Construction & Renovation Services in Country Hills & Harvest Hills

Golf course frontage is a permanent amenity that no amount of development can replicate, and your renovation should treat it as the home's primary asset. Start with the rooms that face the course. If your kitchen, living room, or primary bedroom faces the fairways, the renovation should maximize the connection: larger windows (or floor-to-ceiling glazing if the structure permits), sight lines that draw the eye from the entry toward the view, and finish choices that don't compete with the outdoor scenery (neutral palettes, clean lines, uncluttered layouts). If your home has a walkout basement facing the course, finishing that space is potentially the highest-return renovation in the house. A walkout basement with 8+ foot ceilings, full-width windows or patio doors, and at-grade access to the backyard creates a living level that functions like a main floor — and the golf course view makes it a premium space. A well-finished walkout with view: $60,000-$100,000, creating a home that's effectively two main floors of living space. Deck construction or expansion on the course side is high-value but should be designed for privacy and wind protection. Golf courses are public spaces — golfers and maintenance vehicles will be visible from your deck. A covered or partially screened outdoor living space ($25,000-$50,000) provides the view while adding the shelter and privacy that makes the space usable. Window upgrades on the course-facing elevation alone can be a targeted investment: triple-pane, oversized windows ($8,000-$15,000 for the course-facing wall) improve thermal performance, reduce noise from the course, and frame the view with clean modern sightlines. The return on this investment is amplified by the view — the same windows on a non-view elevation would be a standard efficiency upgrade, but on the course side they transform the living experience.

If you live in Harvest Hills, the former golf course's redevelopment is the single most significant change your community will experience, and it will affect your property whether you're adjacent to the course or not. For properties directly adjacent to the former course: you previously had a green buffer — open space, views, and a guarantee that no one would build next to your backyard. That guarantee ended when the course closed in 2016. The redevelopment will introduce new homes, potentially multi-family buildings, and new traffic on streets that were designed for the existing community's density. Your rear-yard privacy will change, your views may change, and the character of your immediate surroundings will evolve. The impact on adjacent property values is uncertain. In some Calgary redevelopments, adjacent homeowners have seen property values increase as new amenities (parks, commercial, community facilities) replace underutilized land. In others, the increased density has depressed values for immediately adjacent homes while lifting values for the broader community. For the broader Harvest Hills community: the redevelopment will add population, which may support new commercial services, improved transit, and community amenities. It will also add traffic and change the community's suburban character. What to do now: monitor the City's Area Structure Plan amendment process for the golf course lands. Attend public engagement sessions. If you're planning a renovation, don't let the uncertainty paralyze you — the redevelopment will take years to complete, and your renovation investment in the meantime serves your current living quality regardless of what gets built next door. If you're considering selling, the timing question depends on your risk tolerance: sell now for certainty about the community's current character, or wait for the redevelopment to add amenities and potentially lift values. There's no objectively correct answer — it depends on your timeline and financial situation.

Almost certainly yes, for both comfort and resale value. Calgary's summers have been getting warmer, and homes without AC now feel conspicuously uncomfortable during July and August heat events. More importantly for resale: buyers under 40 expect central air conditioning as a standard feature, and a home without it carries a perceived discount that exceeds the cost of installation. The best time to add AC is when you're replacing the furnace. The systems share the air handler and ductwork, and installing both together saves $800-$1,500 in labour versus adding AC to an existing furnace installation. Combined furnace + AC replacement: $7,000-$13,000. If your furnace is still functional (and you want to keep it for now), adding AC alone costs $3,500-$6,000 installed. This includes the outdoor condenser unit, the indoor evaporator coil (mounted in the furnace plenum), the refrigerant line set, the thermostat upgrade, and the electrical circuit for the condenser. The existing ductwork in your 1993 home is adequate for AC distribution — the same ducts that deliver heated air in winter will deliver cooled air in summer. The condenser unit goes on a concrete pad outside the home, typically on the side or rear. On Country Hills homes with sloped lots, the condenser placement requires attention to drainage and grading — the pad must be level and the unit must have adequate clearance for airflow. Return on investment: the installation cost is recovered through improved comfort, reduced reliance on portable AC units (which are energy-inefficient and noisy), and an increase in resale value. Real estate agents consistently report that central AC adds $5,000-$10,000 to the perceived value of a home in this price range — making the installation roughly cost-neutral at resale while providing years of comfort benefit.