Wall-less Exterior

Going to breakdown the latest project, Wall-less in Whitehall, room by room to provide a better snapshot of all the work we did rather than just one big summary post of before and afters. Today we'll start with the exterior!

To me, the exterior of the home is super important. It is the absolute first thing potential buyers, neighbors, or anyone driving through the neighborhood will see and take note of. While you can spend a fortune updating and improving an exterior, you can also make significant changes very simply with minimal funds and some sweat equity. Let's get into all the changes!

We'll start out front. The major changes were all new windows, new window trim, and painting all of the soffits, gutters, and siding. The windows were a pane (lol, get it? "window pane") because the old ones, weren't a standard size. That left the options of ordering custom windows or reframing the openings to fit a standard size. While it was more work, I opted to reframe, the changes needed were only a few inches added to the width, and about an inch subtracted from the height. After the new windows went in, I finished them out by cutting back the aluminum siding (which was covering old wooden siding, which was also cut back) and adding pressure treated 1x4s and 1x6s for trim. Then some caulk and paint and the windows were done!

As you can see from the before picture, the house was a nice dingy white all over. Not quite the "pop" we wanted. After a nice pressure wash, the gutters, soffits, and covered porch got the same white paint as the new window trim, and the siding got a tan Mercurial .

The simple changes were cleaning up the landscaping, adding a planter bed and mulch, wrapping the front porch posts, and sealing the driveway.

We pulled the old overgrown evergreen and rose bushes and replaced them with smaller mums and accent plants. Around these new plants I constructed a simple planter box made from landscape timbers and landscape spikes. This box was only one row tall, so the 12 inch nails were enough to keep them in place. For boxes where multiple rows of timbers will be stacked, drill holes through the timbers and insert rebar to keep the timbers grounded and standing straight.

Wrapping the porch posts was a new one for me. For the longest time I wasn't sure what to do, I just knew I couldn't leave them how they were. It was actually very easy and they turned out pretty great. All I did was rip down and attach treated 1x10s to the front and back of the old aluminum posts with lag bolts, and then cover the sides with treated 1x2s and nails. A bit of pvc trim around the bottom, reattaching the downspouts, and done!

Also, take care or your asphalt driveways people! This one was pretty far gone but a new one wasn't in the budget. I sealed (read painted) just for a cosmetic boost.

Now for the backyard!

So. much. trash.

So. much. overgrown. landscaping.

Once the trash was taken care of and the landscaping cut back, the back of the house and the garage got the same pressure wash and paint treatment as discussed earlier. The boarded garage windows were also not a standard size, so they got sheets of plexiglass as replacements. The garage roof was also missing some shingles. Despite the lost shingles, it never leaked. The decision was to try to color match and patch in shingles rather than a full replacement.

The yard had a decent chain link fence around the perimeter, so to fully fence the yard, a wooden gate was added across the driveway. Planter boxes were constructed on each side of the yard and mums and mulch completed the look.

The biggest project in the backyard was the deck. The area between the backdoor and the laundry room addition was a mud pit, as it didn't' receive enough sun to grow grass. The solution was a 14x8 ft low deck.

Stay tuned for the rest of the house coming soon!