Paint your walls white when selling your home

A Blank Slate: Why You Should Paint Your Walls White

In case you missed the last episode of Property Brothers, here’s what happened on every episode ever. Young couple looking for their dream home. They DO NOT have time for a renovation and MUST HAVE a house that is move-in ready. News Flash: they can’t afford it. Time to look at some fixer-uppers.

Enter Casa # 1. They can’t stand it because it is “sooo yellow.” They move on. I’m yelling at the couple on the TV at this point and judging them. Don’t they realize that they can fix that with a can of paint? The paint should have been the least of their worries. Why would they disregard a house just because of a paint color? Well they did, and it happens on every episode.

Wall paint color trends change over the years. People often don’t realize that home design changes and goes out of style just like clothes do. You probably wouldn’t wear your grandma’s wardrobe just because it fit you, unless it was a unique vintage piece. It’s very much the same in the world of home design. Wall paper used to be popular, then everyone decided they didn’t want to see patterns on walls anymore. They wanted neutral colors. Beige walls hung in there for about a decade and started to be phased out by light grey. Light grey is a hard tone to do just right because it can very easily come out too pink, purple or blue. I finally got the color right in my last house and then… wait. What’s happening on Instagram? Now we are doing white? That’s right. White walls everyone. Oh yeah, and wall paper is cool again.

I’m not suggesting that everyone keep up with home style trends and keep their houses up to date. Everyone has different personal style and that should be encouraged in the same way as we encourage fashion. We like our houses to resemble us and the things and colors that we like. The issue only arises when you want to sell your house. The things and colors that you like may only be appealing to a small group of the population. It narrows down your market.

What I have learned from watching hundreds of couples tour houses on HGTV shows is that when you are trying to sell your house, you must give people a blank slate. They don’t want to imagine what’s past your paint color. Paint it white. Let the prospective buyer imagine the things and colors that they like inside of it.