Designing The Perfect Exterior For Your New Build Home (Pt. 2)

In just 27 days we’ll be able to *officially * call this beauty ours! Our home’s exterior is like 99% done and looking even better than I ever imagined! In my previous post about designing your home’s exterior, I walked through my own process of how I chose the exterior elevation and color scheme for our home. (Be sure to check it out if you missed it!) That post is super helpful for anyone just starting their home build process or considering remodeling the outside of their home. Now that we’re a few months into our build, I have a couple more tips about choosing an exterior that I thought would be helpful to share. Some of these I’ve learned from going through the process myself, some I’ve learned during my time as a New Home Designer, but all are invaluable when it comes to getting the most out of your home build!

checkout your color scheme options before signing

If you’re super picky when it comes to the exterior of your home, ask to see your exterior options before signing. Not every builder or community will have the same color options available, so if you’re dead set on a white house with dark garage doors and black windows, make sure that’s a color scheme that’s available for your community. If you live in a community with an HOA, you’ll also probably have to abide by some sort of repeat rule. For example, a common one is that your home cannot be the same elevation and exterior scheme as the houses on either side of you and the three across the street from you. This keeps the houses in a single area from all looking the same. Ask your sales consultant about any repeat rules and take note of the neighbors’ houses when looking at lots. Driving around your future neighborhood to see existing homes is a great way to see what the color schemes look like in person, but if your neighborhood is brand new (like ours) ask your sales consultant where the closest similar-looking community is so you can take a peek.

don’t do too much (or too little ) with your color scheme

I touched on this one a bit in my last exterior post, but the ideal number of colors on your house can make or break the whole look. After looking back at the original mockups I did of our home, the dark grey trim would’ve been a bit much because we already had an accent color—our black windows and front door. The all-white exterior allows the dark trim and door to really pop without giving your eyes too much to look at.
However, single colors house can also end up looking flat and drab. Another section of our neighborhood has what you’d call “starter homes” by another builder. Those homes are plainer looking, affordable, and non-customizable. The exteriors are almost all siding and most only have one paint color—no contrasting trim or accents. I really wish that builder would’ve added an accent color, even just on the trim around the windows, so that the houses didn’t look so plain. Don’t be that builder.

consider the direction your home faces when picking the color

I’ll be completely honest, this wasn’t at all something I considered when picking our home’s exterior color scheme. Luckily, it worked out in my favor, but depending on the color you chose, your home could look completely different than what you imagined depending on its direction. Our home is south-facing, so it gets a ton of sunlight on the front of the house during the day. This causes our white paint to look bright white, instead of creamy white.

The exterior paint color we chose is Sherwin Williams White Heron. The next (darker) shade of white our builder offered was more beige than I wanted, so I chose the brightest white color possible since there would be a lot of it (we have HardiePlank on the sides and back with just two small painted areas on the front.) I could only find pictures online of White Heron used on interior walls, but just like the swatch, it looked a bit creamy. Not a true white tone, but it was the closest I could get.

Flash forward 4 months and our exterior is WHITE. Like white white. Not creamy, not yellowy. White. At first, I honestly thought they painted it the wrong color. Benjamin Moore also has a White Heron paint color which is much more of a true white tone than Sherwin Williams’ and for about a week I was convinced the painters must have bought the wrong brand of paint. I didn’t mention it to our builder because 1) How could they have made that big of a mistake when they only use SW paint? and 2) I really liked the way it looked on our siding! It was the perfect shade of white—not blinding, but not yellow looking. After a little research, I realized that it probably is the correct color, I just forgot to take into account the fact that sunlight will make the color seem brighter on the exterior. Even on days with some overcast, the house still appears brighter than I originally thought it would.

Below is a quick guide to sun exposure on home exteriors, but I highly recommend reading the full post explaining it all here.

If your home faces south: Your home will be lit up almost the entire day. The sunlight can make the colors look brighter at some times of day, and wash them out at others. Don’t be surprised (like I was) if your home looks 2-3 shades lighter than expected due to all the sunlight.
If your home faces north: Your home’s light exposure will be more shaded and not as bright as a south-facing home. Expect the colors to look predictable and consistent throughout the day.
If your home faces east: Your home will be lit up in the morning and shaded in the later half of the day.
If your home faces west: Your home will be shaded in the morning and lit up in the later half of the day.

know that white stone isn’t “white white”

Most of the front of our house is White 4,6,8 Limestone, with just there painted areas—the garage doors, the board and batten, and the trim around the windows. White limestone, however, is not white white. It has a creamier, yellowish undertone to it—making it a better match with creamy white tones for a monochromatic look, or darker colors if you’re going for contrast.

So naturally, once I saw that our paint color was much brighter than I anticipated, my first concern was whether or not it would match our stone well. For a few days, I watched the masons made progress on our stone and thought “wow, I’m really going to have to repaint the front of our brand new house myself.” The shades of white were not matching. Once the stone was completely finished though, the difference in white tones wasn’t as stark as I thought it would be and looked great. Hallelujah!!! Those couple of days had me worried though haha. So, if you don’t take anything else away from this, take away these two things—your exterior paint color will look brighter than the swatch if your home gets a lot of direct sunlight and “white” stone only looks as white as the white next to it. Don’t pair white stone with a super bright white paint color or you risk the stone looking dingy and yellow.

talk to your construction manager about landscaping early on

Landscaping often gets forgotten about when you’re busy picking paint colors and upgrading your front door. Don’t forget to ask your construction manager about what will be around your home once it’s built. Will you have separate or Good Neighbor fencing? Are you required to have trees in the front yard? Does sod come standard in the front and/or backyard? Knowing what will be around your house can help give you a better, more complete picture of what your lot will look like once the build process is over.

is it trendy or timeless?

I usually don’t put too much thought into following or staying away from design trends. Everything is a trend. Certain styles and looks come and go, but as long as it makes you happy, I say go for it! I heard from multiple people before I built my house that they were sick of seeing the black and white, modern farmhouse look. “It’s overplayed.” “It’s trendy and will be outdated soon.” It been done to death.” Guess what? Black and white color scheme have been around forever. It’s a trend that keeps coming back time and time again. And you know what we call that? Timeless. If you listen to what everyone else wants you to do with your home, you’ll never have a home you truly love—and the conflicting opinions will have your house looking a hodgepodge mess. So forget about what everyone else has to say and do what makes you happy.

money knows best

One thing that really helped me get an idea of what looked great on a home was to drive through neighborhoods with custom, high-end homes. People that have the money to spend on making the outside of their home look absolutely perfect usually also have the money to hire a designer for their build process. I drove around to a few affluent neighborhoods before our design appointment to get ideas for landscaping, exterior lighting, and accents—all features that often times get overlooked during the build process, but can really add some extra curb appeal to your home.

your choices are set in stone

One of the biggest shocks to new home buyers is that they cannot make changes to their home’s exterior plan once they’ve signed off on their selections. With some builders (like mine), exterior selections are made AT SIGNING. So make sure you are 100% about your exterior choices because once you sign the initial contract for your home, you can’t make any changes to it. With other builders (like the one I work for), you make your exterior selections during your design appointment. After the appointment, you may still be able to make changes to your interior selections (and incur a hefty change order fee) but it’s very unlikely that you’ll be able to make any changes to your home’s exterior. Why? Your home’s exterior plans get sent to the city for permitting purposes and to the HOA/Architectural Board to check for any accidental repeats. The builder begins ordering materials, the designer takes on new buyers, and your home is pushed into the next stage of the build process. Once you sign off on your exterior selections, there would be too many people to go back and inform of the change, not to mention you could delay your entire build process. Be confident in your choice, because once you sign off, it’s set in stone.

get a mockup of your home

If you’re still having trouble settling on a color scheme, or want to get a visual of what the scheme you chose will look like, hit me up! I do exterior home mockups for $75 per image with only a 72 hour turnaround time! You can check out some examples I’ve done below for others going through the build process!