Sell Your Home Faster Using Color
By Mark Gilliland
It is no secret that if you have two similar homes, the home that looks nicer typically sells faster. A concept people fail to understand however, is that with a few smart choices you can make your rehab look nicer without much additional cost and in some cases, not even a penny more!
In this market, asking a realistic price is crucial and this article is intended to help sell your home faster for market value.
Color is a powerful tool and it is useful in attracting people to the home. There are a few important things to keep in mind that many people gloss over as if unimportant. Small details have a huge impact on our subconscious appreciation for the work of art we are looking at, and your rehab is your canvas. Too often, I see remodeled homes with no attention paid to how colors complement each other, especially on the exterior.
First, we will start with the exterior of the home and the psychology of color. We as humans have a few subconscious responses to color, but we rarely pay attention to color when we are remodeling, installing a sidewalk, or, heaven forbid, putting on a roof! However, color choices send out signals to potential buyers, and if you replace a sidewalk, you must consider how it will affect the property as a whole: the siding, the trim, the roof, and the gutters.
Color can affect our mood. Yellow is a color of joy and happiness, but it is also the color of caution and deceit. The sight of yellow flowers triggers us to be cautious in our subconscious. With this in mind, we want to avoid using yellow flowers and decorations on the exterior of the home where people get their first impression. This phenomenon seems to prevail most in small quantities, which researchers think is related to a yellow traffic light, whereas a house painted entirely in yellow does not necessarily have negative connotations.
If the exterior of the house is having improvements done, it does not cost a dime more to choose colors that complement each other. I cringe when I see someone paint or side a house that clashes with the roof. Even worse is when they replace both and they still clash! Yuck! It is the details that really make a house stand out. When replacing the roof, you are probably replacing the gutters as well. Many people are unaware that gutters are made in approximately 24 different colors, none of which are more or less expensive.
There are also the shutters and the front door to consider. Careful selections can set a house off and make it shine without additional costs. If you are not planning to replace the front door, a paint job is inexpensive and will make a huge difference. The last main exterior component is landscaping. Since an entire article (or book) could be devoted to this topic, it will suffice to say that you must consider the landscaping when choosing your colors. Your selections should have colors that work with the rest of the home.
Now we will talk about the interior of the home. There is a lot of advice telling us to keep the home neutral in color. This can be okay to a certain extent, but carried too far, neutral colors can have the opposite effect— it can leave a prospective buyer rushing to get out of a drab-looking house. Using neutral colors for the bulk of the home can be a good choice, but you need to add interest or the buyer will be bored by the time he or she has seen the third or fourth bedroom and finds that it looks exactly the same as the first.
One of the ways you can do this is to install inexpensive window coverings, paint the trim different colors, or install one color carpet for the hallway and a complementary color for the bedrooms. You also want the bathrooms and kitchens to stand out and make an impression. I recommend that the permanent fixtures (such as the sinks, bathtubs, water-closets) be neutral in color. You can, however, use accents with mirror frames, window treatments, or other decorations. As long as you do not choose a fad color, you can put some color in your countertops. The family room carpet and a few select walls can make some color statements, if chosen carefully. A one-wall color statement, or accent wall, is easy to change and can potentially affect the entire flavor of the home.
If interior decorating is not your thing, don’t worry. Stores such as Sherwin Williams and Home Depot hire recent interior design graduates who will help you free of charge…just ask. Both stores, and many others too, have photo samples and even computer programs that you can plug in different colors to see how they go together. The most important thing to remember is that thought given to these details will play a large role in the selling of your home.