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Color your
house beautiful with the perfect paint job
By Brad Boisvert
According to some real
estate experts, only one in 20 homebuyers will look at your
house and see its potential down the road. The rest will see
it for what it is right now. That’s why it’s so important that
your house look its best when it goes on the market.
And when it comes to improving home cosmetics, painting may
be the best way to make your house look better kept and more
appealing - inside and out.
When choosing an exterior color, there are several things
to consider, including:
- The things you can’t paint - Choose a color range that
complements the permanent colors on your home, such as
shingled roofs, unpainted brickwork, and stone facades and
foundations.
- Your neighbors’ homes - Even if you’re leaving town in a
huff, you should be kind to your neighbors and repaint your
home in a manner that "fits" with the neighborhood decor. And
if you still feel like sticking it to the neighbors and going
with a garish color, remember this: most homebuyers will want
.to fit in rather than stand out from their new neighbors.
- Historical accuracy and integrity - If your house is an
old one, you may be able to increase its appeal by maintaining
its historical integrity and repainting in accordance to its
pedigree. If it’s registered, the local historic society may
have a say (or at least demand one) in the colors you choose.
For example, the Exeter Historic District Commission
recommends color selection based on architectural style and
the era in which the home was built. (See www.exeternh.org/hdc/hdccolor.html.)
- Your landscape - By painting your house to complement your
landscape, tying in colors from your garden, trees, ponds,
rock walls, etc., you’ll create a seamless and pleasing
setting and a charming curb appeal.
- The size and placement of your house - If you want to make
your house look bigger to growing families, you should go with
a light color. Light colors also can make a house appear
closer to the front of the lot, which may appeal to gregarious
types who don’t like to do a lot of mowing.
If you want to make a tall house look shorter to appeal to
retired couples, you should go with a darker color. Dark
colors create the illusion that a home is smaller and set
farther back.
- The general homebuyer preference - Finally, divorce
yourself from personal preferences and try to ascertain what
the buying public wants. Popular interior paint colors are
like fashion trends and can quickly change. But for exteriors,
the old standbys have been popular for centuries.
According to a national survey by Sears Weatherbeater
Paints, more than a third of Americans would choose white as
the primary color for their homes’ exteriors. In order of
preference according to Sears, the choices are white, gray,
blue, tan and brown, cream, beige, green, yellow, and red.
As a seller, consider conservative and light colors.
Light-colored paint can help maintain a bright clean
appearance. Yet, New England may vary from the rest of the
nation in its preferences. The New England landscape is graced
with many darkly painted houses. Many of them are red -
perhaps because in the days of yore, red paint was cheaper and
appealed to New Englanders’ frugality. Whereas light-colored
paint reflects all wavelengths of sunlight and can help keep a
house’s interior cool in the summer, darker paint absorbs
light waves and can help keep a home warmer in winter. So in
New England, both light and dark paint choices may have
appeal.
For insight and inspiration, visit the Society for the
Preservation of New England Antiquities at www.spnea.org. Or
look up local homebuilders and see what color they’re choosing
to appeal to new homebuyers.
And while we’re on the subject of exterior painting, don’t
neglect the smaller things. For example, make sure your
mailbox is freshly painted. A freshly painted fence and a new
coat of paint on the front door can do wonders for curb
appeal.
For the most part, however, exterior painting is no small
task. If you plan to do it yourself, you’ll need to invest a
multitude of hours scraping, sanding, priming, painting ...
and probably cursing. If you elect to contract the job to a
professional, you’ll invest thousands of dollars. So the
question still begs: is painting the outside of your house
worth it?
It very well could be.
Chances are you’ll get a quicker offer. And that could
color you a winner.
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