Adding Value to your Property with Landscaping

Motivation

Adding value to your property with effective landscaping is easy to achieve if you follow a few simple rules. Whether it is your home or an investment property, adding value will be a key consideration when looking to design the garden and construct it. The main elements when adding value are aesthetics, budget and low maintenance.

Questions to ask yourself – aesthetics

When looking at how to design or renovate your garden you will need to consider what elements the garden needs – A seating area?  A lawn?  Low maintenance plants?  Storage areas?

The golden rule – low maintenance!

As a rule of thumb when looking to renovate for sale and in adding value you want to create a low maintenance garden. People want easy care, they generally don’t want to be spending their entire weekend in the garden in their free time! Low maintenance gardens will appeal to buyers and renters alike, increasing the value of your property.

How do I design a low maintenance garden area?  Here are a few landscape design secrets to achieving a satisfying and successful garden design:

Practicality

A practical garden design for a property needs to be thought out carefully.

Here are a few landscape design tricks and tips – Firstly what practical functions do you need your house and garden to achieve?  A seating area, lawn for the kids to play on, a vegetable patch or a chicken coop.

These practical areas need to be designed around so that the garden seamless flows between the various utilitarian areas, keeping in mind the aesthetics of the garden.  A practical low maintenance garden need not be an ugly garden!

Plant for impact

Use hardy, colourful foliage plants for year round appeal.  Plant your plants in groupings to add impact. Over planting narrow garden beds adds depth to the perimeters of the garden, making the boundaries feel further away and the garden space seem larger.

Decking v Paving

A seating/dining area is essential in the garden these days.  Pavers will require less maintenance than a deck, so consider that as an alternative for a seating area. All these elements can be easily achieved by a DIY gardener, with careful research and planning.

Garden style or feel

The framework of your garden is entirely up to you – whether formal or informal.  A garden design that is open and free form style may have the same maintenance regime as a formal garden depending on the elements that you use/put in.   Remember that rigid straight lines and formal hedges do require some upkeep to maintain that look so to reduce that impact, use slow growing hedge plants to work within that.

A paved courtyard can be warm and inviting if planted out with plenty of foliage. Add contrasting clumps of foliage to create interest and excitement to the planting design such as lush foliage boundary screening plants eg murrayas and viburnum and plant in front of these colourful ornamental grasses such as fountain grass or colourful flaxes.

Winding, flowing pathways also add a sense of intrigue to any garden.

To turf or not to turf, that is the question!

Decide if you even need a lawn at all.  Remember that the choice of grass drives the water usage so be comfortable with the practicality of your choice and if you have dogs/kids/shade, you need to factor that in.

Water features – do you need it?

Water features tend to require ongoing maintenance, so avoid using these in a low maintenance garden. Bird baths, are however, easier to maintain as you may only need to flush out any build up of leaves etc once in a while.

Follow these simple landscaping tips and you can help increase your property value, make a property easier to sell, or increase your rent.

Some tips for low maintenance plants

Do not skimp on this aspect as plants make or break your garden.  All low maintenance gardens are at their best when planted with a full display of garden plants set out in layers including small trees, shrubs, perennials and ground covers, including the following low maintenance plants:

Feature trees – Crepe Myrtle, Cercis

Hedging species – Box hedge, Viburnum, Coastal Rosemary, Lilly pillys, Camelias

Climbers – Star Jasmine, Ivy

Fruit trees – Citrus for evergreen, Stone fruits (deciduous)

Grasses – Fountain Grass, Native Grasses, Flaxes

General shrubs – Murraya, Camelias, Liriopes

Groundcovers – Ajuga, Mondo Grass

Perennials of choice

Bulbs of choice

Herbs

If you like what we do and are needing help in designing your garden, please contact us for an onsite 90 minute consultation.  We charge $220.00 for the visit and can subsequently quote on project managing the entire transformation for you within your budget.

If you like some additional reading try this article.

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