Exterior House Colors: Complete Guide to Choosing the Perfect Palette
Your exterior paint is one of the few home decisions that affects the entire neighborhood. If you pick well, you benefit from personal satisfaction, increased curb appeal, and an enhanced resale value. If you pick wrong, you’ll regret it every time you pull in the driveway, plus you’ll have to bear the cost of redoing it later. This guide covers exterior color guides to help you choose, such as picking by style, pairing with the roof, working with brick or cedar, and smaller decisions on shutters, front door, and the garage door.
Exterior color essentials for a beautiful home
These guides cover the biggest exterior color decisions you can make.
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- Neutral exterior paint colors. The neutral palette that ages well
- Exterior house colors that sell. Colors that help move a listing more quickly
Colors by house style
These style sets help you select a palette before consulting a swatch deck. Use these to pick by the style of house you’ve got.
- Exterior paint colors for ranch style homes. Ranch-house palette done right
- Cape Cod house colors. Classic Cape Cod palettes
- Colonial house colors. Colonial-style color palettes
- Exterior paint colors for craftsman style homes. Craftsman palette guidance
- Spanish style homes exterior paint colors. Spanish-style exterior palettes
- Modern farmhouse exterior colors. Modern farmhouse palette
- Coastal exterior paint colors. Coastal palette and how to keep it from going kitsch
- Mountain home exterior paint colors. Mountain home palettes that read warm
House colors by roof color
The roof is a permanent piece of the palette. These recommendations help you pick the rest of the colors around it.
- House colors with a black roof. Palettes that work under a dark roof
- House paint colors for a green roof. Working with a green roof
- House paint colors for a red roof. Pairing siding and trim with red
Pairing with brick, wood, and cedar
If you’ve got natural materials on your home’s facade, the paint has to work around them.
- Paint colors that go with brick. Trim and siding paint for brick houses
- Paint colors that go with cedar siding. Working with cedar’s warm tones
- Paint colors that go with barn wood. Pairing paint with reclaimed barn wood
- Paint colors that go with honey oak. Honey oak is harder to pair than people think
Shutter colors
Find out how to pair your house color based on the hue of your shutters for a cohesive design.
- Shutter colors for a brick house. Shutter color on brick exteriors
- Shutter colors for a gray house. Shutter color on gray siding
- Shutter colors for a white house. High-contrast shutter choices
- Shutter colors for a yellow house. Shutter color on yellow exteriors
- Shutter colors for a tan house. Shutter color on tan siding
- Best shutter colors for a cream house. Shutters that work with cream
Front door colors
The front door is the cheapest high-impact exterior change you can make. Find out the meanings of popular colors.
- Front door colors. Front door color guide
- Front door colors for a gray house. Front door choices on gray exteriors
Garage door, chimney, and other exterior elements
These guides share color tips for the supporting elements that round out your exterior palette.
- Garage door color ideas. Garage door color choices
- What color to paint an exterior chimney. Painting an exterior chimney
- Best finish for exterior paint. Picking the right exterior paint sheen
- Brown exterior house colors. Using brown as the main exterior color
There are more exterior paint guides being added here as we create them. Get the main house color right and the rest of the palette gets much easier to plan.
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