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If you’re looking to add some resale value to your home and wonder what areas to focus on and which to definitely avoid, this article is for you.  It can be difficult (and quite expensive) to pinpoint the areas that need the most work, as different aspects of the house attract different buyers.  But there are a few places potential buyers look for first, which can help you decide where to focus the majority of your renovation budget.

1) Renovating the Kitchen

For around a hundred dollars, you can get a new faucet, add new handles to the cabinet door, and update lighting fixtures for a great feel.  If you have a higher budget, redo the cabinets completely and update the appliances, which will wow new potential buyers the moment they walk in.

To a majority of the people who search for new homes, the kitchen is the heart and soul of the whole place.  It’s the first place they go the moment they walk in the door. The kitchen/dining area is where families come together and bond, especially during the holiday seasons.  It’s where the magic happens. For a few hundred bucks, you can do a few updates to the kitchen to give it an improved and updated look.

2) Bathrooms. 

Bathrooms are often the second most important update in the house to potential buyers.  And the easiest to fix up. A new toilet seat and a re-grout of the tub may be all it needs.  Even new floor and wall tiles can be a quick, cheap way to give it a better, updated look.  

3) Add a room. 

Maybe you have a two-bedroom house and a den.  A small change may be all that’s needed to turn the den into a bedroom.  For example, maybe the difference is the den doesn’t have a closet. If you find a way to add the closet, suddenly you have a three-bedroom house and that’s much more valuable.  

4) Carpeting. 

Depending on how old the carpet is, it probably looks old and worn.  Even if it’s relatively new, a few years can really do a lot to make newish carpet look old.  You can rent professional cleaning equipment to spruce up the carpets in your home to give it a cleaner look.  If there are particularly bad spots of wear and tear, consider investing in new carpet or well-placed rugs to cover it up. 

Bad Renovations

5) Whirlpool baths, tubs, and saunas. 

These can be an attractive renovation feature, but in today’s economy and market, they can be considered as just too expensive to maintain, as well as the extra energy costs to run/use them. 

6) Personal additions. 

You love the additions you made to your home that suit your style.  For example, your taste in music and movies led you to install a state-of-the-art surround sound and home theater system.  Or the bar in the basement where you received guests. These are specialized, personal additions that may and often do not have any value to anyone other than you.  And thus, people will not pay a premium for a house because of these features.  

7) Wallpaper and paint. 

Just like adding personal renovation to the home, adding paint and wallpaper can turn away potential buyers.  A fresh coat of paint to update the feel of a room may not be a bad idea if it’s really worn, but don’t go crazy adding your own colors and getting it to look good.  Because again, it may look good to you, but not to them. They may feel the need to turn around and repaint or paper how they want it to look, making your attempt a waste of time and money.

Sometimes accidents happen.  The last place you want an injury to occur is in the workplace, potentially costing you time and money.  But some jobs are much tougher than others. The most common types of injuries in the workplace are sprains, usually caused by the lifting of heavy materials, as reported by The Travelers Companies. But that’s why Workers’ Comp exists

While slips, falls, and lifting injuries can be common in some jobs, there are other stories that tend to grab our attention. Not all Workers’ Comp stories are the same, as you’re about to find out. Here are 5 Famous (and often strange) Workers’ Comp stories.

Case #1: The Vending Machine of Steel

We’ve all spent some time trying to woo a member of the opposite sex.  We try to talk to them, buy them little treats, and often remind them how cool we are by doing dumb things we think will win us brownie points.  Often times, we end up looking foolish and the whole thing blows up in our face.  

That’s exactly what Clinton Dwyer was doing when he sustained a fractured hip that left him out of work for an undetermined amount of time.  Yes, Mr. Dwyer injured himself trying to impress a certain lady in his office, but not for a selfish reason. He was trying to free a bag of chips from the office vending machine…a bag of chips he was going to give to his lady of interest.  

It’s unknown how hard you have to shake a vending machine to fracture your hip, but this guy did it.  As a result, he filed for workman’s comp and won the case! The judge decided in his favor because he sought out the comfort of a co-worker by getting her chips when she was hungry. This makes it office and not personal related.  Interesting Workers’ Comp story.

Case #2: The Damn Dog Led to Workers’ Comp

For those of us who own pets, you know it’s downright impossible for them NOT to hang out around our feet and demand attention 24/7.  It’s in the pet ownership rulebook to make sure where you’re walking or something bad might happen. That something bad happened to Mary Sandberg.  She broke her wrist trying to make her way into the garage.  

You might wonder how a trip to the garage in her own home would result in Mary winning a Workers’ Comp case. As it turns out, she’s a decorator for J.C. Penny.  What she had in her garage were many fabric samples she was storing there. This made her home protected territory as long as she was doing her job there. 

Case #3: The Sex Lamp

A woman in Australia (name unknown) recently went on a business trip and while there, busted her face with a lamp attached to the wall.  How did she manage such an incredible feat? By having crazy sex that resulted in said broken lamp breaking off and smacking her. Of course, she filed for workman’s comp, which her place of employment fought.

Their thinking was that the sex wasn’t an ordinary act of the business trip, but the judge decided that no agreement was made beforehand about her conduct while on the business trip, so she won! Fancy that. Awarded Workers’ Comp for having sex on the job.

Case #4: A Man and His Bear

It must be pretty awesome (and terrifying) to work with bears on a daily basis.  Brock Hopkins, a bear feeder at Great Bear Adventures in Montana, gets to do exactly that.  You’d think a job like that would require a person to come to work with a sober and clear mind.  But that’s exactly what Brock didn’t do.

Finishing off his pot stash before work, Brock decided to have a little fun with a particular bear.  And when he ended up getting mauled and losing a part of his butt cheek, he was awarded $65,000 in Workers’ Comp damages to cover his medical bills.

Case #5: The Price is Wrong

Who hasn’t dreamed of one day turning that big wheel on The Price is Right? We can only hope it lands on the famous $1 to get that free spin.  That’s what Cathy Cashwell of North Carolina did in 2009. Using her whole upper body strength, she gave that wheel a good push and round it went. 

The only problem is, she was supposed to be out of work due to an upper-body injury. She was collecting the workman’s comp money while appearing on the show.  Oops! She pled guilty to fraud. There were also pictures posted to her Facebook of her zip-lining that were used against her as well. 

No one likes a trade war. It is essentially two powerful country raising taxes on its own citizens. But that doesn’t mean they’re not effective at getting things done. While many people understand that China has crossed the line, they also don’t like paying more for goods. It’s not good for anyone when the world’s top two strongest economies are butting heads.

The U.S. has taken steps to cut Chinese imports by as much as a quarter. That totals to around $35 billion so far. The move has also increased prices for American consumers. That’s a bad thing going into the 2019 holiday season. While the trade war has been going on for 16 months, there is some optimism a deal might be coming soon. Hopefully that’s just not wishful thinking.

“Overall, the results indicate that the United States tariffs on China are economically hurting both countries,” the report said. “United States losses are largely related to the higher prices for consumers, while China’s losses are related to significant export losses.” So, while both countries have lost money, it would appear the tariffs are doing what Trump wants them to do.

The Trade War and Its Impact

The industries hurt the most is Chinese manufacturing. They’ve been hit with $15 billion in losses. As Trump continued to increase the tariffs, the losses have been growing. As Chinese manufacturing was down, other countries really helped to fill the void. Specifically, Taiwan really won the most by taking in an additional $4.2 billion.

Mexico has also increased the amount of trade with the U.S. They hoped to reap some of the benefits and they have. The country has made an additional $3.5 billion from machinery and agriculture. For China, it’s looking more and more like those losses will be a permanent. They’ve been hit so hard their economy will struggle to recover.

“The longer the trade war goes on, the more likely these losses and gains will be permanent,” Nicita said. Not all of Chinese trade losses were picked up by other economies and billions of dollars in trade were lost entirely. This might be why China is now willing to come back to negotiations.

Make no mistake, China is a proud country. They won’t concede defeat, but hopefully the trade war will end very soon. If it goes on any longer, it could have disastrous implications for our economy.