6 Quick Ideas to Boost Your Home’s Curb Appeal!
Hey friends!
I hope you had a great weekend! Ours was PRETTY CRAZY! I would share more details, but it would seriously take me two hours, but basically, we thought we had our house sold and then the next day, we found out we didn’t. It was quite an emotional roller coaster ride! WHEW!
So today, I have felt mentally and physically exhausted! As I have said before, selling your house is a LOT of work!
Since our house is on the market, we have been going around our house finishing all of our “unfinished” projects. We’ve added lighting, lots of caulk, and new coats of paint. We have cleaned out our crawl space and brought it up to code, and we have cleaned out our messy closets. Lots and lots of work!
It made me think of one of the most important things we can do to help us sell our home, and that is boost our home’s curb appeal! Many buyers have already made up their mind about your home before they even walk in the front door! So it is super important to spend some time sprucing up the exterior of your home to make visitors feel more welcome.
Here are 6 tips that I have done to my own home to boost curb appeal:
1. Give your mailbox a makeover!
Several years ago, we gave our sad little mailbox a makeover! It was a quick little fix, but it made a huge impact. CLICK HERE or click on the picture below to see how we did it!
2. Add DIY Wood Shutters!
Our home did not have matching shutters on the house when we bought it. So after we painted the brick on our home, we decided to make our own shutters.
You can see the difference it made in the picture below. CLICK HERE to see the tutorial.
3. Add Window Boxes!
Another little touch we added to the two windows on our front porch is window boxes! I absolutely LOVE them, and they are really easy to maintain. I switch out the flowers for each season, and they add such a welcoming touch when you visit our home.
These are the ones I have…
I painted mine Valspar’s “Ebony Fields” to match my shutters.
If you don’t want to buy them, I have a post about how you can make your own! CLICK HERE to see the tutorial.
4. Add a New Door Mat!
Y’all know I love a beautiful door mat! I shared a post recently about how I like to layer my door mats and shared possible combos. CLICK HERE to view that post.
5. Add a Place to Sip Sweet Tea!
In the south, we like to sit on our front porches and sip some sweet tea! In order to do that, you need a bench, swing, or rocking chair. Heck, I wish I had room for all three!
For me, I added a bench to my front porch. I found it at a yard sale years ago, and it was aqua, so I spray painted it black.
My mom always loved rocking chairs on her front porches, similar to these…
I’ve always dreamed about having a porch swing. If I did right now, I would want a bed swing like the one below…
6. Lastly, Paint Your Front Door!
I have wooden doors on my front porch, so I don’t want to paint them. But if you have a standard metal door that needs a facelift, give it a new coat of paint!
I wrote two different posts with all kinds of painted door inspiration that you can see HERE and HERE.
Well, those are my top 6 ideas to boost your curb appeal!
Let me know if you have tried any of these ideas or if you have a new idea to share with the rest of us!
Beautiful!!
The mail box looks nice. That is one thing that people do look for, a safe mail delivery. You have many great updates inside and outside. Be careful or you may decide to stay in your nice updated home. Just be sure you have a good reason to move.
I don’t know how anyone wouldn’t love your home! It’s simply beautiful….just like you!
We live in a retirement community with an over zealous HOA…so cant do some of your ideas without jumping thru lots of hoops. That said, I just freshened up our front door, added a rug & door mat, and have a table and 2 chairs for front porch sitting. Also more potted plants than allowed, but so far no violation letters. 😜
Everyone that walks by always tells us we have the nicest looking front yard….so I guess it’s working!
Praying for the perfect buyers and the perfect new home for y’all..
Great ideas all around! None of what I’m about to say it directed at you, Traci, these are just things I’ve learned along the way. I’ve bought and sold quite a few homes and I always think it’s helpful to have someone else come over – maybe even a few friends – ones who will be “real honest” and tell you what they like, and what they notice may not be great selling points. I’ve been that person for a few of my friends – LOL – yep, I can be real honest , but they all knew I had their best interest at heart. I’m often surprised at how much stuff people keep on their kitchen and bathroom counters – and that’s fine for everyday living, but not when selling a home. Also, clean, clean, clean, and then clean some more. Clean houses sell faster. I sold my condo a few years ago – on the market for 3 days and I had 4 good offers. The young man who bought it told me at closing that it was the cleanest home he had seen and he had been looking for over 6 months. Too much furniture – it may work when living in the home, but you may need to remove some when selling so the rooms look spacious. Pets – we love ’em, but not everyone does. I once found a home I was in love with – it, the location, the landscaping – all perfection – BUT, they had two cats and they were all over me when I was looking at the house. I’m highly allergic to cats – it took me almost a week to recover from viewing that home, and I was heart broken. The cats there took that home off the list for me as I was afraid I would never get all the “cat” out of the home. Another home, as soon as we opened the front door I smelled the dogs – I didn’t go any farther into the home. I know these statements may make some people mad – but here’s the thing – if you want to sell the house maybe relocate your animals during showings and make sure any evidence of them is removed – including the smell. Don’t be emotionally attached to your home, and be open to any and all suggestions to help sell it quickly – in the end isn’t that what you want – you want it sold.
I think your home is beautiful, and it’s easy to ignore all the things when you’re living day-to-day, but as you’ve pointed out, it’s a lot of work prepping a home to sell.
First and foremost, how is Cy’s eye? And how is your dad’s wife doing? What a great post, Traci! A couple of years ago, turning our porch into a wrap around, was my Christmas gift from Larry. I have always loved wrap around porches! It’s amazing what a positive change that addition has made to the front of our home. Way out here in the country, front porch sitting is done a lot, especially since there’s a group of us that are retired. We have 5 sitting areas and a swing. A couple of real challenges I have are: keeping all of the furniture wiped off to do some sitting and; the paint repeatedly peels off of the swing, which is so ugly, the swing is white, so it shows dirt/stains so fast. I welcome any suggestions you might have for the swing appearance and keeping the rest of the furniture sitting ready! After seeing your post about layering mats at the front door, I tried it, but the bottom of the glass door got hung up on the top mat and drug it, so one mat is all I can use. Because it is super sandy here (like at the beach) I have a huge rubber mat at the top of the stairs to help keep some of the sand outside. It’s not pretty, but it’s a necessity for my sanity. Years ago I painted our metal front door and the porch shutters a bright yellow, which I love. You see right into the kitchen from the front door, so I have painted the detail on the cabinets and doors bright yellow and put yellow flower knobs on the cabinets. It give a cohesive appearance. YES, selling a house is an awful lot of work. Have a blessed day, my friend!
Hi Ginger! Thank you for your concern for Cy’s eye. I just wrote an update post tonight. :).
I LOVE wrap around porches too! Actually, when we built our master bedroom addition, we put French doors in the sitting area to lead out to our future wrap around porch. Sadly, we’ve never had time to build it because of all of our other projects. :(. Maybe then next home owner will be able to? Your porch sounds lovely!! I know that the bench on my front porch gets a little dirty to and I have to wipe it off sometimes. I hate that your paint is peeling. Are you using a good exterior paint? I would even use a strong porch paint to help with the peeling? Your yellow door sounds very cheerful! Thanks for all your encouragement! xoxo Traci
Where will you be moving? Best of luck!
Thank you, Jan! We haven’t announced where we are moving yet, but will be soon! :)
The outside of your house looks SO GOOD! I noticed you do not have shutters on the front porch, only window boxes. Can you explain why you did it that way? We have a red brick ranch home that needs some major help on the outside. Not sure about painting the brick, but want to try window boxes and shutters. Thanks, Tracy!
Hi Patty! You know, that is a great question! I’ve never really thought about it, so I went back and looked at pictures. haha! I guess that I just liked the clean look of the taller windows and our door and didn’t feel that shutters were needed? I had the gray color of the window boxes, and the dark brown color of the doors, and didn’t really want to add any more “dark colors” to the porch. I like the white around the windows. But I think that shutters would probably look fine there, if I added them? I just didn’t feel they were necessary. Hope that helps! Blessings!