Home depot

Property experts reveal the £40 plant that can add 5% to the value of your home

May 29, 2023 by www.dailymail.co.uk Leave a Comment

Wisteria, currently in full bloom across the UK, could add up to 5 per cent to the price of your home – so smitten are homebuyers with the look of the trailing purple flowers.

Last year the Royal Horticultural Society (RHS) reported a surge in demand for the English garden favourite, which gently grows across brickwork before exploding into colour in the spring.

It’s a staple in British period dramas, with the Netflix series Bridgerton apparently sparking a huge demand for pots of it after the latest season aired in 2022.

Flowering for weeks on end between April and June – and occasionally offering a second flourish at the summer’s end, wisteria can transform the way a home looks when it blooms.

Add in a fragrant scent, and it’s little wonder that homeowners are seduced by the flower when potentially considering a property purchase.

Homebuyers are often led by the dream of a forever home, and a well-established Wisteria plant – with ambrosial scent – can be hugely enticing, says garden expert Rosebie Morton (stock image)

A well-established standard wisteria plant costs around £40 but estate agents have predicted it could add up to 5 per cent on to the value of a home – offering a handsome return.

Rosebie Morton, founder of The Real Flower Company, says people looking for the dream home are often seduced by an ambrosial exterior aesthetic.

She tells FEMAIL: ‘Buying a home can be an incredibly emotional process and there’s plenty of research connecting scent and emotion.

‘Not only does wisteria look beautiful, it’s a highly fragrant flower with musky notes which linger in the air, evoking a sense of being in the English countryside no matter where you are.

‘Potential buyers experiencing this as they walk through your front door are already associating the property with positivity and forming an emotional connection to the home.’

She warns though that the plant is slow-maturing so buying a pot now and hoping for instant blooms is unlikely to happen: ‘Those looking to recreate the effect could be waiting up to five years for the plant to bloom, depending on how it was bought or grown.

‘However, to have a fully matured wisteria plant adorning the front of a house or doorway could be as attractive as a house with a loft conversion or en-suite for some buyers.’

And the plant is also great for the rest of your garden, says Sam Jenkinson, a garden expert at shed specialist Tiger.

A well-established standard wisteria plant costs around £40 but estate agents have predicted it could add up to 5 per cent on to the value of a home – offering a handsome return (stock image)

He says: ‘Wisteria has a long history in British gardening culture and the quintessential associations it holds brings a touch of nostalgia and heritage to a traditional home or garden.

‘As well as looking beautiful, Wisteria flowers attract bees, butterflies, and other pollinators, contributing to the biodiversity of a garden which is hugely relevant in the gardening world right now has the re-wilding trend continues to grow.’

HOW WISTERIA CAN ADD VALUE TO YOUR HOME

USE IT TO FRAME OUTDOOR LIVING SPACE

Sam revealed: ‘Wisteria can be used to create inviting outdoor living spaces.

‘By planting wisteria near a seating area or near garden buildings or pergolas to crawl up, homeowners can enjoy its shade, fragrance, and beauty while relaxing or entertaining outdoors.

‘Such well-designed outdoor spaces can increase the usable area of a home and contribute to its overall value.

A NATURAL PRIVACY SCREEN

‘Wisteria can act as a natural privacy screen when grown along fences, walls, or trellises.

‘Its dense foliage and climbing habit can provide a sense of seclusion and add privacy to a home’s outdoor areas.

‘This feature can be especially appealing for potential buyers looking for privacy in their backyard.

MEMORABILITY FACTOR

‘Homes with well-maintained gardens and attractive landscaping tend to have higher market appeal.

‘Wisteria, with its aesthetic charm and association with traditional English gardens, can contribute to the overall appeal of a property.

‘It can make a home more memorable and desirable to potential buyers, potentially leading to a higher sale price or faster sale.’

We’re sick of our newbuild home as builders have been using the garage for five YEARS – now we’re taking drastic action

May 29, 2023 by www.thesun.co.uk Leave a Comment

A FED-UP family have revealed they’re taking drastic action after builders used their dream newbuild’s garage for five years.

Oliver Sims, his wife and three children have still not set foot in their outhouse – almost five years after buying their home .

The garage has been used by home builder Strata to flog homes on a new estate in Hull .

Oliver claimed the developer had told them they would need the showroom office “for a year and a half tops”.

Strata say Oliver signed a ryder allowing the company legal use of the garages up to December 2025.

Yet despite all properties on the site being sold, the garage is still yet to be handed over to the NHS worker and his family.

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And contractors are yet to landscape their front garden – which had been used as a car park for potential customers.

Oliver, 32, told Sun Online: “I’ve owned the garage for five years and I’ve never even been inside.

“The whole thing has been absolutely laughable.

“We’ve had enough of it. I think we’re probably going to look to sell, to be honest.

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“Once we get the garage, we will be going. I can’t see us staying here.”

The Sims family were told on moving day in July 2018 that their home was not ready because their garage was housing a sales centre.

But in a desperate attempt to stop the sale from falling through, Oliver signed papers allowing the Strata to use his garage and driveway.

The company says the contract allowed them to use it until December 2025 – though Oliver claims he was told it would be his within 18 months.

“Once we get the garage, we will be going. I can’t see us staying here

Oliver Sims

While builders have now replaced the show home windows with traditional garage doors, flooring has not been laid.

And the former car park where his front lawn should be is currently piled with mud.

Oliver said: “The only reason we accepted the deal was because this was the last of this particular house type and we really wanted it.

“We didn’t want our house sale to fall through or end up homeless.”

While he said at the time of buying the house they could last a year with a garage he added they never thought it would go on for so long – and they still don’t have timescale.

Oliver said prospective customers parking outside his house sometimes forced him and his wife to park 10-minute walk from home.

And he told how youths have taken lumps of mud from what should be his front garden to hurl at houses.

‘NOWHERE TO PARK’

He added: “We’ve always had the stress of having nowhere to park.

“I’ve got three young children and we were given nowhere else to park so we had to abandon our cars down the road.

“Or we’ve had to ask customers in the Strata office to move their cars so we could park outside our home.”

Oliver has vowed not to buy another new build – and “definitely not” from Strata.

He said: “If we had known they were going to use the garage for that length of time we would have looked elsewhere.

“I can’t say that we didn’t know there was going to be some length of time they’d be in there, but we never thought it would be for this long.

“Covid obviously caused a bit of a delay but they’ve really taken liberties with us.

“It’s been like pulling teeth trying to get a timescale.

Strata said it was currently in the process of reverting the office to a garage and creating the front garden.

But Oliver, who hopes to finally store bikes for his children in the garage, said the experience had soured owning the four-bed semi.

‘I’VE JUST HAD ENOUGH’

He added: “My wife is a bit more pragmatic than I am but because I work from home, I’ve just had enough of it.

“It’s a shame because we do like the house. But I’ve just had enough.

“I want to get into an established house – not a new build.”

Strata said in a statement that the buyers of the plots relating to the garages had signed a ryder, saying that Strata had use of the garages up to December 2025.

While it was unable to share the signed copies of the legal paperwork due to GDPR reasons, it said the ryder included details that Mr Sims had agreed to allow the company to use the garage and driveway until 2015.

They added: “Once the Company has finished the garages will be instated to garages at the company expense.”

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Strata added: “With regards to the remaining works to be carried out in preparation for handover, the customers have received communication from Strata advising that the works would begin on March 13, 2023, and would last approximately three weeks.

“Unfortunately due to adverse weather conditions throughout March & April, the works have been slightly delayed and are currently a high priority for the Hull site team to complete as soon as possible.”