Boosting Your Home's Value in a Down Market

With foreclosures reaching an all-time record in the third quarter, the housing market has been flooded with the highest number of single family homes up for sale since 1988. That glut, in combination with the ongoing credit crunch, helped to strip 5.7% off the value of the average U.S. home last year, according to Zillow.com, an online real estate service. Values could continue to dive well into 2008.

Even if you're not planning to sell your home anytime soon, you should be concerned about falling home prices. An estimate of your home's current value is a must for assessing homeowners insurance and property tax, as well as for planning your estate. It's also an important factor in figuring out which remodeling projects you should embark on now in order to get a bigger payoff in the long run.

If you seek to boost the value of your abode, make sure you don't overdo it. Now is not the time to dip into your home's equity or rack up credit-card debt to fund pricey remodeling projects.

Instead, choose projects that offer the most bang for the buck. Here are five ways to beef up your home's value without embarking on a costly and massive renovation.

Keep up with the Joneses. Find another outlet to express your individuality. To get the most money out of your home, you need to be in lockstep with your neighbors. "You don't want the biggest house on the block, or the nicest," says Sid Davis, author of "Home Makeovers That Sell." If most of the other homes on your block have laminate kitchen countertops and you splurge for granite, it's unlikely you'll get that money back in added value. Nor does it pay to be nonconformist. If all your neighbors' homes have designer kitchens, buyers will see replacing your olive green '70s-era refrigerator and oven as one more line on their tab.