As if all the blue and mauve trim on the inside of the house isn’t enough, we had some outside trim that needed some attention. When we bought this house we knew we had four major things to deal with: the roof and the furnace, a few bad trees, and this last bear: some rotting areas of siding and trim that needed to be replaced along with a fresh paint job for the whole house. But at least we knew about all of them going into the house purchase (and the first two didn’t end up draining our wallets) – so maybe that softened the blow a little? Speaking of soft, I give you… our siding.
This hole was big enough for a bat or a mouse to crawl in. I’ll pause while you ewwww for a second.
Some of the wood trim and siding just couldn’t be salvaged and would need to be completely replaced. And the rest of it was in desperate need of a cleaning, scraping, priming, and two fresh coats of paint to protect it from rotting like the other stuff that was already too far gone. Given the extent of the rot, the sheer size of the project, and the fact that a lot of it was high off the ground, we knew it was a job for the pros. So we got four estimates and ultimately chose the crew that made us feel the most confident, who was a local chain called Certa Pro Painters. It didn’t hurt that they were recommended by a neighbor up the street along with a wish-she-was-our-neighbor friend of ours. They also were the most flexible (which enabled us to save an extra 1k by doing some things ourselves, but more on that later).
After picking who to go with, it was color picking time. We decided that we wanted the trim to be one color and the siding to be another color, just so the house had a little more dimension. We didn’t hate the existing cream on cream trim and siding, but we did love a few other possibilities more, especially after walking around the neighborhood and staring at other brick colonials to see what they had going on. So after a whole lotta house-gawking, we came home and stared at our paint deck.
We decided we liked the idea of a putty color (not too brown, and not too gray – sort of right in the middle) since that tone is kind of “related” to the brick, so it ties in. We waffled back and forth between the two colors with the red arrow in that top swatch for a while and finally settled on the lighter one because we worried the darker one might be gloomy for the siding. Then for the windowsills and trim we picked a nice not-too-yellow-and-not-too-blue white tone.
Spoiler alert: we picked the wrong color and should have gone with the darker one for the siding. But thankfully we caught it early enough (just as the first coat was starting to go up) that they were happy to apply the darker tone as the second coat, which had great coverage since it was only a shade darker. So this is the final choice. Pretty, right?
It’s such a rich look, and because the brick is such a visually “weighty” color, it’s a really nice balance. The lighter color was so washed out it almost still looked cream – or even like a soft white. So… disaster averted!
See how the triangle over the portico looks like it’s a soft whispy white-ish color? That was just one square lighter on that swatch (yet it looked about three shades lighter when the light hit it!). You can see Danny applying the final color right over it, which really helped the white trim pop more while holding its own with the strong brick and the dark shutters behind it. Whew.
The process was actually pretty fun to watch (we didn’t envy them for a second up on those crazy ladders for five days in 90+ degree temperatures). The first step was power-washing the entire house, then they scraped the trim and siding before priming anything that was raw wood, and painting everything (two coats for the siding and trim, and one coat around the windows since they were just going from cream to white). If the wood/siding was in bad shape, they cut it out and replaced it. In the end, they had cut out and repaired about 20 pieces of rotten siding and trim, so it broke down to one day of power washing, two days of rot repair and scraping, and two days of priming/painting.
As for the paint, they used Duration by Sherwin Williams, which they said was awesome for the exterior and had really nice thick coverage (so we’re glad our house won’t be all sad and rotten again anytime soon). The colors we ended up going with were Snowbound (for the white trim) and Anonymous (for the putty colored siding).
We’re so happy with it. And we’ll never doubt those house painting tipsters again when that say “go a shade darker than you think for the exterior of a house since the light that hits it will wash things out.” We really thought we could just look at the swatches outside, but it was crazy how light/white that very clearly gray-brown swatch looked once it was up on the house! Three cheers for second chances. Oh man, we’re so thankful.
Here’s what the house looked like when we got it:
And here it is (a little closer) now. More dimensional, right? So much less… brown.
The new roof was definitely a game changer, but the fresh paint is a pretty noticeable upgrade too. Even just the white trim around the windows and the porch railing feels nice and fresh from the curb. It’s one of those things when we drive down the street to come home we’re still doing that double take since our brains are taking a second to catch up with the current look.
Here’s the back before, which we thought made the siding part on the top right look a little too light and unbalanced (gah, choppy photo, sorry!):
Now it just feels more evenly weighted, so it sticks out less and looks more integrated.
And here’s a closer shot that shows how the sunroom looked when it was all cream before.
Now it has a crisper feeling, and the dark storm windows on the house tie into the dark tones in the brick as well as the putty color in the siding – so the sunroom feels more tied in and less like a little add-on-pop-out in the back.
When it comes to the cost of rot repair/house painting, that definitely varies depending on where you live, how much rot you have, what type of house it is (mostly brick or all siding), how large your house is, etc. The receipt’s in one of our moving chaos piles (aka: lost in the Bermuda Triangle) but I think it was around 1K for all of the wood rot repair and over 2K for the scraping and painting. Update: Just remembered we got 10% off because John’s a member of ACAC, so any locals getting an estimate should show their membership card if they have one!
Writing the check was another one of those bleeding money moments, but we were able to knock 1K off their original estimate by offering to DIY some easier-to-reach spots ourselves that we had faith we could do well. So here’s a tip for anyone who loves tackling what they can while leaving the stuff that’s out of their league to the experts: just break it all down in your head and see what you think you can bite off. We said “hey, we’ll gladly paint three areas ourselves!” which are: the garage doors (we think we’ll go a tone darker than the siding with those)…
… the interior walls, trim, and ceiling of the sunroom (everyone quoted that since it’s technically an outdoor room), and the front door and sidelights.
Not only did that save us a cool grand, it means we have more time to think about what colors we want in those areas. Predictably, I’m the most excited about a new front door color. Nothing’s off limits. Seriously, every swatch in the rainbow is in the running.
One roof-related casualty did occur when we accidentally ran over a screw that had landed in our driveway, but thankfully it was only a $29 fix (we could get it patched instead of replacing it) so all’s well that ends well.
Oh home improvement. You take our money and sometimes you even flatten our tires, but we keep crawling back.
Terri says
Love, love, love a contrasting color for front doors. Our cranberry door looks so awesome as contrast to our white cape cod with black shutters.
YoungHouseLove says
Sounds so pretty!
xo
s
Amber says
I cannot believe the difference! It’s absolutely beautiful! Congratulations on the progress you have already made in a month’s time!
PS We are moving into a foreclosure we have been working to remodel and I have totally stolen your term of “bleeding money!” Why does it always feel like that?!? There seems to always be something we “need!”
YoungHouseLove says
Oh man, I know! We do it every time we move so you’d think we’d be used to it. Yet we still panic every time! Thankfully it’s feeling like it’s slowing down and the things on our immediate to-do list are thankfully nice and inexpensive (peeling wallpaper, painting trim) while we build up the ol’ bank account.
xo
s
erin says
It looks great! I used that paint card all over my house. The lighter colors for my living room and the darker colors for my hallways and bedroom. I used Anonymous in my hallways at my house! It’s so moody, I love it!
YoungHouseLove says
Sounds so pretty!
xo
s
Laura @ Rather Square says
Excited to see what the front door color will be! I’m also liking your exterior color choices so far. The putty color is a nice tie between the gray roof and the red brick. It makes the house exterior seem intentional and thoughtful instead of just bland and generic.
We have a white stucco house that needs repainting down the road (lots of dark areas where damage was patched), but that will also be a job for the pros, I think. Did you ever consider a stucco-exterior house when you were hunting? I initially didn’t want one, but there are a lot in our area, so it’s pretty standard.
YoungHouseLove says
I don’t think there are a lot of those in our area, so I’m not even sure we’ve come across any in all of our years of open houses! They’re really pretty in magazines though (there’s a stucco house from Domino a while back that I have always loved).
xo
s
Lauren @ The Highlands Life says
We had our house repainted last November and love it so much. What a difference a fresh coat of paint makes on an older home.
Julie says
I love the paint job! I’m just wondering why you painted the triangle above the portico (is it called a pediment?) the dark gray. I think it might stand out even more in white, but I can’t really tell.
Did you paint the shutters too? They look great in the photos! If a dark curtain rod is eyeliner for windows, those black shutters are like fake eyelashes. Very va-va-va-voom! Love!
YoungHouseLove says
We just went with the pros recommendation on what was “trim” and what was siding, and that area above the sunroom was clearly siding so we just had them go with the darker tone there when they said that would be the “standard” way of dealing with it. In person we love it for the reasons we mentioned (when the sunroom was all cream it looked added on, but the darker tone up there ties it into the brick tones and the dark storm windows on the house). As for the shutters, they’re the same (black) which seems to be our favorite (we had them on our first and second house too).
xo
s
Fran Siefert says
EVERYTHING you YOUNG,HOUSE,LOVE twosome touch turns GOLDEN. The projects inside and outside your new home will give you (us) pleasure for years to come. Love seeing all you do. Happy 4th to you and your family (Petersiks, especially).
YoungHouseLove says
Thanks Fran! You too!
xo
s
Katelyn @ evanandkatelyn.com says
Ahhh! It looks SOOOOOO good!!! So now that you’ve seen the process from start to finish, I have a question for you. We have a couple easy to reach spots on the siding of our mostly-brick house that had some water damage. The inspector poked them to see how bad they were so now we have two holes where he poked, bah! Do you think fixing those two holes is doable for a couple of new DIY-ers? And what about painting? We have a one story house but some areas would still require a ladder. Thanks!
YoungHouseLove says
Hmm, I think the general rule is if you can poke a hole with your finger it’s too rotten to be saved, so you’ll have to cut out those spots and replace them entirely and then paint everything to match/blend stuff in. Maybe watch some YouTube tutorials for replacing siding/trim to see if you think you can tackle it? I think if you don’t have to balance extra high on a ladder (since your house is one story) it might be less difficult. Hope it helps!
xo
s
Lacey says
Obviously not anytime soon (cue a Weird Al parody of Leona Lewis’ “Bleeding Love” called “Bleeding Money”), but are you planning on painting the shutters? If yes, would you hire someone for that job as well?
YoungHouseLove says
I think we’d try to do those ourselves since we could hopefully pop them off and paint them on the ground and just put them back up (so we wouldn’t spend days up on ladders). Although we like the black right now (it was the shutter color of our first and second house so I guess it’s a pattern at this point, haha!).
xo
s
Nikki says
I’m sorry that you got a flat, but it’s so strange that you mention it! When you posted about the roof, I almost left a comment suggesting that you carefully look around the whole yard for stray nails. We found TONS after my MIL’s roof was replaced a few years back, even though they went around the yard w/a rolling, magnetic thing to pick up scraps/nails.
I’m sure you’re already on it, but I’d take a gander around the rest of the yard to be sure – wouldn’t want sweet Clara catching one in her shoe or foot!
The house looks great – I can’t wait to see what else you do to it :)
YoungHouseLove says
Oh yes, while we waited a few hours for the towing company to come (thank goodness we have free roadside assistance) we trolled the rest of the driveway and yard looking for other things!
xo
s
Shellie says
Ohh man, when we bought our house there was a big home-made shed in the backyard. We used the YHL tip and posted on Craigslist “free to whoever comes and tears it down!” The people who came took out every nail and just tossed it into our dirt-and-gravel backyard, making them impossible to see. 3 YEARS later and we still get the occasional nail-in-the-shoe!
I’m surprised you guys called roadside for a flat tire in your own driveway. Guess the DIY bug didn’t get you in the automotive department? :)
YoungHouseLove says
Oh man, that stinks Shellie! And yes, we are car dummies! We can change a tire and a battery, but that’s about it.
xo
s
Corrie @ Little House On The Update says
Love the color choice- great pick, guys:)
Jessica says
Oh my word, that makes such a huge difference. At first I was thinking how big a difference could painting the siding and trim make since the house is largely brick. The answer – it makes a world of difference. Great choice on the siding color. I was hoping that you guys were going to pick the darker shade. It looks great!
Kristin @ bliss-athome.com says
It’s looking great! I love that you are breathing new life into that house. It is going to be a beautiful home for you all! xo Kristin
Silent Lu says
We’ve been putting off this very thing for 2.5 years. Our 3rd floor window gable is in seriously poor shape on our 100 year old house. But it’s amazing how much better your house looks now that its fixed, I can only imagine how much better mine would look if we bit the bullet and doled out the cash to have it done too.
Sarah says
Wow what a difference the white trim makes! BTW I’m voting for a red door!
Tina W. says
my bedroom is painted “anonymous” …love it!
YoungHouseLove says
So funny to hear from other Anonymous lovers! It seems to be a popular bedroom color. Must be so moody and dramatic!
xo
s
Angela says
Wow, I really like the siding color you picked. We have a colonial with the same brick color and black shutters. Our siding color is white aluminum which I hate because no matter how many times we have had it washed it just shows dirt like crazy and looks dingy. I have been trying to figure out what color goes with our brick and shutters. The putty color is genius and I think it will hide the dirt well too so it does not look dirty all the time like our white does. Someday when new siding is in the budget but until then I will stare at your pictures and dream. Thanks for the inspiration!
Manda Wolf says
Looks really awesome. I love the grey next to the red, I would have never of went that route. For some reason I never realized you guys had that much siding. Our soffit and trim was horrible when we moved into our house, we went with the seamless steal siding option and had all exposed wood wrapped in aluminum. It looks really sharp and we don’t have to worry about having to repaint it ever so often.
Kristen says
Oh, my SNOWBOUND! We’d bought a gallon when we were painting most of our new home after moving in this last September, and we’d bought Snowbound for the trim in the upstairs bathroom, but it wasn’t the right color, and now we’re about to use it for trim in a few other places (entryway, laundry room)… and this just makes me all the more eager to go for it! Fourth of July home projects, here we come!
YoungHouseLove says
Woot!
xo
s
karen says
i have another way you could bleed more money!
instead of painting the garage doors…swap out for cedar doors!! would be so stunning! if its a forever house.
YoungHouseLove says
Oh my gosh, I feel like I’ve been stabbed. Those would be gorgeous, but alas, they’re not in the budget for now. Gotta stop the bleeding! Haha!
xo
s
Marcella says
Okay, I have to say it I love it. Have you considered painting your garage doors black to match the shutters? We just did ours and have a brick home with a red door and a putty colored stucco and I have to say I love it I think who would have a white one, in fact it looks so good 3 other neighbors painted there’s black as well.
YoungHouseLove says
Oh yes, that’s definitely another possibility! Something super dark, we think. Just have to see which swatches or test pots look the best :)
xo
s
Stefanie says
I love the shutters black! I see a lot of people asking about changing them but I think they give good contrast to the brick and its very classic! I would actually like to see the garage doors in black… with a nice white pergola. :) Dark blue with white side lights might be nice on the front door (like this http://pinterest.com/pin/351912440492065/)
YoungHouseLove says
Really pretty! Love those ideas too!
xo
s
Tasha Ruck says
Sorry if I missed it, but is the siding vinyl? I just wondered if that can be painted. Looks great, great improvement!
YoungHouseLove says
It’s hardboard siding, which is basically a wood-like composite that can be painted and repainted. Hope it helps!
xo
s
JenB says
Thanks for asking my question. Darn. We have vinyl and I keep waiting for a product to come out that will work well to paint over it. Everything I read indicates that painting vinyl is very, very tricky. Someone’s going to make some serious money when they invent the product that will cover it!
christina @ homemade ocean says
Ohhhhh that front door has me sooooo excited!
And can we talk about that porch, the railing is sooo unique!
YoungHouseLove says
Thanks Christina! We got so lucky! There are a few other houses in the neighborhood with the same railing, but a lot of others just have pillars or regular vertical slats, so we feel like our guy’s special :)
xo
s
Jackie Toye says
Great Shade selection. We have a neighbor who went lighter … and they regret it. I’ll have to send an “anonymous” pic as a change suggestion. hahaha
Mary | lemongroveblog says
Wow! You guys are busting out projects fast on this abode! The outside has had such a transformation since you bought the place!
YoungHouseLove says
Oh yes, well those four things we listed at the beginning of this post were the most urgent, so now that we’re done we’re trying to apply pressure to our wound and stop the money bleeding! Haha! I think we’re psyched to slow down and wait for our bank account to recover while we hang curtains and paint trim and peel wallpaper for a while. Whew!
xo
s
Heather Clark says
It looks wonderful. I can’t wait to see what color you decide on for the front door. Our new home has the same color brick as yours and we need a new front door and we’re having a terrible time trying to pick something.
John says
Are the storm windows vinyl or aluminum? The dark frames are a little different than the usual light colors. Wonder how a light frame would look in a Photoshop picture.
YoungHouseLove says
They’re aluminum, and we love them dark! There are a lot of brick colonials with light ones and dark ones around our neighborhood so we just looked to see which ones we liked and dark was it – which thankfully means no additional painting :)
xo
s
Shannon [Our Home Notebook] says
What a difference! I’ve totally gone with the wrong shade the first time around and had to correct with a different colour, sometimes those things are just hard to know for sure until you see them. So nice that it was an easy fix with just one more coat.
Your exterior is looking so sharp these days!
Jane says
You guys have done so much in such a short amout of time. Everything looks great! I’ll bet your house is enjoying the big dose of love it’s getting! When you first posted about your new home my comment to you then was: “I wonder what color you will pick for your front door”? Still wondering and can’t wait to see what color wins out. All the best to both of you and to Clara and Burger!
Happy 4th of July,
Jane
YoungHouseLove says
Haha, thanks Jane! I think the front door is my favorite part…
xo
s
Kirstin @ Things Made New says
Wow, the new paint color looks really great! We just painted all of our aluminum siding ourselves, which is a big job. We definitely found that going with the darker paint color choice was the way to go. I was nervous about it at first, but we love the way it turned out!
http://www.thingsmadenew.com/how-we-painted-our-aluminum-siding-with-brushes/
YoungHouseLove says
Oh my gosh, you guys are beasts! That’s a huge job!!!
xo
s
Sarah M. says
Wow!! Looks really great! We have a similar house style with a portico too….and we had a hard time trying to figure out if we paint the whole portico the trim color or do what you guys did and paint the top part the siding color. We went the other way…but have to say yours looks great too!
YoungHouseLove says
Aw thanks Sarah! We saw it done both ways in our area too, and they both looked nice, so it was nice to know it would probably be ok either way.
xo
s
Matt says
There is no way you had this work done for 2k! Just guestimating you have about 1500sf of surface. Duration is $75/gal. with a coverage of about 300sf. SO two coats is 3000sf this would need $750 bucks worth of topcoat and another $500 of primer. Replacing hardboard siding is about $4/ LF and double that for soffit. So your chimney pic alone has about $200 worth of repair needed. SO what you are telling us is that 2 men for five days only cost you $500. Come on guys get real!!!
YoungHouseLove says
We said around 3K for the whole thing, not 2K! 1K for the rot (they didn’t replace all the siding/trim, just the rotten parts were cut out and replaced) and over 2K for the painting. It was originally estimated around 4K and then they knocked off 1K for the garage and the sunroom and the door/sidelights since we’re doing that. Duration is $50 a gallon through Certa, so maybe they get a discount since they use it so much? I definitely think this stuff varies by region! They also only spot primed when it was bare wood so it was nowhere near $500 for primer (if they scraped down to wood they primed, they didn’t prime the entire house). I think every job/location/price seems to vary depending on what costs the vendors pay for paint, how much their men charge, what type of rot they’re repairing (siding was a lot cheaper than trim), etc.
xo
s
matt says
“I definitely think this stuff varies by region!”
I forgot your on the SouthSide.
I just wish you guys were upfront about the fact that you are not paying full price for giving shout outs to these contractors. Nobody is going to fault you for that but its a little misleading to your readers to think that they can complete these projects for anything close to what you guys are paying.
Case in point- I have used your tree removal contractor and trust me my price was nothing close to yours and Im a VERY good negotiator!
YoungHouseLove says
It would be illegal to accept freebies or special treatment without disclosing that as a blogger (that’s why you see disclosure statements by law at the end of any post where something was perked or discounted for a blogger). If we wanted to accept them and disclose them, we would, but we have a policy against that. Every week we get emails from companies offering us freebies and we offer them as giveaways for our readers instead (we even give away the affiliate fees that we get for curating sales for Joss & Main instead of keeping them). I promise you we got 4 estimates, didn’t mention the blog at all, and none of them knew us from adam. Even our tree guy asked “are you still in advertising?” when he came out and we said “we’re writers now” and that’s it. He gave us a great price because we spent thousands on a giant split tree that he removed years ago, as I’m sure he would with any repeat customer.
xo
s
Laura C says
Whoa, Matt – take it easy! You may want to retract your statement about negotiation skills. $75/gallon for Duration is crazy. I had my house out in Eastern Long Island painted last year and my contractor (who provided me with receipts for all materials) paid just under $50 a gallon. Of course, he does a lot of work and gets a big contractor’s discount, but still. Duration is one of the more expensive exterior paints out there, but even a regular person walking in off the street shouldn’t be paying $75/gallon.
Also, have a drink, chill out, be nice. You’ll feel better.
Jeanna says
I don’t know why everyone keeps asking about the shutters, cause I love them black! The door however, should pop with a terrific color, and I can’t wait to see what you pick :) The outside of the house is really looking so darn good, and I can’t wait to see the inside get some love!
Katherine says
It looks great! That’s so smart to save 1K by doing the easy-to-reach areas yourself. You two have a real handle on what to leave to the pros and what to DIY. I’m taking notes for when we eventually buy a house (soon I hope – the Toronto real estate market is crazy right now).
We also ran over a screw this weekend and were relieved to learn that it would only cost $25 to get the tire patched instead of 10 times that for a new tire.
YoungHouseLove says
It’s such a relief, right?! We were so glad!
xo
s
Kara says
Love how small changes make huge impacts and curb appeal. Looking good! Can’t wait to see what you will do to the front door. Another yellow one?
YoungHouseLove says
Any color is possible! So whatever swatches and test pots look best have the best chance :)
xo
s
lolly says
we just bit the bullet on a similar project after debating if we should do it ourselves! but our 115 year old house was in much sadder shape. so much peeling, flaking LEAD paint and rotting wood, nails popping out everywhere from the roofing shingles. we ended up having to have soffits built and gutters added as well, and man, did it hurt the pocket book, especially with having to hire an EPA lead certified contractor.
the guys were out here for over a week working, and our house isn’t even that big, about 1100 square feet, with a fair amount of vinyl siding.
a previous commenter mentioned living in a rental where the outside isn’t kept up. i think i understand from a landlord’s perspective! these jobs are so costly and time-consuming, much more than you’d ever realize. i don’t know if in some of the more inexpensive areas you’d even really see that money back. shelling out potentially $4k on perhaps a $70k house, for something people expect to be done anyway and don’t want to pay extra for, that’s a tough pill to swallow!
YoungHouseLove says
Oh man, I can totally see how hard that is!
xo
s
Kristen says
That photo of the hole you said a mouse or bat could fit through … how big was it? A mouse can squeeze themselves through a 1/4- inch hole! Ick! And raccoons can fit in a 4-inch hole … I found that one out the hard way!
Looks fantastic!
YoungHouseLove says
It was about 1.5″ I think. At first the inspector worried bees had gone in and made a nest (ack!) but it was all clear. Thank goodness. Other than the possum in the crawl space…
xo
s
HeatherB says
Not directly related to this post, but your furnace reference brought it to mind…
I know you got the home warranty and that covered your replacement furnace. Well, we did not do that, but a couple of weeks after moving into our new house in April, we got a call from the power company, wanting to know if we wanted to continue the hot water repair/replace insurance policy that the prior owners had through them for $5.99 a month. Since I knew the hot water heater was nearly 20 years old, I figured that would probably be worth it. Didn’t know how soon, though.
I came home last Thursday to see a little river running out of the garage door and down the driveway…yep, it was coming from the hot water heater. The valve was so corroded I couldn’t get the water turned off (not good), and called my plumber to save the day. He got the water turned off, and said the HWH needed to be replaced (no surprise). I remembered the policy, called the power company, and although I had to use their contracted plumber, it was easy. They sent their guy out, he pulled out old, replaced with new (took him a while to find a new to match, as we have a 50 gal HWH, apparently an uncommon size around here), and that was that. My plumber estimated $550 total to replace. I’ll have to pay for his service call, and possibly a $50 deductible/fee to the power company, but other than that, we’re gold! Not bad for a $6/mo for 3 months investment :)
I’d never heard of such a program through the power company, and wonder if other things may be included? Anyway, thought I’d share our story.
YoungHouseLove says
Oh my gosh, that’s crazy! Thanks so much for sharing. Such a great tip!
xo
s
Hillary says
Hey YHL! Love the new colors and looks amazing! Since we are on the topic of outdoor paint, I just finished sanding our teak deck furniture. I should have taken better care of it, so instead of using teak oil, I am going to paint to help bring some life back. I was going to use porch and deck paint, but it got me thinking… do you think I should go with porch/deck paint or try this siding paint your painters recommended by SW? It is pretty dry and some cracks so could use a think coat and fill in some smaller cracks. Thoughts on paining outdoor wood furniture?!
YoungHouseLove says
Hmm, for furniture I wonder if porch/deck paint would better? It’s hard to know what’s really different about that stuff. Maybe ask the paint pro at HD or BM if you can?
xo
s
BamaCarol says
Your brick looks similar to ours. Does it have any blue in it? Hard to tell from the monitor. I have black shutters and now I’m looking at that Anonymous gray as a good possibility for our eaves when we paint it next. It has been several years so probably will be due soon. Having a house is so rewarding even if it does seem like you are constantly spending.
YoungHouseLove says
I think the brick is mostly maroon with browns and deep grays (like charcoal) in it, so not any blue that I can see. I would definitely get little test pots of paint and see which one works best now that we learned how much outside colors change from the swatch!
xo
s
Lissa says
Looks great! And very excited to see this post as our recently purchased 1986 brick colonial has very similar issues. May even have to copy your paint colors :) (Though our brick is a more mottled orange tone, so we’ll have to see if it works.)
But curious if you all have any issue with rot around your windows? If so did they fix that as part of this or will that happen later? We’ve got rot in other places as well, but a couple windows have sills that have basically rotted out. Even poked a big very-large-mouse sized hole in one while trying to pop our painted shut windows.
YoungHouseLove says
Oh yes, all of the windowsills were scraped and caulked and painted (and one had to be replaced because it had a lot of rot). Water gets around windows a lot so it’s an important area to keep up with I think!
xo
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Mia says
More unsolicited front door thoughts: Emerald/Plum would get lost with the reduce light from the porch roof. Robin’s Egg Blue would fall into the “more classic” colors/style you expressed for this house. But for that Pop O’ Petersik, turquoise(y) would be grand!
YoungHouseLove says
Pretty!
xo
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Yvette says
Completely excited about eventually seeing the winning door color! I love a classic red door, but can’t wait to see what you do!
My main reason for posting, however, is to show some love for bats which are not creepy, but awesome. Especially the insect eating ones. But I do completely understand not wanting to cohabitate with any of them.
Jamie D says
I am so excited for you all to paint the front door now! It almost seems like the most natural progression of what to do next. I’m planning to paint ours in a few weeks and i’ve decided to do something in the cool colors realm- blue/purple/teal/green against our yellow house. Can’t wait to see what you end up with!
Lindsey d. says
$3K sounds like a steal to me! I recently had about 20% of the siding on my 1135 sq. ft. cottage replaced. It was 80 year old cypress siding and the guy had to use slightly thinner redwood siding to replace the cracked and rotting pieces. One piece actually bent back as if you pulled your fingers back toward the back of your hand! That cost $2400 AND THEN I paid to have the whole house painted. That was another $2800 (and I got a deal on that). I’m jealous of your brickwork that kept costs down… My house looks great, though.
YoungHouseLove says
Oh yes, it definitely helped that we have a full brick facade on the front, back, and most of the sides! I can’t imagine what our neighbor paid (she had all siding and a bigger house – although she probably had a lot less rot).
xo
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Eri says
Great! It makes the house look even more like yours!
And thanks, the post is very informative and helpful, esp great to know painters can do some fix of rotten siding etc. I have some exterior soffit to repaint (looks like your roof really doesn’t have one… does it?) but some part of it feels kinda little porous. I will clean and paint it anyway since it’s not quite rotten (yet), but now I know who to hire if I want and when it gets really bad.
Enjoy color picking for the doors and others inside and out!
Theresa says
I love that you added the flat tire tid-bit. It’s like you are REAL people haha. :)
Emma says
I am amazed in the difference between the befor& after. The before wasn’t bad until you compare it to the after. I love the 2 colors you chose.i always learn something when I read your blog.
Katie says
Since the roofers should have cleaned up after themselves (mine took a magnet thing around the yard to look for stray screws/nails), if it was definitely a roofing nail/screw then they should pay for the cost of the repair to your tire. It doesn’t hurt to ask…
YoungHouseLove says
See, it either could have been a roofing screw or a screw from siding repair, so we’re not sure which and don’t want to accuse anyone.
xo
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