How did we add a significant amount of livable square footage and increase our listed home from 1,300 to 1,550 finished square feet in just 48 hours? No overnight addition was built. We simply added a permanent heat source to our existing sunroom—and now it counts as livable square footage.
A realtor friend told us that in Richmond, rooms only need to be heated (not necessarily cooled) to qualify as “finished” square footage. That meant the only thing keeping our largest room—the sunroom—from being included in the official total was a heat source. We contacted several electricians for estimates to hardwire and install a six-foot baseboard heater. That type of heater should keep the room comfortably warm on cool days, assuming the sliding doors are closed. The lowest bid was $250, and the heater was installed within 48 hours. Our former three-season room can now be used year-round.
Here’s the breaker box during the installation:
We’re glad we didn’t try to DIY this one. Working on the main breaker while the house was on the market felt risky, and the installers had to drill through the sunroom’s concrete floor and run wiring through the basement and crawl space. Leaving it to professionals was the right call.
The most satisfying part? Updating our listing flyers from 1,300 to 1,550 square feet. That improves our dollars-per-square-foot metric and ensures the house appears in searches with a 1,500-square-foot minimum. Our sunroom has always been one of the best rooms in the house, and it felt wrong that it didn’t count before. That issue is now resolved—sunroom: you count.
We like the clean look of the baseboard heater installed along the foot of the brick wall. Its simple dial—off, low, med, and high—makes it easy to heat the room whenever needed.
A one-room heat pump would have been a pricier option, with estimates between $2,000 and $3,000, but our realtor recommended the baseboard heater as a straightforward and cost-effective solution. For most sunrooms, a baseboard heater is all that’s required. That’s how we gained 250 finished square feet for roughly a dollar per square foot.
Have you ever finished a nearly-finished space to sell or to enjoy? We’re a bit regretting that it took us this long to install the baseboard—our sunroom is a favorite and could have seen more use over the past four winters.
Note: If you pursue this route, get an impartial appraisal so the updated square footage is verified and documented. You may also need to notify your county about the expanded square footage and adjust property tax records. We already pay taxes on the sunroom, garage, basement, and other unfinished areas, but we’ll double-check that everything is properly recorded for this newly counted area. Rules vary by location, so confirm local requirements before making changes.