What’s Your Paint Pick for 2023
In the real estate industry, we depend on colors to move property.
Pick the right ones, and you increase curb appeal; draw attention to the best features; and create competition for ownership. Pick the wrong ones, and guests will not make it to open house.
Thankfully, we have much to choose from and lots of advice for 2023. Greige interiors from 2022 are making way for a burst of subtle tones and brights that are everything but neutral.
HGTV describes the 2023 palette as rich and restorative from neutrals to vintage-inspired, and the names alone -- Darkroom, Raspberry Blush, Tiramisu -- create strong emotional responses surpassed only by seeing the luxury of the saturated rooms.
BEHR's 2023 toasty color trends are warm, with no gray in sight.
Sherwin Williams encourages us to "bring home the warmth and intrigue of Redend Point," their 2023 color like pink sand at eighty-five degrees. We love the warmth at home, and the hint of pink that promises to explode bold in 2023, yet caution whether intrigue is befitting when you're trying to sell a house to a broad base of buyers.
Paint colors are inspired by culture, and fashions shift TrendBook's selections annually. But home sellers are not likely to be rewarded for embracing ephemeral style statements from runway colors.
Better Homes and Gardens sums up top pics, and while greige is still in the picture, more on the warm than cool side, Blank Canvas is their "creamy shade of white that goes with practically everything."
FIXR's 2022 survey of industry influencers and designers hailed greens as the color of the year, and we saw green showing up in individual rooms, accent chairs, and kitchen cabinets. Even so, whites and cremes came out on top in 2022, picked by 81% of designers as the best for selling a house. That did not deter realtors from recommending gray to clients, and Curbio from trendy use of Agreeable Gray in renovation projects, though recommended by only 14% of designers.
How we actually live -- with our personal and personality style choices -- is not necessarily aligned with what we want to see when house hunting. We love how the furniture is placed, the house is sparse with no TV, the textiles are light colored, and there are no window treatments. This appeals to our innate desire for cleanliness, simplicity, and order.
Your professional stager understands the psychology of colors, and also knows that gray may be agreeable, but is not agreeable in all properties. That white does go with everything, but that there are dozens of whites and some undertones in white can clash with floors, furnishings, and lighting.
So for 2023, vibrant colors and wallpaper will indeed show up from pales to brights to patterns in kitchen cabinets, dining nooks and coves, and statement walls; and for selling a property, whites and creams will remain the preference -- yes, over gray. Bold colors will still be too emotionally charged for prospective home buyers, but will be embraced by home owners and short term rental investors, where creating mood with color is part of the experience.