As so many people were forced to work from home during the pandemic, the existence of home offices multiplied greatly.
Although working from home was on the rise anyway before the pandemic, its existence in homes accelerated enormously during the last two years. With nearly half of all working people in the UK working from home in 2021, home offices have become a staple of today’s houses.
With the ability to have a stable internet connection anywhere in the world and the existence of top quality team communication software and collaboration tools, you do not need to be in the same office anymore to communicate as a team effectively.
That is why building a home office is becoming more popular with more people than ever before. Whether turning a spare bedroom into a dedicated office, renovating the garage or changing the garden shed, home offices can be built anywhere; easily and effectively and for a potentially reasonable cost.
Not only do home offices save your sanity whilst all the family are in the house together, they can have long-term benefits to the resale value of your home.
Does a Home Office Add Value to A House?
On average adding a home office to your house can increase the sale on price of your house by 5-10%. There are other home improvements too, which can add different levels of value to a house, including:
- Loft conversions
- Redecorating
- Double glazing
- Landscape gardening
- Home insulation
The amount that a home office, much like other home improvements and renovations adds to your house depends on the location of the office space, the amount of resources you dedicate to it and how it fits in with the rest of the house.
Why Does a Home Office Add Value?
A home office can feasibly add value to your house because it provides a dedicated work space for the new owners to use for their office.
Although many people are still working from home for the majority of the time, new home owners will not have to dedicate time to creating an office space and instead use the one that you have already built. Alternatively, the home office can be converted into something else, for example, the space can be converted into:
- A home gym
- A utility room
- Storage space
- A guest suite (subject to local planning permission)
Where Should My Home Office Go?
A home office can be built and situated in a variety of different parts of the property which may include:
Spare Bedroom – A common place for home offices to be placed is in a spare bedroom in the house. This, however, will not have much effect, positively or negatively on the value of your house.
This is simply seen as another bedroom regardless of a reconfiguration into a home office and therefore if you want an easy home office rebuild, a spare bedroom is great but it will not add much if anything to the resale value of the house.
Unused Space – Unused spaces within the house are the best places to put your home office if you are looking to add value to the home.
Places such as your loft, your garage or even your conservatory are great places to add a home office. How much this increases your home value depends on a number of factors. However, when looking to sell your property certainly adding a home office as a loft conversion can raise the price of your house up to 8%.
Garden Shed or Extensions – If neither of these options are available then it might be possible to add a home office through outside of the home itself.
One way that you can do this is by converting your garden shed into a home office. Although it may cost a little bit more, having a garden home office can increase your price of property up to 5% allowing you to cover the costs of building it and more. It is always important to check whether you need planning permission in order to do this. You will need permission to build an extension and they can cost a lot just for a home office, but if you need more space an extension is guaranteed to increase the value of your home.
