When you decide to build your dream home, builders usually have modifications or enhancements you can select from to embellish the base model. Always remember that whatever options you choose, a smart home owner always considers their house in the context of the neighborhood in which is sits.

Just keep in mind when making choices that it is possible to “over-improve”, which means that you will be potentially owning the fanciest house in the subdivision. While this might give you some personal satisfaction, it might not payoff when sales time comes around.

With a lot more enhancements than your neighbors, buyers might be willing to pay a little more for your house, but certainly not 30 to 50% more. Adding options offered by a builder like high speed Internet connections or recessed lighting, a furnished basement, additional bathrooms, or hardwood versus carpeting, will definitely add value to your new home and will make living there better for you.

Just keep in mind, though, that when buyers are looking for a home they are following that old saying “the best value is to buy the least expensive house in the best neighborhood you can afford”.

That said, living in a house with nice amenities and conveniences is more fun than living in one that is strictly barebones and generic. So, you need to strike a balance between what you think would really be great and what you would actually use or enjoy on a regular basis. For example, whirlpool baths with jets sound great; but, let’s face it, 99.9% of the time people use showers. Bath tubs, even the fanciest of them, are generally used once every two or three months, if that much unless there are small children in the house. So you need to decide if the cost is worth the use it will get.

There is an upside to having more, rather than less in terms of possible options, however. Keep in mind that, although too many enhancements or high end amenities might not provide as much additional value to the house as you may wish, they will probably make your house sell faster if it is priced similarly to other houses in the area that are going up for sale.