, go ahead, Send
me some stuff.
Make fun of me, I don't care, Ican take it, I'm a man.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Yes, you are.
The Philly prediction turnedout to be pretty darn good.
They looked awesome.
And AJ Brown, you know he cameto play.
That's their number guy.
He's not far behind.
He had a decent game.
But I think the Saquon Barkleyprediction that I said last week
it really came to fruitionbecause he's in a better offense
than he had with the Giants andhe really came to play.
(05:52):
I want to say he had threetouchdowns last week and pretty
much anybody who played againsthim in fantasy football took an
L my best friend from childhood.
He has him on his fantasy teamand he really laid the bragging
rights on Thick Sunday and Ihate when he wins, but that's
another story.
Aside from that, with Carolina,I know we got a lot of Panther
(06:12):
fans listening to the show andman, they got drugged Sunday.
It was an embarrassment.
I watched other games insteadof my favorite team play and I'm
almost not embarrassed to saythat because they just really
laid an egg on Sunday.
One big takeaway and you don'thear a lot of sports analysts
talking about this, but we'vegot guys that we cycled through
our team and got rid of thoseguys Sam Darnold he's a backup
(06:34):
quarterback for the Vikings and,of course the rookie that they
had, that was supposed to be asuperstar, got hurt in the
preseason and he's out for theseason.
So Sam Darnold found himself ina starting gig with Justin
Jefferson, the number onereceiver in the league, at his
disposal.
So you know, of course he had agreat day and they won Baker
Mayfield.
He passed through Carolina acouple years ago and basically I
(06:54):
thought he made a fool ofhimself, but of course he ended
up in Tampa Bay and had awinning season last year.
So two of our quarterbacks thatwe had previously, both are on
other teams getting wins outthere.
And we've got a rookiequarterback.
And you know the coach that Imentioned in Carolina.
He was Baker Mayfield'soffensive coordinator last year.
So supposedly and I said thislast week he's the quarterback
whisperer, but no dice.
This past Sunday, I think thevery first play of the game,
(07:16):
bryce Young threw aninterception and that was just a
gut punch for all of us loyalCarolina fans.
Speaker 1 (07:20):
Yeah, it's only week one and you got to work out some
bugs.
Some of the teams that havelost this, like the Ravens, lost
KC.
Do you really think you'regoing to be crappy this year?
No, they're still going to be astrong team.
We're going to just go aheadand do this for the next few
months.
Anyways, we're going to talksports because it's a cool thing
.
(07:43):
But on the Carolina ContractorShow, wecarolinacontractorcom,
you can also go to YouTube.
We've got a page there.
We've got social media links upthat you can find again through
the website.
We also have a thing called Askthe Contractor and, unlike
Kamala Harris, donnie is notafraid to answer questions.
So if you have a question aboutyour house the inside, the
outside, the top, the bottom,roofs, attics, insulation,
electrical, things like that youcan submit your question there
(08:05):
and have a real licensed generalcontractor AKA Donnie Blanchard
, aka passenger and TyreekHill's car the other day.
He'll answer.
Those get back to you andsometimes we do questions only
shows that you can submitquestions to.
We just rattle off 10 questionsand stuff like that.
And also you can.
What was your thing I had?
Oh, download past shows.
(08:25):
We got hundreds of them.
Literally you can download andpodcast for them.
But let's jump into this,donnie, because we said, oh,
we'll just spend like twominutes talking about football.
We blew it.
Here we are.
What we want to talk abouttoday are return on investment
projects you can do on yourhouse ROI but we broke them in
two categories.
The first part of this showwe're going to talk about things
(08:46):
you can do yourself true DIYand what the return on
investment is.
The second half of the showwe're going to talk about
investments you can make on yourhouse that have really high
ROIs, but you're going to needsomeone like Donnie, a general
contractor, to do it, because itmight entail multiple trades or
permits or things like that.
But the easiest thing to do isstart off with stuff you can do
(09:08):
without having to call a Donnie.
And what's the first thing onyour list, donnie, of a DIY that
actually yields a respectableROI?
Speaker 2 (09:16):
I think the main thing that came to mind when I
put the list together was thatyou can refresh your kitchen
cabinets.
So this may not be anythingmore than just paint and cabinet
hardware and that's totally inthe DIY world Just changing the
color of your cabinets.
If they're darker, of course,go light.
If you have real wood cabinets,you can change the same stain
color.
But it's one of those thingswhere you know you may want to
(09:36):
tackle that in small bites.
You want to do maybe onesection of upper cabinets one
weekend and then the nextweekend take a little more on
and then switch to the basecabinet.
So this could be a four, five,six week project.
But the reason I say take yourtime is because you want to do
it right.
If you're not going to hire apro, you're going to use a lot
of painter's tape.
If you're not handy with apaint brush and you know, just
making this thing look like aprofessional did it is the end
(09:57):
game, because kitchens sellhouses and that's no secret
there.
But with the hardware, you know, I would say give yourself a
good half day.
If you change the hardware, youwant to make sure that the
spacing matches, because ofcourse you don't want to drill
new holes, but I'd sayrefreshing your kitchen, making
it look better, and you knowit'll be nicer for you while you
live in the house, while it isfor sale, so you'll get to enjoy
(10:17):
that upgrade and it will bringyou more money down the road.
Um, the next thing I would sayis create curb appeal.
When you pull up to a housethat's for sale, you know you
want to say hey, that, wow, likethis, the front of this house
looks amazing and, um, you knowyou can hire a landscaper, of
course, but if you wanted to doit yourself, I think landscaping
is DIY all day long.
But if you're not familiar withplants and um, and what is
(10:38):
seasonal and what looks good inthe front of the house, my
recommendation would be getonline and Google things.
Front elevation plants andfront elevation landscaping
would be what I would search,and you can take a picture to
your local landscaping supplyand they could probably line you
up with whatever grows best inour area here.
So some of the pictures youmight find could be from out
West, but you could certainlyfind a substitution and I think
(11:00):
the big thing is relying on alandscape supply for layers.
So when I built my house I putknockout roses in the very front
and that was what 15 years ago.
I had no idea they were goingto take over.
So I've got a beautifulJapanese maple that I have to
cut all my roses down just to beable to see the Japanese maple
every year, and one of thesedays I'm going to pull them out
of there.
But you know, I didn't layer mylandscaping in my personal
house correctly, and that's justsomething that a landscaping
(11:21):
supply can do and not charge youfor that service.
Moving on, I'd say the nextthing on the list would be a
front door makeover, which is asuper popular thing, and if I
remember right, didn't you guysdo this not so long ago?
Speaker 1 (11:33):
Yeah, a few years ago my wife wanted which is trendy
the red barn color of paint.
And it is easy.
I didn't take the doors off thehinges.
I take that back.
I just lied.
So there's the first lie of thenight.
I took our storm door offbecause that one we painted red.
It's a wood one, but the otherdoor that I painted is a solid
core.
You know your standard, 6p andall I had to do was take the
(11:55):
handle off and I painted it onthe hinges.
I was just careful when I waspainting that section of it.
But easy to do, a light sand Iwould recommend.
I'd also recommend a prime,even if you're going from a
light color to a dark, but goahead and prime it and then
paint it.
It makes a door look brand newand shiny.
You can put your handle on or,as you talked about, cabinet
fixtures, that's an opportunitymaybe to upgrade to a new
(12:18):
deadbolt and handle if you wantto do that, because even name
brands higher end brands likeSchlage or something, you can
get a really nice handle forunder a hundred bucks and a lot
of places will rekey it for free.
Easy to do, instant impact onthe eyes.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
I agree a thousand percent.
I think those door handles thathave the programmable code,
where if you forget your keysyou can punch the code in to get
in, they've come down a lot inprice.
I want to say they're about ahundred bucks.
But you know who uses the frontdoor.
I think the front door is kindof for looks only, because we
come in from the garage I'd say90% of the time.
But it definitely looks goodand that's something that would
(12:52):
be a good sales pitch.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
Let me add to that.
You're right, because the bighandles with the very decorative
base on them that definitelygoes on the front entry door.
But the people that come intoour store they'll order those
and they love them.
But for their side door orgarage door, where they use
their primary, use it as theirprimary entrance they just get a
standard, you know, singledeadbolt and a locking entry
(13:18):
door, usually just a standardround one because that's not as
important.
So again, front door is forlook so big, shiny handle and a
new paint job looks great.
So we'll move on to your kindof your neck of the woods more
than mine because you like to doa lot of stuff outside.
But an outdoor living space isa big seller and you don't have
to invest a whole lot to get agood return on it.
Speaker 2 (13:37):
Yeah, and usually decks are on the back of the
house and so sometimes theydon't get adequate sunlight,
especially if it's on the northside.
And I think the easiest thingto do and it's if you have a saw
you know you could.
You could go deck board by deckboard and replace those.
And if you have treated wood,that's one of those things that
it's guaranteed to wear out.
So either stain or coat whatyou have in place or, you know,
(13:59):
replace the deck boards.
We're always advocates forcomposite decking and the thing
to know there is that if you doget a lot of sunlight, then that
stuff gets really hot.
You can't walk on it barefooted.
But other than that, you know,I wear Crocs at home all day but
redoing the deck and adding,maybe, a fire pit with some
pavers, if you have an areabelow the deck and you have a
relatively flat surface whereyou don't have to change a lot
of elevations, you know that'swhere fire pits get tricky.
(14:21):
So if you're going to buildyour own fire pit and you don't
want to do it on a grade, inother words and you want to have
a seating area around it, butadding pavers for a seating area
, a few bags of sand.
You know, pavers will go in theback of your car, even if
you've got to make a couple oftrips, but pavers in a fire pit
or something that you can throwdown in a weekend, and that's
something you'll definitely geta lot of use out of Very easy
thing to do.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Moving down to your lower levels of your house, a
lot of people have a dark room.
Sometimes it's they don'trealize their living room or a
bonus room is kind of dark, andalso if you have a basement
that's got high enough ceilings,they tend to be dark, and
that's an opportunity to reallybrighten up that room with
lighting.
Paint something that will makeit look livable versus that
(15:02):
place that's under the house,and you can do that for cheap.
Even if it's like a block wall,you can paint it and dress it
up and get some lighting inthere.
Throw in a couch and all of asudden a potential home buyer is
going to go hey, look at this,we got all this room downstairs
too, cause you've got somethinglike that, am I correct?
Speaker 2 (15:18):
Oh yeah for sure.
I left my basement unfinishedand then I kind of went all out
and um I, um.
I think my wife wasn't speakingto me one Valentine's day, so I
just camped out in the basementand started the process and so
I framed up some walls and madethe best part of the day and we
have basically a half kitchendown there, refrigerator, ping
pong pool and a movie theaterroom and a workout room, along
(15:40):
with a mechanical room and toolstorage.
So I divided it off just likeit fit me.
I didn't have to ask anybodyfor permission or any questions
and we rolled with it.
But we did wood on the walls,tongue and groove wood on the
walls, did some stone archesgoing into the movie room and I
went to Appalachian State so I'mvery partial to the mountainy
look and turned my basement intoalmost like a cabin oasis.
(16:03):
So it is the favorite place forthe children to hang out and
basements, like you mentionedbefore.
Somebody might think aboutbuying that house and that is a
really good place to throw thekids, where they can't make too
much noise, and the alternativeis them hanging out upstairs
over your head, so it's a lotquieter than that.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
I also think any small repairs that you're
comfortable making are onlygoing to improve your house.
We talked about fixtures onyour cabinets and your drawers.
We talked about door handles,faucets in every room just
changing them out Little stuffthat you can do that is going to
improve your house Again, ifyou're selling it and you came
up with this quote, donnie it'snot just improving the look,
(16:40):
it's improving the markability.
And when someone pulls up onthe curb and the first thing
they see is the yard iswell-groomed, the windows look
nice, it's got a nice barn reddoor with a great new handle on
it.
They're already interested.
So little stuff can add upquick.
Speaker 2 (16:54):
Yeah, I definitely think there's a direct
correlation between ROI andmarketability, because you know
if you want to get the max foryour house, then it has to look
good, and so no secret there.
And, like you mentioned tocomment on what you said last,
the small repairs that you feelcomfortable with.
There's no excuse for anythingnow that we got YouTube, because
they have so many short videos,long videos and on just about
anything you can think of, andso most people, if you're
(17:16):
decently handy and competentenough, I think, things like
faucet change-outs, like youmentioned.
One thing that I tell folks andthey'll call me no-transcript.
Speaker 1 (17:54):
The average DIYers hands and you've kind of got
this three.
I list that we kind of refer tothat.
We'll get to in a sec.
But you found a list of items.
You can have someone install,repair, reno on your house based
in the South Atlantic and we'regoing to kind of run through
some of them, give their opinionand then come back and give our
(18:17):
real world opinion on them.
But do you want to talk aboutthe three?
I's first.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
Yeah Well, the three I's are how we're going to.
We're going to compare this tothe real world, and the three
big issues that we have going onright now are inventory,
because inventory is stillpretty darn low, interest rates
are still pretty darn high andinflation is through the roof no
secret there.
But this list is basicallycategorized as a latest cost
versus value.
So what you spend versus whatyou make it worth is how this
(18:43):
list is supposedly based, and Ichose to talk about this because
it came from someone who has alot of street cred with
remodelingnet and that's a greatwebsite.
They have a lot of good ideas,but when it came to numbers and
I read what they wrote, it justdidn't sound right.
And one of the main reasons Isaid that and I chose to talk
about the list of categoriesthat they have here is because,
out of, say, 20 different thingsyou know, entry door
(19:06):
replacement, garage doorreplacement and manufactured
stone veneer, which is like ifyou have a brick house or you
choose to put a little bit ofstone on the outside of your
house to change the look of thefront elevation those were the
only three things that had apositive payback in the whole
list and everything else issaying, hey, if you spend
$10,000, you're only going toget $70,000 worth of value out
of that.
(19:26):
But I find that a little hard tobelieve.
And we're going to circle backto marketability and inventory,
because all those have adefinite impact on whether or
not somebody is going to buyyour house.
And if you spend the money toupgrade your house, of course
you want to get that money back.
So I think I'll let you runthrough the list and I'll just
comment on some of the items.
But entry door, garage door andstone veneer don't strike me as
(19:47):
the only things with a positivepayback.
Speaker 1 (19:49):
Yeah, entry door replacement.
The steel type came first andit lists that your return on the
investment is almost 200%.
Entry doors are kind ofspecific on what someone might
like.
What I like in an entry doormight be a solid core, no
windows, no glass, maybe sidelights, where someone else might
want a big decorative frontdoor with a lot of glass and no
(20:11):
side lights, and I don't see howyou drop entry doors in and get
a big payback.
My other problem is the price.
They listed in this report wassaying it's like a $2,300
investment for a nice entry door.
Not sure where they're gettingtheir entry doors from,
especially if it's steel, but ifyou want a nice entry door
you're going to talk two orthree times more than that and
(20:31):
I'm sorry I'm not going to walkup to a house and go.
The entry door sold it for me,honey, let's go ahead and buy it
.
Speaker 2 (20:37):
What's your experience?
Yeah, absolutely, and I agreewith what you said.
Fiberglass or real wood, I knowthose are what's the most
popular in my world, and when Iestimate a house, I do it at a
minimum of $5,000 allowance forthe front entry door.
So yeah, them saying $2,300 andyou're going to get $4,600
worth of value out of that.
(20:58):
I don't think those numbers arecorrect at all All right.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
I've heard for a long time garage door replacement
has a high ROI.
This list has it returning atabout 190% on your investment.
I don't own one, but I've heardcommercials saying the same
thing.
I can't comment because I don'town a garage and I don't look
at them the same way maybe otherpeople do.
When they're buying a house,they see a garage and they think
the door is new and looks greator is fashionable.
(21:22):
That'll have a great impact.
Your experience.
Speaker 2 (21:25):
Yeah, I mean, I just think garage doors take a
beating if you have childrenespecially, and the jam outside
of the garage, so that's thethickness of the wall, that area
If your child has a basketballor a BB gun.
I've got so many scars outsidemy garage.
My garage doors look fine, butI think that the weather
stripping and the trim coil allneed to be changed out as a
courtesy before you put thehouse on the market.
(21:47):
But I can't see just changingthe garage door out itself If
it's not insulated.
Yeah, go ahead and do that,because an insulated garage door
is well worth it.
But I just think that the priceof the garage door at $4,500,
that's pretty spot on for alarger door.
A smaller door should be abouthalf of that.
But I just don't see the ROIbeing double right there.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
All right.
The third thing that said,you'll get more than you put
into it.
Your ROI is it 150% formanufactured stone veneer and,
as you explained a few minutesago, donnie, a lot of people
they put it on around the frontdoor and maybe the front half of
their house and the rest of thehouse might be just traditional
siding.
It doesn't matter if it's fiberor something like that.
Speaker 2 (22:27):
I kind of like a mixed veneer and so I think
there's a classy way to do it,and sometimes they're just
downright loud.
It just rubs you wrong andpeople don't pick the right
color scheme.
So I think that depends on thehomeowner designer.
But this could go either way.
They have man-made stone andthey have natural stone.
Of course the man-made stone isa little cheaper, but is it
weather resistant?
(22:48):
You know you have to ask all theright questions before you
commit to a stone.
And then you know I have awonderful stonemason and he is
very just, efficient and veryaffordable.
But it took me about 12, 14years, something like that, to
find this guy, and before that Ialmost paid double for my stone
labor.
But this guy is a rock star.
He gets in and gets out and sohe can charge less.
(23:09):
But having the right guy forthe labor, that's half the
battle right there.
So choosing a cheaper stone theother half of the battle.
So there's so many factors thatplay into this that I don't
know how they came up with theirnumbers, but I think they were
right around $11,000 to do thisupgrade and said that you gained
over 17 grand from that.
But I don't know.
I think they pulled this oneout of thin air.
I think somebody's sitting inan office and just trying to get
(23:31):
an article, to get somepublicity, because those numbers
just don't make sense.
Speaker 1 (23:36):
And did you catch your?
You said your stonemason is arock star.
Speaker 2 (23:39):
I did not Look at me.
Speaker 1 (23:40):
Brilliant, Even didn't you're so good, you don't
?
Speaker 2 (23:59):
you don't even know it yourself.
A few more things let's go over.
Would you agree, donnie, thatreplacing your siding especially
if it's higher end don'treplace your siding with
masonite but with fiber cement?
For example, they say it'shouse is in because higher end
homes kind of like good side oftown type thing.
If you want to put fiber cementon your house, you know there's
going to be a market for that.
There's going to be people whowould appreciate that.
You know fiber cement is kindof like your forever siding, so
you're never going to have toput siding on, but you are going
to have to paint it.
So take that into account and Iwould say that if you put the
(24:21):
money into it, I don't thinkyou'll lose that money.
But this one may be the onlyone that's kind of on target
that you're only going torecover 90% of what you spend.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
All right, we would agree the same with vinyl.
It's going to help.
Vinyl has its detractors, but alot of people like it.
It's very common and so we'llput that in the same kind of
area that it's beneficial to do.
It's not going to help, but Iguess when you go inside the
house it's a no brainer thatremodeling, if it's done right,
helps.
So a kitchen remodel is goingto help you get money back, and
(24:51):
that you've got to know fromexperience.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
Oh yeah, and we mentioned this on the DIY.
But if you want to go fullscale, have the cabinets
replaced and everything, I thinkthey're saying you know, 27
grand looks like the figure theycame up with and you're only
going to get 26 grand worth ofvalue out of that.
I beg to differ.
And this is all situationalbecause of the square footage of
the house.
It's going to be one of thosethings where cabinets cost more
(25:13):
than they've ever cost and I'vewatched my cabinet budget pretty
much double since the pandemicand everybody that sells
cabinets they're charging a lotmore.
And cool side story there webecame a cabinet dealer because
we have so many in-house guyswho are wonderful carpenters.
I thought I'd take matters intomy own hands and try to bypass
the middleman.
So in light of doing morekitchen remodels, we can buy the
(25:37):
cabinets directly and we cutthe folks out who are adding the
markup that make thoseunaffordable.
So I still think at $27,000, ifit's a decent size kitchen and
you incorporate the cost ofcountertops, because nobody ever
wants to put new cabinets inand not put nice countertops on
there.
So I'd say that that number iskind of low.
For the full-blown kitchenremodel you do cabinets, tops
(25:58):
and floors, for instance.
It's going to be more in that$40,000 to $50,000 range, but I
definitely think the payback isway off on this one and I think
that you recoup every dime youspend in a kitchen because the
wife makes a decision on thehouse and the wife likes the
kitchen.
So there you go.
Speaker 1 (26:13):
I'm going to jump around here a little bit, but I
want you to bear with me here,Donnie, in the last few minutes.
So it lists a wood deckaddition to your house will have
a return of 80%.
But as we move HVAC 65 andgetting a new asphalt roof, your
(26:33):
return is only going to be 60%.
First of all, let's talk aboutthat.
Do you think putting lumber inthe backyard is going to make a
big improvement on your?
Speaker 2 (26:41):
house.
Yeah, this one's going to getme emotional.
No, I don't.
I do think that if you upgradethe deck to composite, I think
the payback is there for that.
Just changing wood for wood, Idon't know that.
It's there and, like Imentioned earlier in the show,
that's a DIY thing if you'regoing to go wood for wood,
because you don't have to beincredibly skilled to change out
your deck boards.
But no, I don't think so.
(27:02):
And for them to rank deckshigher than roofs, I mean, when
you pull up to a house, the deckis always on the back of the
house and it's one of thosethings where a brand new roof is
about the first thing you see.
So I think that the roof shouldcarry much more weight.
I think the figure we've thrownout there for years is that a
new roof adds 7% to the value ofthe house, and the numbers that
(27:23):
they're throwing out there fora roof, you know saying that
it's going to be what?
$30,000 for a roof.
That's crazy, and so yeah.
Speaker 1 (27:30):
Donnie, they said the deck.
You should budget $16,000 to$17,000.
Speaker 2 (27:35):
What kind of what do you have there?
I think that they mistookCalifornia prices for Carolina
numbers because you know itdoesn't.
The deck replacement, becauseyou don't replace the structural
components.
You don't replace the deckjoists, the deck band, the
columns, the support columns oranything.
You're basically just replacingthe rails and the top and I
(27:57):
can't see you hitting 16 grandfor that.
But anyway, those things looknice and if you spend a lot of
time outside then someone wouldappreciate that.
But I just think that thepayback numbers are all wrong
because a brand new roof willsell a house.
I mean, ask every realtor thatwe work for that can't get a
house to move.
They put a new roof on it andit moves within a week and so
and I just think that the roofnumbers.
The average roof doesn't costanywhere near $30,000, more like
$8,000 to $10,000 on an averagesize home and if you do that,
(28:18):
7% of what the house value isdoesn't equate to what they're
saying here on these numbers.
But to comment on the other twothings that you mentioned HVAC
and window replacement they'renot incorporating the fact that
if you replace all your windows,especially in an older home,
with a brand new window,especially in an older home with
a brand new window.
The worst window you can buynow is better than the best
window you could buy 10 yearsago, because the energy code has
gotten so much more strict andthe HVAC systems, of course.
(28:42):
The SEER rating minimumrequirement is up to a 16 now,
so they are just so much moreefficient.
An electric heat pump can doalmost what a gas system could
do in the wintertime.
That is 10, 15 years ago, sothey have gotten so much better,
cheaper and more efficient thatI think a new HVAC system
should carry a lot more weightthan it does there.
And what they're not accountingfor is that it's going to lower
(29:05):
your both of those incombination.
Especially if you do airsealing around the windows like
we preach, those are going tolower your monthly utilities by
a couple hundred, if not more,dollars every single month.
So when you multiply thatnumber times the end game of a
30-year mortgage dude, it's wild.
You know you're spending alittle bit now to save a whole
lot down the road and I justthink that they're taking in the
(29:25):
initial cost to do it and whatsomebody they think somebody
would pay on, you know anincreased sale price.
But I think this whole list isjust garbage and every number on
here is skewed man.
Speaker 1 (29:36):
Well, I think somebody wanting to spend
$17,000 on lumber to improvetheir backyard is just.
They want people to go.
Hey man, you got a big deck outhere and they want to show off
their wood and I don't thinkthat that's worth the ROI right
there.
I see what you did there.
I gave an example before westarted the show.
I want someone consideringbuying a house to think this
(29:58):
which is more important, toprove that this list is kind of
junk If I were selling my houseand I said to you I have a brand
new wood deck out back and theroof is 10 years old, versus I
have a 10 year old wood deck outback, but I have a brand new
roof, which house are you goingto choose?
Speaker 2 (30:17):
Oh, the roof all day long.
I mean you've got a roof that'sgoing to be a 50-year warranty
and you've got a treated wooddeck that's going to be a
maintenance nightmare for yearsand years.
That's a yearly, if not everyother year, maintenance problem,
and so definitely, having thatroof we always talk about
roofing and heating and air arethe two big ticket items on your
house that are guaranteed towear out.
So I think those are the most.
(30:37):
I always tell people those arethe most two important things if
you're going to buy a house, tomake sure that the warranty is
documented or know when theinstallation happened, because
those are the two things thatare going to cost you down the
road.
Speaker 1 (30:46):
So if you have a house that you're thinking about
selling and you know your roofis due for a replacement or
maybe an inspection, it's agreat time to call Donnie,
because, again, he owns SureTopRoofing.
Or you can go to the websitesuretoproofingcom, get a free
inspection or get it on, because, as we just talked about, when
you have someone like Donniewho's a certified installer,
give you a new roof, you'regoing to get that money back.
(31:07):
If you're getting ready to sellyour house because, especially
with GAF, you have 50-yearwarranties the new buyer gets
that same warranty.
It comes along with the house.
Talk about a selling point.
Having a wood deck out back orhaving new handles on your front
door if you painted it barn redor bright canary yellow ain't
going to return a realinvestment on it.
But a roof will up-to-date HVACsystem, correct insulation, new
(31:31):
windows.
That is where your return is.
So this list is interesting butfor the most part I'm going to
give it a D minus for accuracyon the ROI Full agreement, man,
full agreement.
Speaker 2 (31:43):
So I just kind of wanted to burn through this,
because this is the stuff thatthe internet puts out there and
we live in the real world, andalso I filtered this list to be
tailored around our area.
So these are supposedly thehouse prices that would apply to
where we live, but I thinkthey're all out of whack and I
just anybody listening that wasthinking about doing a remodel
(32:03):
or improving their house or justanything DIY to improve the ROI
.
Don't go to the internet.
This is the real world stuffwe're putting out there.
Speaker 1 (32:10):
Yeah, this would be a great question for Donnie.
If you want to go to thewebsite,
thecarolinacontractorcom, clickon, ask the contractor.
And if you have a questionabout one of these renovations
or one of these remodeling jobsor something for an increased
ROI, go ahead and ask him.
Hey, if I do this in my house,what do you think the ROI?
He's building houses and he'saround them all day.
He knows what moves them andwhat increases their value.
(32:32):
So go ahead and give him aholler there at the website and
if you have any other questionsor comments about the show again
, you can do it atthecarolinacontractorcom.
We want to thank everybody fortuning in to the Football Turned
Contractor Show and we hope youtune in again next week for
updated scores in the NFL andsomething to do with your house.
So we'll see you next week.
(32:52):
I'm going to eat.
Say thanks everybody.
No-transcript.
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