How much value does a garden add to a property?

[Didimum]

Thinking ahead to remortgaging (next year). I was wondering if anyone had any experience or an educated guess as to what % increase you can expect on a property by adding a garden that previously didn’t have one.

We bought the house last year – a family home. The ‘back garden’ was a fully concreted space/drive way with a dilapidated double garage (unusable), open to the road. For this reason, the house struggled to sell. It sat on the market for a year and was lowered in asking price twice. It last had been sold in 1970. We turned the ‘driveway’ into a proper landscaped garden by walling it off from the road and also retained a driveway. The garden is around 900sq ft. We got rid of the garage, but do have both a loft, cellar and added garden storage.

Any ideas? Thanks!

If the land you are now using as an enclosed garden was previously open to the public that could be a problem that would prevent you selling.

Its all relative.
Depends on who wants the place - are they renting it out - is it a family house - what the area is like and what its close to - its all relaltive
you need to determine if your place is large enough to attract a family with young children - to be blunt - if the house is in a nice area, had charachter and was to our taste or had the potential and being sold at the right prcie, we/anyone would buy

its maket forces, supply ad demand and being in the right place at the right time -

EG, a place we rent out, 2 buglaows sold recently one doen up well and really lovely ready to move in, other had not been touched since the 60's - done up on sale higher price, both chai free - guess what, both sold for almost the same price - just shows timing and who wants what and how desperate one is to sell.

only you can decide but ask an estate agent, they will tell you not to re-do garden as they only get money when sale is completed and do not want delysa

only you can decide

If you care to do the maths, your insurance values your house, your purchase price valued the house and land, subtract one from the other and you are left with land value. Then you can divide by square meterage if you want to try to get accurate local comparisons.

Roughly.

This.
If it's a remortgage they won't be the slightest bit interested. They will do a desktop valuation based on the value at purchase and the % change in the area based on other properties.

Yes, presumably it could be a planning issue to enclose it. Hopefully the OP has already done the work on that.

I would pay more for a nice garden but how much more is relative to overall price and local comparables. We bought a house with a big garden, about 45mlong and 15m wide. It was a bit of a mess. The bottom 3rd was an enclosed concrete dog run, the other 3rd was an orchard where the trees had died. We flattened it, decked the 3rd of it, built a pergola, enclosed hot tub and outdoor kitchen. Lawned the rest and re-fenced the whole garden. Added shrubs etc.

We're not planning on moving but I'd say the house is a lot more sellable because of the improved garden and would achieve a slightly higher asking price. We have a double garage so didn't need to touch that.

When I say open to the public, I mean not walled or fenced, similar to a front garden. It is not a public thoroughfare nor did anyone have right of way across it or to use it. So that’s not an issue.

Sounds beautiful! When trying to research, it was widely said that landscaping an ‘ugly’ garden could add as much as 30% to a sale price. So I don’t accept some saying here that turning a 30sqm concrete ‘driveway’ into a nice landscaped garden when there was none wouldn’t add value, especially as we retained a driveway too.

Yes, there’s no issue there at all.

We’ve had mortgage lender round before when remortgaging previous properties.

If there is already planning for the garage, you could consider replacing it with a home office type stand alone on that footprint (if that is allowed in your area) and depending on the size of your house. A separate workshop / office / gym / playroom can add value.

Exactly. I’m just wondering how much, because a garden isn’t comparable to a kitchen in terms of use. I can only find data on grass only garden to nice landscaped garden price differences, which points to around 20%.

When we remortgaged our last property, the lender came round for a valuation. It was not a garden that time, but another significant improvement.

It’s not really needed as the house contains ample areas for the above. A garden was all it was ‘missing’.

The work is done and we’re not moving. It’s just curiosity at this point. I’m not looking to make money on it.

Yes, it’s a large family home in a desirable location. Essentially, from what we can deduce from investigation, the garden used to be completely enclosed by walls (circa 1960s) and the walls were knocked down, garden concreted and garage added. The house is in an area where driveways aren’t common, so this is probably why they did it, but they sacrificed the entire garden to give the house a driveway.

I think some of the answers are not answering the question you asked. They are giving a value of a house with no garden v a house in a larger plot with a garden.

you had the plot, all you’ve done is landscaping.

so your question should be how much value does landscaping add to an existing plot.

and that is very difficult to answer. It makes it more sellable. More attractive, more likely to be viewed, but actual value? That’s more difficult, especially as you got rid of the garage, instead of making it usable. A loft/celler/shed doesn’t make up for that.

getting rid of the double garage has likely reduced the value. You’ve not said really if it was unrenovatable, which is unlikely.

so removing it, may have reduced the value more than the landscaping increased it.

That’s clearly inaccurate. Think about it, two houses on one street. Both fairly similar one garden is laid to lawn, the other well landscaped. You don’t habe one sell for 500k and the landscaped one for 600k. You must know this. No one would pay that much extra as it costs so much less to do it yourself.

however that’s not your issue. Your issue is you had tne plot. You’ve landscaped it, but you’ve got rid of a double garage and not replaced. That’s the biggest impact.

‘Ugly’ garden to nice landscaped garden seems to be about up to 20% value added from research.

The homes in my area do not have garages so I don’t think it’s an issue in this particular location.

It’s ‘up to’ 20% so there is a range, considering the type of work done and changes made. Similar to turning front lawn into a driveway in an area where driveways come at a premium. In my last area, adding a driveway certainly drove the price up by a very significant %.

As I said, garages are not at a premium here.

I wouldn’t buy a house without a garden and mature trees in it.

Plastic grass would be a deal breaker though as the soil underneath will be dead/polluted.

it's a good question. we looked at a property with a small-medium sized garden that was triangular in shape. It was a probate property and below market price. We still passed on it. That garden made us see that the garden was important to us.

In my last area, adding a driveway certainly drove the price up by a very significant %.
Unless the house is extremely low value to begin with, this seems unlikely.
Laying a driveway isn’t either particularly expensive or hard work.
As pp have pointed out, the land is already there, it’s just a (relatively minor) change of use.

I tried to tell my parents this when they committed to fake grass! Separate issue of course, as we had ours turfed, but do you know if you can just replace the topsoil and grow a healthy lawn again? My sister tried to grow lawn over where an old patio used to be in her garden and had trouble, but I suspect the ground wasn’t properly prepared.

Unless the house is extremely low value to begin with, this seems unlikely.

In my previous area the difference between a house with no driveway and a driveway was around 75K–100k, and this was on houses sold for £500–600k in the south east. It was a dense area with a lot of market activity so we saw it very commonly over the 5-6yrs we were there. I’m not trying to argue with you, but it was what it was whether someone thinks it’s unlikely or not.

I have read quite frequently that lockdown turned gardens and types of gardens into more of an asset than they were previously, and that continues now due to WFH.