If you are interested in improving the appearance of your home, the easiest and most effective home renovation project you can undertake is introducing a new color to your home’s exterior surfaces. However, choosing the right color is essential to ensuring you achieve your desired results. A dull color can make your home seem bland and lifeless, while an overly bold choice can overpower your architecture, irritate the neighbors, even reduce the chances of selling your home. When you make the investment in the right color and use it skillfully, you can boost curb appeal and property value and create the appearance of a larger home without adding square footage.
Review the information below to learn which exterior color your home should be to make it appear larger, and then contact Mr. Roof today if you have any questions or concerns about your next home renovation project.
Choose light colors
Making the exterior of your home a light color is the best way to make your home look larger, brighter, and more inviting. Light colors such as white, ivory, pale gray, and sage green reflect higher amounts of light than dark colors, tricking the eye into perceiving the home as larger than it is. Reflecting the light from the sun also diverts heat from your home during the sunny, warm months of summer, keeping your home at a cooler, more comfortable temperature without forcing you to crank up the air conditioning.
White, in particular, has been a popular choice among homeowners for centuries because it instills a structure with a certain air of timeless grandeur. This color is especially popular with traditional classical architecture, but it can complement homes of any size, style, or location. When considering property sales data, white homes tend to be most attractive to buyers. This sleek, clean shade is attention-grabbing while acting as a clean slate. Compared to other colors, white helps people see the home’s full potential and desirability and allows them to more effectively imagine themselves living there.
Avoid dark colors
Dark colors, especially on the lower portion of the exterior, can make a home seem smaller yet more substantial and permanent. While light colors pull surfaces forward and make them appear more prominent, dark colors cause surfaces to recede. They emphasize details and shadows, so they are best for accents, such as porches, railings, doors, and shutters. Although homes in dark or bold colors tend to turn off potential buyers, using such colors sparingly in certain areas can attract buyers and lead them to spend more to close on a house. A recent report from Zillow found that homes with black doors sell for over $6,000 more than expected.
Along with making homes look smaller, dark colors absorb more heat, making the interior of your home reach higher temperatures during the hottest months of the year. Unlike light colors that reflect sunlight, dark colors absorb approximately 70% to 90% of the radiant energy from the sun, meaning you will be forced to turn up your air conditioning and spend more on your monthly energy bills. All exterior paint colors are prone to fading from the sun, but dark colors make fading, chalking, and other forms of discoloration much more noticeable than light colors.
Final thoughts—consider your architecture
Remember that the best colors for your home will be the ones that highlight its most attractive features. Too little color variation can leave you with a flat, boring appearance, and too much color variation can be overwhelming. The simpler your home’s style, the fewer colors you should use and the more similar they should be. Homes with minimal architecture like mid-century modern ranches look best with only two colors within the same family, one for siding paired with a darker shade of the same color for trim. In contrast, homes with more complex or ornate architectural features like Victorians can support six different colors to contrast the various types of trim work and details.
Contact Mr. Roof today
To learn more about how you can improve your home with high-impact renovations, contact Mr. Roof today. With over five decades of experience, we consistently rank as one of the nation’s best roof and exterior services companies. We offer the highest quality roofing, windows, siding, gutters, masonry, and insulation services backed by lifetime warranties. Schedule a consultation with our team by submitting the form on our website.
