How to Choose a Trim Color for Your House

Your home's trim is the best place to use bold colors and show your personality, but that does not mean that you should just blindly pick a color that happens to appeal to you. In order to create the look for your home that you want, it takes a bit more thought than that. However, choosing a trim color does not have to be overwhelming either. There are five easy steps you can use to guide you to the right trim color for your home.

Start by collecting paint chips that you think you will like on your home. Make sure you pick up a wide range of colors and shades. The more options you have to look at, the more likely you are to find the trim color that is perfect for your home. Paint chips are free anyway, so there is no need to be stingy.

Next you are going to want to hold up the paint chips you picked out up to your home's exterior. You want to make sure that the trim color will complement your home's existing brick or vinyl. If a color just does not look right, toss it and move on. For the trim color to look good it must work with the home's exterior color, so do not try to make a color work just because you like it.

After you have eliminated colors based on your home's brick or siding color, make sure that the colors you have left will work with your roof color as well. Most of the time your trim color will be right next to your roof, so it is important for the color to work with your roof. Again, if it just doesn't work, don't force it.

Now that you have eliminated quite a few colors, it is time to decide the look that you are going for. Do you want your trim to make a statement or do you want it to play a supporting role? Look at the colors you have left and eliminate those that will not work with the look you want. If you are not sure what a color will do for the look of your home, ask a friend that has a good eye for color what they think. Sometimes a second opinion is all you need.

Here comes the fun part. You have probably eliminated all but a few color choices, so the time has come to paint. Take the paint chips you have left to your local home improvement store, and purchase a sample of each paint color to test on your home. Paint a patch of each color on your home and then step back and look at them. Which one draws your eye? Is it also the one that appeals to you the most? Then that is your color. How easy is that?

You are done! You have picked out your home's new trim color. That wasn't as bad as you thought it would be right? Now get to painting so that you can enjoy that trim color on your home for years to come.