Paint colours for home resale

Paint colours for home resale

Let us help you choose the best paint colours to use when selling your home.

One of the most important rules of thumb when you're preparing your home for sale is to look at it from a buyer's point of view, not just from your own.

Nowhere is that truer than in the wall colours you choose. You may love

strong colours and have very stylish interior decor that goes with them,

but colour can present several drawbacks when it comes to resale.

As Toronto designer Shelley Kirsch points out, "Colour adds a lot of personality to an environment -- which is good and bad.

If a buyer is very visual, they can see beyond a certain colour; but if

they aren't, the colour can distract, making it hard for them to

visualize themselves in the room."

Of course, that needn't mean

you should always paint all the rooms boring beige before you put a

house on the Calgary real estate market. In fact, that could conceivably have the opposite

effect, making a house seem plain-Jane (especially if it's limited in

architectural detail or is under-furnished).

The ideal, in

Kirsch's view, is to choose colours with just the right touch of life to

them: neutral enough to present a blank canvas,but interesting enough

to add some character. We asked her to give us some of her favourite

all-round paint colours, both for resale and for very livable interiors

in general

Quincy Tan HC-25, Benjamin Moore

"I find this

putty-grey-beigey-taupe to be a very neutral, non-competitive colour,

but it also adds a certain depth and character that brings out the

beauty of the home, rather than merely acting as a backdrop. Also, it

allows you to use accents in stronger colours and still maintain a

classic look.

40YY-51/084, ICI Paints.

"Grey

is very trendy right now, especially warm greys like this one. It's

especially beautiful in townhouses, with architectural detail picked out

in white trim, like cornice and crown mouldings, or marble. It's a very

sophisticated colour, and classic settings like this seem to suit it

better than modern or too-bright settings, which might make it look

cold."

Stone White 11, Farrow & Ball.

"This has a

vintage, mission feeling to it that I like. They call it a white, but

it's really a chalky grey-green. It's beautiful with gumwood trim, wood

floors, in fact any natural wood

Sesame, Sico Paints.

"If you

want the warmth of yellow but are unsure -- and I consider yellows to

be the hardest colour in the palette to work with -- you might want to

try going for an amber or cloudy yellow instead. This is a beautiful,

soft greyed yellow that looks marvellous with Cloud White [Benjamin

Moore OC-40] trim."

Silver Blonde 2141, Pratt & Lambert.

"A

mushroomy tone like this one is very versatile. It looks equally lovely

with red, or with cream upholstery. This is what you'd call the most

˜circular' of colours, in that it looks lovely with both light and dark

woods and accents. It's a clean, modern, almost Scandinavian look."

Note: Swatch colours may appear different on some monitors.