Get rid of plant on the left, edge on the right and that green ish on the bottom right for starters.

Can you do better stairs? Paint.

Hmmm, to start, paint the exterior and trim, possibly add shutters to the two smaller windows and absolutely add a walkway. Line walkway with pretty annuals and maybe flower boxes under the two large windows. Thoughts?

My bad, I just noticed there are walkways...never mind ;)

There is a cool modern look lurking here . . back with sketches for the deck suggestion at the end. Shutters need to go, and you need fat trim around the aluminum windows. Let's give you a throwback nautical referenced contemporary look.

Stucco in a natural stone color - olive undertone but light and bright - bm stingray
(see how they pair it with blue-gray and dark chocolate?) trim at fascia, eave, around doors and windows in nimbus gray - but don't carry this onto carports . .
Front door brighter in bm van courtland blue

http://www.benjaminmoore.com/en-us/paint-color/stingray
http://www.benjaminmoore.com/en-us/paint-color/nimbusgray
http://www.benjaminmoore.com/en-us/paint-color/vancourtlandblue

All the carports and new decks and leave the below stucco basement dark brown .. if they need a new coat, look at bm black bean soup. The nimbus gray will relate to the aluminum windows - if you replace them you should add paintable trim, and you might get them painted in nimbus in vinyl formulated paint before you install .. split the higher windows into thirds so you have three squares across.

There is some investment in decking and stairs across the front that would transform your basic look and livability. You need book matched decks that run from the doors out to the ends (since there are basement windows in between doors, we won't run them across there .. . decks should be two steps down from entry doors, and the stairs down from the deck should head to the middle four steps down where another deck that bridges the rest of the area in front sits just three steps off the ground. (this will create a little privacy for teh basement windows but leave them plenty of sun). Those three steps should be the width of the front deck and turning back to it so you have a center entry to a common landing about 12' across with stairs off both ends going up to private decks that have wider 8' three steps to doors. Horizontal steel cable rails between structural posts and rails will keep the contemporary look.

Across the front of both decks, plant something like abelia grandiflora - a flowering evergreen bush (depending on your zone) in a zig zag on either side of the middle stair / section / so it will grow up together and shield the lower area under deck / has a nice architecture and pulls the whole place together.

I think window boxes under the two smaller windows would look nice.

Take the shrubs out and then put in a deck

Remove foundation plantings. Paint entire house white. Remove shutters. Paint smokestacks black. New front doors with opaque glass panels. New barn lighting light fixtures for front lights.

Invest in a large specimen tree to provide "foreground" for the house, and shade. Depending on where you live I can suggest species. Seems like the turf grass could use some TLC and organic fertilizer.

Good luck!

A tall architectural fence with large openings to totally change the substandard appearance and have some fun in the process.

Yes, i agree add a porch. The front doors look way too much off the ground, and by adding a deck and extending the roof line you get a porch. Relocate the stairs, add railings to the porch

I like the idea of the porch but the lower level rooms would be completely dark....also, shutters to scale rather than the tiny ones in place would look much better. If I'm renting one of the units, I'm not sure I would want one large connected deck, there would have to be separation and privacy.

larkspur, I only see lower windows between the doors, not from the doors out, so there is a way to create separate decks, privacy, and provide light to the middle ..

On the roof what are those things protruding from roof ? Vents? Do they need to be so high due to zoning regulations ? They are a disturbance to me, i.e. there somewhat goes your curb appeal.

This looks to me like a prefab home or a mobile home . As such, in photo, what looks like a window in lower space is nothing more than a vent for the crawlspace. I should know, we live in such a structure and we call it HOME :) When you build your deck or porch over this area it's important not to block cross ventilation thru this crawl space. So when i converted our crawl space into a storage i wasn't too concerned about insulating it too MUCH

Nope, these are just the kind of basement duplexes built in some parts of the country post war - late 40's I'd wager. If you put a contemporary style front door on these (once you remove shutters) you'd get an even better look. You don't have the architecture to pull off real cottage / bungalow charm without a lot more work on the structure - corbel supported entry roofs, etc. . . . . .Here's the sketch of the levels involved with the deck concept

And some cable deck railings from houzz [houzz=] [houzz=]

Those vents on the roof are likely for some type of natural gas appliance such as a dryer or water heater. They, by code, have to be a certain height above the combustible roofing materials.

LibraDesignEye, I appreciate the design you put together.

I had something else in mind. No stairs from front the door out to the porch. Just strait out door to the porch. Then the porch would stretch the entire length over to the other duplex apt. and be 6 or more feet deep. Enough to have some adirondack chairs for example.

Then have the section in the middle between the front doors be deeper, maybe 12'....enough for a couple BBQ's and maybe a table. Then have two sets of stairs go down to the ground from there.

The two sets of stairs should go 'one to the right' and 'one to the left' from the larger deck with a walkway to the designated parking on the right and left of the building.

@Curt, The vent stacks are for natural draft appliances. To satisfy the draft requirements, they must be at least 3' above the roof. Nothing to do with combustible roofing.
G2427.5.3

http://publicecodes.cyberregs.com/icod/irc/2012/icod_irc_2012_24_sec025.htm

When I saw this post my first thought was a porch connecting the two entrances. Libradesigneye did what I was thinking of but couldn't put in words. Perfect.

I think no stairs to porch is good - just have to have a long run of stairs somewhere then . . that can be more difficult to navigate, while a short run is safer and easier. . and I'd like to see you use something like this detail at the bottom stairs so that is shared .. .
my scenario does create the largest deck area as a private deck . . .and the middle landing only as shared . . that way you can clearly define shared and not shared space . . .
. . . is snow or ice an issue? [houzz=]