planning to sell: should we paint our exterior?

[linda_loo]

We are planning to put our house on the market in the spring, and have been talking about painting the exterior. The estimates to paint it are too high for our current budget, so we were planning to do it ourselves over the next few months. Problem is, we don't really have the money to do it ourselves at the moment. If I had to be honest, I'd say we don't have the time either. We live in cold/snowy Western PA, so we will run out of time to do this within a few months.

I have been wracking my brain over this, knowing that I will make time and scrape enough $ together to do it, if we have to. I'm trying to carefully consider if it is worth our time/$ at all. As far as we know, there are no big inspection-issues that we will face... our deck was just finished and looks great. The lawn/landscaping is ok and the interior will be painted, well-cared for... uncluttered, etc.

I know, it's hard to make a recommendation w/o seeing the entire house, but what do you think a buyer will think, seeing our siding? Completely turned-off and drive away? Or if they like the rest of the house, do you think they will simply take the siding into consideration (knowing they will have to paint it in the near future) if they choose to make an offer?

Please excuse the mess in some of these shots. I took the pictures while we were doing our deck, and a lot of things were not in their proper place.

front left:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/lindy-loo/P9110007.jpg

close-up, where you can see holes made by carpenter bees (that we would fill and prime, if we were to paint):
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/lindy-loo/P9110008.jpg

front right:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/lindy-loo/P9110005.jpg

close up, where you can see a board or two coming loose, between the two windows, at the bottom. If we were to paint, we would probably replace this board. If we don't paint, we'll just tap the nails in again (for like the 4th time).
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/lindy-loo/P9110006.jpg
that is also a good shot of the paint wearing. The trim on these windows is quite grayed.

[linda_loo]

back of the house, you can see where we have repaired woodpecker holes, including a place where we had to replace 2 entire boards:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/lindy-loo/P9110003.jpg

right side of house, some woodpecker holes again:
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/lindy-loo/P9110004.jpg

left side of the house (again, woodpecker holes):
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v331/lindy-loo/P9110010.jpg

TIA!

[jennylou]

Painting a house yourself is a HUGE undertaking. I know, I've have one under my belt and one that I am working on. It took us months. With only nights and weekends, well, you just don't make quite as much progress as you'd like.

That said, the outside of a house is a huge selling point. Curb appeal is very important.

Have you priced out vinyl siding? I've been surprised by the high costs of painting quotes myself. With one house, we bought the siding ourselves, paid some handymen to side (all who've done it before) and it was LESS than the quotes for painting.

While the outside of your home doesn't look horrible it does look like it needs either a painting or vinyl siding...I'd knock off at least 10k off my offering price because of this.

[linda_loo]

I have thought about siding - but I hate to rip off cedar siding, it just seems wrong, kwim? You didn't say anything that I wasn't already thinking. Argh. Get my brushes ready, eh?

I can get some done in the afternoons, and have cousins come in on the weekends. Hopefully it will take a month or less.

[MeTheGirlie]

I would say definitely repaint, get the most for your house you possibly can. I wouldn't replace cedar siding, I wish I had it!

[Dotsie]

As a PA Realtor I say paint it. You want the most curb appeal. You want people to drive by, see a listing, and be really intrigued by the looks of your house. Remember, you have only 1 time to make a great first impression. Besides, if it costs $10,000 to paint your house, you'll make at least $15,000 from it. It definitely pays off. Good Luck...too bad I'm on the Eastern part of Pa.

[linda_loo]

Besides, if it costs $10,000 to paint your house, you'll make at least $15,000 from it. It definitely pays off.

Dotsie - do you have a link or can you provide a reference for a stat like this? If I could convince dh of this, I think we'd just pay to have it done out of our savings. Thanks.

[linda_loo]

I'm finding that it's about 81% (which sounds good to me, that's 19% that we lose, but worth it if the house sells, right?):

http://loan.yahoo.com/m/living5.html

Time and time again, repainting proves to be the most basic, and the most bankable, of fix-ups. There's almost nothing a coat of paint won't fix, at least if you plan to sell within a year or two. "People don't like buying other people's problems," says Rhode Island broker William Eccleston, "and a coat of paint can cover a lot of problems." According to the National Association of Realtors, professionally painting the exterior of a house costs an average of $3,250 and recoups 81% of its cost. "A clean, neat, orderly fresh coat of paint, that's what sells," says New Jersey broker Steve Krawse. "In the short term, changing floors, cabinetry, fixtures and sinks only counts when your house is so functionally outdated that a $4,000 investment adds $14,000 to the value. Most of the time, you're better off fixing the cracked front steps and painting the front door."

[Dotsie]

I've always found that you will make your money back if you paint or replace siding. I guess my statistics are better than what you found. But like you said, if your house sells fast, it's totally worth it. I don't know about your area, but in the area that I work in the "average" house takes about 37 days to sell. Of course in the more desirable areas I've seen houses sold within 2 days of being listed. Good Luck!!

[Sevilla]

I don't think your house looks bad, and i wouldn't replace it with vinyl siding (and fwiw, they probalby wouldn't rip off the cedar--they would cover it with siding insulation and put the vinyl over it, it's cheaper that way).

Honestly, i don't think i'd repaint it either. Just sounds like too much time, $$, and hassle for not enough return. But then again, i'm a buyer who cares about the inside of the house more than the outside.

[ejs]

I'd paint or stain the outside. Our philosophy when we're home shopping is that if the seller doesn't seem to care about the outside of the home, there are probably interior things that they haven't cared about either.

I'm not saying that YOU have done this! I'm just sharing what DH and I think when we're going to open houses.

[Hangin'in]

I would paint/stain. DH and I were looking several months ago, and there were houses that I would not even go in because I hated the way the outside looked. Call me what you will... but that's what I did. I figured if I was going to have to do that much work on the outside, I'd have to do work on the inside as well. My mother is completely the opposite... she thinks that since you live *inside* that should be the most important thing to look at...

[linda_loo]

Thanks for all the 2 cents, everyone. I think we are going to pay someone to do it. I made a lot of calls today and am working on estimates (already have 2, 2 scheduled and another 4 to return my call). I know it will be at least $3K, or as high as $5K. We might be able to work out something with this one guy (who usually just does interior work, but needs work right now) with sweat equity, getting it closer to $2K. Friends of ours offered to do it for $2K, but I don't think they were being serious. They've been working on their own house for the last 3 weeks, not making much progress. ;)

I can totally see how people do slop-jobs to get their house ready for the market. Not that I'm saying we'll do that, but I have to say that I'm not real motivated to pay a ton of money for work that I won't get to live with and enjoy for very long.

Interesting link: www.certapro.com has a fairly thorough online estimate that is really neat. Just in case anyone else is interested.

[ManteoChik]

I would paint/stain. DH and I were looking several months ago, and there were houses that I would not even go in because I hated the way the outside looked. Call me what you will... but that's what I did. I figured if I was going to have to do that much work on the outside, I'd have to do work on the inside as well. My mother is completely the opposite... she thinks that since you live *inside* that should be the most important thing to look at...

I feel the same way. We started looking a little bit but will probably get more serious about the home buying in the next year and a half and if I don't like the front I won't go in it because it wouldn't be worth my time. I wouldn't buy a house that I didn't love and if I didn't love the way it looked too I would pass on it. Most likely we'll build a house because I feel like you're spending so much money already you better get what you want. To me I want to move into a house and not have to worry about changing things.