Some real estate agents believe that selling a Louisville house with a pool acts as a deterrent to at least 50% of home buyers. While some agents may not agree with this percentage, almost all will agree that selling a home with a pool is harder to sell than one without.
Here are the main reasons why many people are not interested in owning a Louisville home with a pool.
1. Children’s safety
Drowning is a major concern for parents of toddlers and many choose to avoid having a Louisville house with a pool for just this reason. Even having a fence and a safety system in place cannot guarantee 100% that a mistake won’t happen.
2. Maintenance
It takes a lot of work to maintain a pool. If you hire a company or an individual to keep your pool clean, you’ll still have to vacuum it between cleanings. If the pool company only comes once a week, you’ll have to vacuum it at least once between visits. If you decide to clean the pool yourself, it involves a time commitment that cannot be broken.
The cost of maintaining a pool is very expensive. Every 10 years the pool will need to be resurfaced (or a new pool liner) and this can cost $5000 and up, depending on the size of the pool. Hiring a company to clean your pool will average about $500 monthly and this may or may not include the pool supplies. Chemicals can run over $1000 per year and the costs will run higher if any repairs need to be made.
3. Cost of damage
If the pool is not maintained it will become stained due to an overgrowth of algae. If it is totally neglected it will begin cracking due to lack of calcium. It would cost more than $10,000 to get the pool repaired at this point.
If you think that you may want to put your house up for sale within the next five years or so, you may want to rethink any plans you have of installing a new pool. It may slow down the sale of your home in the future because many buyers stay away from a Louisville house with a pool.
Advice
Once the pool is in, removing it is not likely a good solution. The best advice is to keep the pool in tip-top shape and list your home at the beginning of pool season. That’s the time of year when having a pool is a major plus… go ahead and promote it!
