Every square foot often counts in a hot housing market such as Chester County’s, but in some cases, poorly-thought-out additions can actually hurt a home’s resale value, writes Stefanos Chen for The Wall Street Journal.

In fact, scaling back a home can be beneficial as it could widen the buyer pool, and in some markets, restoring a home to its original footprint can bring significant tax breaks.

Call it addition by subtraction.

Eight years ago, the firm of Chadds Ford architect John Milner demolished a mismatched sunroom that covered 1,100 square feet at the back of a historic, Mediterranean-Revival mansion in Merion Station.

The team convinced the homeowners to remove the addition and reveal historic details that had been concealed by the clunky expansion. The result was a substantial increase in value.

Juliet Cordeiro, a real estate agent in Wayne, confirmed that removing unappealing square footage and restoring historic features can bring in more buyers.

She added that, when you are dealing with homes that are already large themselves, “you’re not going to get someone to come in and say, ‘Oh my God, it’s only 8,000 square feet?’”

Read more about the strategy in The Wall Street Journal here.