Do Your Home’s Exterior Elements Meet Your Expectations? 4 Tips to Improve the Exterior of Your Home
Remodeling and updating the interior of your home is always an exciting endeavor, and it’s easy to find ideas and inspiration almost anywhere you look. Updating and improving the exterior of your home can be a bit trickier – from where to start to where your budget is best spent. Here are 4 tips for improving the exterior of your home.
Begin with Basics
Simple maintenance and basic cleanup can go a long way towards improving the aesthetic of your home. Regular power washing, paint touch ups, lawn care, fresh mulch and weeding or landscaping are fairly simple ways to give your home a bit of life. Projects like re-painting a front door and adding a few small shrubs or potted plants are inexpensive and quick ways to instantly up curb appeal.
Landscaping
Experts like architects and home designers agree almost unanimously that landscaping makes the biggest difference in exterior appeal. It doesn’t have to be complex or elaborate to be appealing, even a quick touch up can make a huge difference. Look at your home and take the time to come up with a plan. Try to find a good balance between lawn and plants, getting a visual from the curb or street to put yourself in the shoes of the everyday people who see your home. Even if you don’t have the budget or time for planting, a big cleanup can make a big difference. Edging flower beds and walkways, adding topsoil and mulch, and trimming trees and shrubs are great, simple ways to update your exterior.
Fresh Paint
After landscaping, refreshing the exterior paint is one of the most inexpensive and high impact ways to update your exterior. Consistency and simplicity allow you to highlight your home’s best features. Begin by figuring out the colors you can’t change – for instance natural stone, brick, or wood. Use these features as the basics for your paint palette. Using a three color palette is a great way to focus – choose a color for siding, another for trim, and an accent color. Use the accent to emphasize unique and beautiful features and camouflage any less appealing areas.
Know Your Home
It’s important to take care when making changes or updates to older homes. Though charming, older homes can come with unique challenges that require extra attention when doing home renovations. If you’re looking to update the exterior of an older home, take time to inspect for rotted sills, failed joints, deteriorating windows, rotted sills, water damage, and gutter functionality. Consider how many times the home has been painted and the skill with which it was done. Some older homes may even require stripping old paint. If you find issues or worry that your home’s age may complicate things, consulting a professional can be the best choice.
Remodeling the Ranch Style Home
We see a lot of ranch style homes here in the Decatur area. Many ranch style homes in the area have been renovated to two-story homes or even large colonial or craftsman style homes. We truly enjoy remodeling local homes to suit the homeowner’s lifestyle. Give us a call at 404-378-6962, email us, or contact us using our contact form on the website. Our designers will help you design the perfect remodeling project to meet your individual needs.