How Paint Can Help (or Hurt) Your Home’s Value

A good exterior paint job adds value; a misguided one can make you weep — or LOL. Here’s a collection of our favorite oddballs.

Urban Jungle

Friends and the pizza delivery guy won’t have any trouble finding your house when you tell them to look for the leopard spots. No matter what your color scheme, take care when prepping an older house for repainting by testing for lead paint and knowing current lead paint laws.

Credit: Libby Walker for HouseLogic

Flower Power

The prospect of brand-new siding for this 1907 house brought out a creative flurry in the homeowners, who spent a weekend festooning the old siding with little portraits of roses as a fond farewell to their 100-year-old exterior. Give your wood siding some TLC by inspecting, caulking, and trimming back shrubbery, and maybe it’ll last a century, too.

Credit: Brittany Powell

What Will the Neighbors Think?

Many of singer Chris Brown’s neighbors weren’t too happy with his decision to paint wild graffiti on the curbside wall of his Hollywood Hills home. Los Angeles city officials agreed, and fined the R&B star $376 for unpermitted signage. Before you get out the cans of spray paint, check your city ordinances and HOA rules about what’s allowed — and what isn’t.

Credit: Owen Beiny/WENN.com

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