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Need advice on sprucing up exterior of home.

last month

My home is 30 yrs old and in desperate need of a refresh. What jumps out at you as needing a change? The shutters still have the original color…thinking of changing them and the front door to black or a sage green…thoughts/opinions? Thank you!

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PPF.

last month

Wash the house and roof. Larger columns on the porch. New landscaping.

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Comments (15)

lisaam
last month
^ Yes to above. With respect to shutter color, many options but navy blue would be nice. Red on the door is perfect.
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need advice on sprucing up the facade on my mothers house
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Comments (16)
apologize for the late response as i didnt realize this formum doesnt send out notifications for new replies,,,that or i just dont have the right settings for my account. i appreciate all the responses and like the corbell or trellis idea to add some dimension to a rather flat facade. also a round accent, which can be used as a roof vent would be a nice touch. to answer some of the questions: 1. yes the right side of the garage was raised to accommodate a van. i recently spoke to a garage installer and the plan was to raise the left to match the right. i do like the idea of widening the trim but this will require some modifications to the vinyl to bring in the lip. i have planned on going with a 2 panel door with square window accents on the top in white. i played around with door colors like going brown but it brought way too much attn to the garage doors. 2. i decided to hold off on the garage doors for a few months since the priority shifted towards fixing our leaking roof, which will be started in a couple weeks. the color of choice i have debating on for weeks to the point where i now drive around town looking at roofs and gutter colors/styles. we narrowed the choices down to going with a slate or charcoal since the ultimate goal is to do less w/ the red/tannish accents. i decided on a GAF timerbline charcoal color with matching 5-6" gutters or even a white gutter. still TBD on those choices. 3. windows: the brown is actually the metal frame for the window. the red is a metal trim that was part of the vinyl siding install. im considering painting the red to white...adding some interior white shutters. i just hope the brown doesnt clash too much w/ the white. wondering if painting the brown is a bad idea im terrible at photoshop(actually ms paint) but at least this gives a decent idea of how it might look. appreciate all the input... stage 1: replace roof shingles, add the circular vent trim accent stage 2: garage doors stage 3: shutters, lights, window trim, maybe the trellis or corbell stage 4(my dream) paver stones in the driveway and add brick/stone facade accents, redo the brick steps on the left and right side. this style home is typical to a certain area in the SF bay area. houses are packed together on small lots with very little to no side yard. rather ugly to say the least so im trying to do the best w/ the limitations we have.
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My home exterior needs your advice!
Q
Comments (7)
Agree that the shutters should be removed entirely - they don't fit the windows. Fencelet on the corner too. Awnings should also go. And what are those white "wings" on either side of your front door - more shutters? Another likely candidate for removal! All of the white looks very stark against the brick right now, but it might look better once the shutters are removed, since there will be a lot less of it. As for an alternate color for the yellow section, it would help to see your roof, but personally I like grey with red brick. Once you decide on a color for the body of the house you can decide whether to paint the garage door the same color and how to handle other trim pieces, etc.
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Need ideas to spruce up the exterior of our '30s house
Q
Comments (14)
Thank you for all the great ideas! We're definitely going to go with a wood door and I can see that removing the shutters completely is a good idea, although I wonder if I could get away with just one pair in the larger window. I do want to get away from the brown though and go with a lighter color (maybe light taupe) for the entire house (including the parts painted brown). My husband would like to put some scallops up there like some other houses in the area have. We plan on replacing the wood fence with a brick wall. I'm also trying to talk him into adding a "porch" by replacing the bushes in front of the house (which are old and woody) with brick and putting a trellis in that area designed to look porch-like. I've seen some in the neighborhood that look really nice. Thanks again for the comments and suggestions!
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Need Help with Shutters and Sprucing Up Exterior of Tri-Level House
Q
Comments (16)
Thank you everyone for your comments! Some things I hadn't even thought of! This house had absolutely no curb appeal when we bought it and we don't like the muted "blah" colors. I'm also not a fan of shutters, but every single house in our neighborhood has them. It wasn't until we went inside the house that we absolutely loved it. We knew we had to do something with the exterior, just didn't know what. Eventually we'd like to paint all the siding and brick, but for this year just looking to change some minor things like shutters, replace columns, front door, landscaping, etc. So many great ideas; this is a great starting point for us to tackle this Spring. Thank you again!
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PRO
HALLETT & Co.
last month
Front door with some glass and landscaping that has shrubs in natural shapes and some trees. Paint the handrails to match the trim.
HU-187528210
last month
I agree start with power washing the entire house.
Definitely beefier columns and new landscaping
Here’s some inspiration
Carla Pruiett
Original Author
last month
Thank you for taking the time to do that!^^ I’m a very visual person so that’s very helpful!
HU-187528210
last month
Absolutely! 💛🙏
Sigrid
last month
I wouldn't bother with porch columns. The shutters look faded, they need to be painted. I like the idea of a green. I'm not a fan of the ball landscaping, but it does look kind of cool. I would not replace it with a boring hedge, as in the pic below.

What are the shrubs? A bunch of yews? Or flowering shrubs that are pruned so that they don't flower? If the latter, I'd prune a few of them much more severely, so they can grow and bloom in future years.
Carla Pruiett
Original Author
last month
Yes planning on painting the shutters for sure. The very back shrubs are a holly, the medium size just in front of them are azaleas that bloom in the Spring.
D M PNW
last month
After the azaleas finish blooming, I would do a renovation pruning taking them down at least a third and probably by a half. Then allow them to grow more naturally without the bare legs. The hollies are also too tall and I would be thinning them and taking them below the window sill. If you like the heavy hedge look, below the sill would work better.
littlebug Zone 5 Missouri
last month
The landscaping is overworked and overgrown. It’s just too much.

Hire a professional to subdue it, maybe reduce the items by half in number and in size.
cat_ky
last month
last modified: last month
I would repaint the shutters, just a bit darker than what they are. They do appear to be faded. Maybe hire a landscape company to come and plan out a new landscape design, and depending on budget , you can work on it little by little. No more of those awful green ball things. Natural shapes on shrubs are much nicer, and I dont like that hedge in the drawing above at all. Get a professional designer involved, so you end up with something nice. Its a nice house. It deserves better landscaping.
Carla Pruiett
Original Author
last month
Thank you everyone! Wow…the rounded hollies are tons of work…so if they don’t even look good, I don’t mind doing something different! 🤷‍♀️ It is a fairly “common” look here (VA), but granted, with much smaller bushes! If I keep them and cut them down, they will still need to be trimmed…are they just not a good look?
littlebug Zone 5 Missouri
last month
If the hollies want to grow taller than 3’ or so, they’re not a good choice.
Carla Pruiett
Original Author
last month
Unfortunately they’ve gotten “leggy,” I should’ve been keeping them pruned tighter…
cat_ky
last month
last modified: last month
Azaela's are beautiful, if left to grow naturally, and not pruned into little balls. Pruned like that, I would never have realised any were azaelas

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