When is it Time to Paint Your Home?

How do you know when it’s time to paint your house? There are three obvious reasons and two that are not quite as apparent. Read on! 

1 – You’re Looking To Sell Your Home or Condo

Interestingly, the idea of painting to sell a home wouldn’t have been considered ten to fifteen years ago. The difference is that today’s buyers are looking for something turnkey. Not only can a new paint job increase the money your house will sell for, it may sell faster. 

I was recently called to paint a home that had been on the market for five months. In addition to repainting the home a contemporary colour, it was staged with new furniture. Within two weeks, the home sold, and only the paint and furniture had changed.

This is a perfect illustration of how people can be easily distracted by bright colours or chipping paint and can’t see past it to the bones of a house. There is a return on investment with a fresh coat of paint –  neutral colour opens up the market so that more people are interested in your house. 

2 – You’re About to Move and Want to Make it Your Own

So you’ve just bought a new home – congratulations! It’s more than likely the sellers had it repainted in neutral colours before they put it on the market. Now that you’re going to be living there, you want to make it your own. The easiest time to paint is before you’ve moved in, so if you have a few days between closings, use that opportunity! Of course, you can always move furniture to paint, but wouldn’t you rather move into a house that’s ready?

3 - During or After Renovations

Let’s say you have a leak in your bathroom. Not only may this require cutting open walls to find the source of the leak, but you may decide that it’s the perfect time to update your bathroom, which naturally, will involve a new coat of paint.

So the bathroom gets renovated, but the stained ceiling in the dining room also has to be repaired because you don’t want your family worrying that the ceiling will collapse during Thanksgiving dinner.

Now that you see how bright the paint on the ceiling looks, the rest of the room starts to look tired, so perhaps you decide to replace the floor, which you were thinking about doing anyway, and if you’re going that far… you may as well repaint the walls! 

4 – You Can’t Remember When You Last Painted

If you can’t remember when your home was last painted, it’s likely that your colour is out of date. Fifteen years ago, the most popular colour palate was a golden taupe colour. We then went through a white phase, but now people are going a light grey – the colour palates are becoming a little cooler. 
If you want your home to look consistently fresh, it should be painted every four to five years.  It’s not critical, but it will also give you the opportunity to give the place a good clean and fix any nail holes that may be exposed when you moved those living room pictures around!

5 – You Have Painted Exteriors

If you have a home that is at least twenty years old, it should be repainted every 3 to 5 years. This will not only improve it cosmetically but also help protect the wood from weathering. 

If you think it’s time to refresh the paint in your home, please give us a call!