We painted our house!!

I can’t express how happy I am that we painted our house! Since we bought the house two years ago, I’ve wanted to update the exterior and paint it white. Now that it’s finally done, I am so happy to share with you how we did it ourselves for about 1/6 of what we were quoted by the pros!

When we first came across the listing for our house over two years ago, we passed it up a few times. The first photo in the listing showed a 1960s bi-level home that just wasn’t our style. Thankfully, we decided to take a look at it.

After a showing of the house, we could see so much potential. The interior was updated, and it was on almost an acre of land, which included beautiful mature trees and an in-ground pool. We could see raising our family here. We put in an offer, but we were too late. The sellers had already accepted another offer that was higher. But God had a plan for us and that house. Something fell through and the sellers accepted our backup offer, which was less than the asking price! The house was ours!

It needed A LOT of deep cleaning (as in scrubbing the walls to rid them of pet hair, etc) and some rooms needed painted before we could move in. After a long weeks’ worth of cleaning and prep work, we were able to move in. Right away, I started planning how I wanted to decorate each space and got to work making what I envisioned for each room come to life. Slowly but surely, our house began to feel like home.

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One of the major things I disliked about the house was the exterior. It just didn’t match what was on the inside, what I worked so hard to make look nice. So when springtime rolled around and I began getting outside more and looking at the exterior, I got it in my head that we should paint it this summer. I scoured Pinterest and Instagram for inspiration on paint colors and had everything planned out for what I hoped our exterior could look like someday.

We decided to get a free quote from a local painting company that had great reviews and claims that they were budget-friendly compared to others in the area. We were quoted $4,100. While that may be affordable to some, it just wasn’t possible for us and most likely would never be possible to spend on a purely cosmetic update.

I really wanted to paint the house and couldn’t get it out of my mind, so I began pricing things out to see how much it would be if we did it ourselves. My dad owns a paint sprayer he said we could use and offered his help. After eventually convincing my husband that we (really, he, as I was 8 months pregnant and couldn’t do much) could do this, we decided to start that weekend and finish up the next.

My husband knew how much I wanted to paint the house white and one Friday evening after I had mentioned it once again, he came to me and said “Okay. So we need to go get the paint tonight and I need you to call your dad and see if we can borrow the paint sprayer tomorrow.” His hard work to make this crazy dream of mine come true is one of the sweetest gestures of love I’ve ever been shown.

We went to Home Depot where I had found an affordable brick and masonry paint and primer in one, along with exterior vinyl paint.

We borrowed my dad’s airless paint sprayer and first painted all of the brick. The brick took two full coats and then some touch up in a few spots. We then painted the trim around the lower level of our home. The brick and trim above the brick took one weekend with just my husband and father working.

A lot of the time was spent on prep work the first weekend. We had to power wash the entire house and pull back all of the landscaping rock and mulch to get the the bottom brick. We also had to take off all of the downspouts and light fixtures. Power washing took off most of the old and peeling paint on the trim. The majority of the time that Saturday was spent covering windows with plastic and paper.

We didn’t have enough time to start the upper level of the house, so we put it on hold until the next weekend. Through the week, I painted doors and window ledges and spray painted the exterior door knobs with Rustoleum Satin Black spray paint.

The next weekend, my husband and dad got right back to work to finish the house. We only needed Saturday to finish it! They sprayed the vinyl siding and the top trim and gutters. Then they painted the downspouts and reattached them.

We bought new house numbers from Menards and new exterior light fixtures from Amazon. I was gifted a clearance welcome sign from my mom last year and finally hung it up outside our front door. What a transformation!

Overall, this DIY project, including all of the paint, prep work supplies, new light fixtures and house numbers, came to a total cost of right around $700. That’s almost 1/6 of the price we were quoted just by doing the work ourselves!

I absolutely LOVE how it turned out! I have a white “farmhouse” now! My husband and father have never painted the exterior of a house before, but if they can do it, so can you! If you have any questions about our exterior renovation, please reach out or look under my highlights on Instagram @faith.and.farmhouse.

Thanks for reading! God bless!