Decorating with life - Creating a living homeWritten by William Berg
Decorating with life - Creating a living homeIn today’s hectic world it can be nice to create an oasis where you can relax and be sheltered from outside world. This can be created by using plants to create that calm more natural atmosphere. The feeling of serenity can be increased even more by adding other types of life to your decoration such as adding a tranquil aquarium which you can watch while relaxing. You should strive to create a home that is perfectly suited for you. There are however a few tips you might want to take to your heart while planning your new heaven. If you have luxury of choosing which room you should redecorate you should choose a room with a lot of windows, a warm colour is also preferable. This might seem strange seen you are trying to shelter yourself from world outside those windows for a minute or two. However benefits of getting light into room both for yourself and for plant you choose to use will more then compensate for disturbance that might be caused from windows. Once you have chosen which room to redecorate in order to create this sanctuary you should se which other things you want to keep in that room before you decide how to redecorate it. It might be things you need in that room to be able to relax. Perhaps you want to keep your TV in room to allow you to get entertained while relaxing or perhaps you want to redecorate your study to be a calm undisturbed place and need to keep a few things to be able to work. Once you decided what you need to keep you should remove everything else from room. Observe what free spaces you have got to fill. These spaces might be good places to but an aquarium or a terrarium if you want to keep both animals and plants in room. Personally I think aquariums have a more calming effect then almost everything else you can keep in a room. If you decide to decorate using an aquarium you should read about how to manage an aquarium and then buy one that suits your needs. Which fish to choose is completely dependent on your personality some prefer calm fishes to relax while other prefers predatory fish to relax?
| | Building a Home AdditonWritten by Mark J. Donovan
Besides providing your home with more living space, a home addition can be a terrific investment. However, before embarking on such a project homeowner should first consider several important items. These items include: home market values in neighborhood, financing, size and scale of project, architecture, timetable for completion, personal disruption/inconvenience threshold and sweat equity commitment level. Size of Addition and Market ValuePrior to actually breaking ground on a home addition, it is best to first determine what you are looking for in terms of additional living space. For example: How many square feet? What types of rooms? Once this is understood, it is then important to find out market value of homes in local area with similar size and features to new and improved home. With this information homeowner can then calculate difference between their current home market value and new and improved home market value. This difference should represent maximum budget for new addition if a positive investment is desired. For example, a homeowner would not want to spend $50,000 on a new home addition that provides only $25,000 in increased market value to improved home. Financing The next important question involves how to fund home addition. Unless project is being funded via cash/savings then financing will be required. If current mortgage rates are higher than existing mortgage, then a home equity loan will probably make most sense. If current mortgage rates are lower than existing mortgage, then refinancing entire home, including cost of home addition project, may make most sense. Architectural Considerations Once financial items have been addressed it is then time to focus on size and scale of project, as well as architectural and aesthetics of new addition. The addition should be of size and scale such that it aesthetically melds into original house. It should not be too small or too big. Frequently, homeowners get carried away and add large amounts of new living space without sufficient thought on outside appearance. From a market value, there is more to a home than just pure living space. A home needs to maintain its exterior aesthetics as well. It is important to consider such items as siding, doors, windows, rooflines, and elevations. All should meld into existing home exterior seamlessly and aesthetically.
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