We all say it’s what’s on the inside that counts, but let’s be honest.
External first impressions do leave a mark. It’s true, even if we don’t want to admit it, which is why I’m so happy to report that our house finally got an exterior facelift. Woot! Our main summer goal was to refinish the stucco on our house—yes, we know it’s practically winter—but the process has taken quite a bit longer than we expected. You would think we’d know better by now…
Initially, we planned to paint over the old stucco ourselves using quality paint made for rough exteriors, like Duramax from Lowe’s. But in the midst of making that decision, we had our stucco repaired in a few spots by a local stucco handyman named Antonio…and come to think of it, I actually have no idea what his last name is. Anyway, good ole’ Tony was recommended to us by our neighbors, and since their house is lovely and they had nothing but glowing comments regarding his work, we called him up to work on our house. You can see one of his repairs on the basement window.
After he finished the small repair jobs, he asked us if we planned to repaint. We said yes, that was the plan. Then he threw us a sales pitch saying that he could put a stucco paste—tinted a color of our choice—over our entire house for a very reasonable amount of money. We kind of stammered around for a second and then told him we’d let him know if decided to go that route. I’m pretty sure both of us were rolling our eyes though, because even though he quoted us a low price, paint was certain to be much, much cheaper. Right? That’s when we realized that while paint may normally be a cheap and quick fix, it might be a different story when the exterior is involved.
As it turns out, quality paint that is designed for stucco would have cost us only a few hundred dollars less, since we would need to do two coats (which would eventually need to be repainted, unlike tinted stucco paste), plus hours of our own labor. Not long after actually calculating the cost of painting the house ourselves, we happily called Antonio to see when he could get a crew over to our house. *I’m not gonna lie. Contractors can be a pain to get ahold of, and while we loved his work, Antonio was no exception. Thankfully, it was worth the wait.*
The color is slightly grayer than I envisioned, but overall we love it—especially the fact that they were able to update the texture to a more modern look that hides previous imperfections. It’s just nice having a cohesive exterior; everything looks so much cleaner. Clearly the neighbors feel the same way, because we’ve received lots of compliments—even from folks just meandering by on a walk with the dog.
My favorite part might actually be the back stoop. Check it out…
If you’re wondering about the white trim, we painted it ourselves before the stucco guys arrived. Despite having a small house, it took us a full weekend and a half to put on one coat of primer and two coats of Sherwin Williams exterior paint.
We’re not done quite yet though. I’m itching to paint the front door, and we need to add some lights and house numbers. Hopefully we’ll make some headway on those things this weekend. Eventually I plan to spray paint our mailbox (which is happily sitting the planter at the moment…), and when the weather warms back up, we’ll add the adirondack chair we picked up at ACE for a song, along with some plants.
Ultimately, I’m just glad I no longer have to tell people coming to our house for the first time, “Yeah, it’s the pink and yellow house. You can’t miss it—it’s the ugliest house on the street.” What do you think?
(Did you know these little guys are called “emoticons”? What a crack up!)
