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We have never liked the outside of our house, but when we were house hunting we knew immediately this was the right house for us at the time. Almost 7 years later, we are finally getting ready to do something about the outside. Here's a photo from a few years ago but representing the current state of the exterior - blue vinyl siding and huge boulders - quite a combination.
We have considered new hardie-board siding, stucco, or a combination of the two, which is quite popular these days. My original preference was to replace the blue vinyl with the hardie board siding in a combination of wide horizontal lapboard and shake shingle look, keeping with the cottagey look of the place. Unfortunately, getting rid of the rocks isn't a practical option so they have to stay.
We are keeping an eye out for resale though we aren't seriously looking to move right now. This means that we want to stay relatively neutral in our color selections so we don't limit our pool of potential buyers later. I also don't want to pay to make the house significantly nicer than the rest of the neighborhood homes, again keeping resale value in mind.
After looking at our options, we're considering mostly or all stucco. It is significantly cheaper than the hardie board and with all the rock that has to stay on the front of the house, I'm less concerned about including different textures than I once was - my main beef with stucco homes is that they can look awfully plain.
So, whether we do all stucco or still include some accent siding in the way of shake shingles or board and batten, we are trying to decide on colors. Again, we will stay neutral. For the life of us, we can't decide if we should go with a medium stucco and dark trim or the other way around. In the end, it probably doesn't matter, but I thought I'd post some pics and get a vote from the group.
Please excuse the poor photoshop skills.
Boulders and Blue in all it's glory:
Light with dark trim:
Dark with light trim:
We have considered new hardie-board siding, stucco, or a combination of the two, which is quite popular these days. My original preference was to replace the blue vinyl with the hardie board siding in a combination of wide horizontal lapboard and shake shingle look, keeping with the cottagey look of the place. Unfortunately, getting rid of the rocks isn't a practical option so they have to stay.
We are keeping an eye out for resale though we aren't seriously looking to move right now. This means that we want to stay relatively neutral in our color selections so we don't limit our pool of potential buyers later. I also don't want to pay to make the house significantly nicer than the rest of the neighborhood homes, again keeping resale value in mind.
After looking at our options, we're considering mostly or all stucco. It is significantly cheaper than the hardie board and with all the rock that has to stay on the front of the house, I'm less concerned about including different textures than I once was - my main beef with stucco homes is that they can look awfully plain.
So, whether we do all stucco or still include some accent siding in the way of shake shingles or board and batten, we are trying to decide on colors. Again, we will stay neutral. For the life of us, we can't decide if we should go with a medium stucco and dark trim or the other way around. In the end, it probably doesn't matter, but I thought I'd post some pics and get a vote from the group.
Please excuse the poor photoshop skills.
Boulders and Blue in all it's glory:
Light with dark trim:
Dark with light trim:
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