Curb appeal is important. If your home doesn’t look stunning from the outside, you’ll attract fewer potential buyers and your home value will not increase much over time. One way to increase your curb appeal is to replace your siding. However, siding is not just aesthetic – it’s functional.
Have you ever wondered why home improvement gurus stress the importance of siding? It’s not just for looks – here are four other reasons to prioritize your siding.
1. Siding can increase your home’s energy efficiency
Energy efficiency is a buzzword these days, but it’s actually an important factor to consider regarding your home. In short,energy efficient siding will save you money.
When your home is energy efficient, it will retain heat and cold when you run your heater or air conditioner. This means you won’t have to keep your HVAC system running all the time just to gain a little bit of temperature control.
It doesn’t matter if you’re using central heat, an HVAC system, or space heaters/free standing air conditioners. When you run your heating and cooling systems less frequently, you’ll save money on electricity or whatever fuel you use (like natural gas or propane).
2. Great siding can increase your home’s resale value
An excellent siding job can increase your home’s resale value. In addition to making your home aesthetically pleasing, a great siding job that is also energy efficient and durable will increase the value based on its practicality.
It’s not uncommon for home sellers to redo their siding before putting their homes on the market. Replacing or repairing your siding will leave a stronger impression on potential buyers, but once they learn how durable your siding is, they’ll be even more impressed.
3. Siding keeps the elements and termites out of your home
When you look at traditional siding, have you ever wondered who designed it that way? It’s hard to imagine someone sat down and decided to affix thousands of strips to the front of a house just for the design.
Siding wasn’t created for its looks – it was created to protect a home from the elements and destructive bugs. As we’ve gotten used to looking at siding over the years, the unique design has become a normal part of a home’s design, but it was created from a practical need.
Termites are the last thing you want to have in your home. While they don’t technically eat wood, they shred it as they build their colonies, which weakens the structure of your home over time. Depending on how bad the infestation is, you could end up with part of your house collapsing.
The easiest way to keep termites out is by installing siding designed to keep them out. As long as you don’t have cracks in your baseboards and you get regular inspections, you probably won’t need to worry about termites.
4. Siding was designed to protect homes
Each type of siding offers a different level of protection and comes with different maintenance needs. For example, vinyl siding is the most popular type, and it’s easy to repair, but if your home is exposed to high heat, it will require more maintenance than usual.
Regardless of what kind of siding you have, it needs to protect your home from rain, wind, the heat of the sun, fire, termites, and rot. You can get all these benefits from fiber cement siding, although it will cost a little more than vinyl.
5. The right siding can help you with insurance claims
Most homeowners insurance policies will cover wind and hail damage.Both of these can damage your siding. If your siding was already in poor shape or cheap, you won’t get much money if you file a claim. That means you’ll have to spend money out of pocket to replace your siding with something more substantial.
If you get better siding to start with, you won’t need to go through all the hassle of having your siding destroyed in a storm and then dealing with an insurance claim that won’t pay out much. Granted, your brand-new siding could also be damaged in a hail or rainstorm, but if that’s the case, you’ll get more compensation from your insurance company to cover the cost of replacement or repair.
6. Siding is one of the most important, yet overlooked elements of a home
Few things are more important than good siding. You can have the most beautiful home in the world, but if your siding job is bad, you can expect damage to your home.
Article Submitted By Community Writer
