You will see people who do some renovations and kid themselves that this is an "investment" in their home - in practice the increase in market value of the home will typically be negligible, sometimes negative and only in some very unusual cases would it meet or exceed their costs in doing the work. This doesn't make renovating your house a bad idea, but you should have your eyes open that it's only an "investment" the way a nice meal or holiday trip is an "investment".
The reason Real Property (usually) goes up in value is that it's in some sense scarce. If I need fifty square metres of Manhattan Island, no amount of Ohio, whether fifty square metres or fifty square miles is a valid substitute.
The hmme can seem like it adds value because an equivalent amount of land nearby with no house on it is often worth much less - except if that equivalent amount of land comes with legal authority to put a house on it you'll find suddenly it is worth almost as much as the land with an actual house on it. That permission (where required) is very valuable, the timber and paint and so on not so much.