I haven't moved in very long time but sure have helped my mother, mother in law and both my kids in the staging to sell.
Both times my daughter has sold her house it was decorated...once wall paper all over and red carpet on the main floor and up the stairs....sold in literally hours! The next time the house was sponge painted in the living and dining room...bright colors...sold in less than 3 weeks. My son's house had very recently been painted with a mural in one bedroom, and big wall of different colored squares in the living/diningroom...and the walk out family room had been repainted with dark pink woodwork!...They sold it to the first people who looked forw hat they wanted. Then there was my mother's all neutral house that was on the market 8 months.
I'd leave it the way is is....make sure it's clean and looking fresh, but don't change color to sell your house.
Linda C

It depends on the buyer.

Me? I have very specific color tastes. I would rather have a blank palette with a warm neutral color - fully painted and move-in ready. That way I wouldn't feel the need to come in and "decorate". I could work on each room as I need to.

Also, I would be more concerned with what's under the hood...

I would make sure that everything is CLEAN, freshly painted, and puts the buyer at ease.

I hope this helps

I think a house is more likely to sell if it is very clean and freshly painted, in neutral colors.
Also, de-clutter it; remove excess, oversize, and outdated furniture and accessories. Perform any needed maintenance, inside and out. Freshen up the front yard.

I'd personally prefer the house to be neutral that way I could decorate and repaint as money and time allowed.

However, if you're going to be living there for a few years yet I'd probably do what I wanted with the place and enjoy it. There are also people that don't like neutral wall direction.

Is there an upstairs? Maybe keep the down stairs more neutral and do more colors upstairs.

Either way, when it's time to sell I'd just make sure the place is really clean and edited well and I think you'll be fine.

My house sold in a month with light yellow, light green and beige walls. Everything was spotless, floors were new, etc.

Single mom was so glad to find our house since all she has to do is move her furniture in and enjoy the house. I suppose it depends on who is buying. If it's a family with a handy man they may not mind having to come in and do some work. Leaving a house in not just right condition is grounds for the potential buyers to offer less money.

My house sold for the asking price.

I fell in love with a townhouse that was very neutral in colors, spotless, staged nicely since I was a new home buyer 13.5 years ago and could not see past the wild colors in the other townhouse. Now that I am an educated buyer, I feel I would be able to see past colors and poor decorations but new homeowners sometimes can't.

I feel the same way lynn2006 does - I can see past paint, but it seems today most homebuyers cannot.

Case in point - my neighbor's house was up for sale for a long time (over a year). Other houses were selling in our area and we all thought the neighbors were priced right. The house had a lot of very stong and dark colors and very ethnic decorations. Most of the potential buyers were young families looking to move into our school district. They want move-in-ready houses and the feedback the sellers got from open houses were that people were turned off by the loud colors. The sellers refused to paint for a very long time. Finally, they gave in and painted. And the house did sell a short time later.

I think it's fine to have color but don't go crazy. You don't have to have the entire house beige. As the other posters have said, make sure it is clean and that things that need to be fixed are fixed.

I think if you want some "color" you might choose a darker neutral, like a deeper tan (I'm sure many people here could name names!). Sometimes an orange, red, blue, etc. turn people off, while a darker brown or grey still *seem* neutral.

Slightly OT, but when I was looking for homes about 5-years-ago, I was shocked at the number of homes with 20-30+ year old cabinets that would just slap new granite on the counters, thinking that would make a home sell. It must've worked, though, and there were buyers who probably never open the cabinets or drawers.

If you are not selling though for a few years, I would go ahead with what you like. Plans change, sometimes unexpectedly, and that is one of the joys of homeownership, not to have white/neutral walls! For things that are more permanent like bathrooms, flooring, etc. however I would try to use more neutral choices. A well cared for home, clean and well maintained should be a plus for many buyers. I got to the point I could very easily tell the difference between a home improved to flip it and a house that was lovingly maintained. I almost always preferred the latter.

Valinsv, I agree with you. The other townhouse that I could not see beyond the colors had glossy hot pink wall paper in the Master Bathroom and on the ceiling with streaks of white throughout it. Orange vertical blinds, green patterned dirty carpet, , etc. It was $20,000 more due to the Marble fire place, ceiling fans and lights and when I was offered $20,000 to drop the contract to buy that townhouse instead, I was so in love with the neutral townshouse, I would not accept the deal but I see now, with $20,000 I could have changed all those things.I see now I was in love with his Cherry furniture and it was not just the neutral decor but how his interior designer had everything staged. I agree a house lovingly maintained and clean is what I would look for now but many new home buyers can't look beyond loud colors that is not everyone's taste.

When my mother passed away, we could not sell our house due to the Bright orange walls, bright red walls, red,white and blue walls, etc. in the bedrooms. We should have repainted those glossy loud walls! I think my father and new stepmother took a major reduction in price which could have been prevented with going with less loud colors on the walls. So color on the walls is OK if done in a classy way and staged well or at least looked liked it was lovingly cared for but color that is way too bright in too many rooms, may need to be toned down a bit to have buyers be able to look past the colors.

I definitely now can see beyond a lot of decorating that is not my taste but then I could not.

I did fall in love year years earlier with a house lovingly maintained with wall paper and colors all that appealed to me and if the location was different, I would have bought the house. The older couple loved their home and I would have enjoyed living there so much but the neighborhood had been changing and it was too closed to a bad neighborhood when I called the police to find out the crime in the neighborhood.

You say "planning to sell in a few years".

Plans may not materialize.

Paint how you want to live.

IF and WHEN you sell, repaint any loud bright colors white or tan.
Probably won't be the whole place anyway.

BTW, NOTHING is selling in my neighborhood, neutral or wallpapered.

Depends, depends, depends!

How good a decorator are you?

What kind of house, what kind of neighborhood?

If you REALLY want to sell the house in a couple of years, keep selling in mind as you decorate.

My opinion is this: To reach the greatest number of potential buyers, neutral is best. Neutral will appeal to uneducated buyers, and educated buyers will be able to see past it.

We put our house up for sale, expecting to live here for the next six to nine months, given the economy, blah, blah, blah.

We had a bid within a week, and a closing date within two weeks. Wooohooo!

And yep, our house is painted in a variety of neutral, transitional colors.

Well, I don't think the two are mutually exclusive-- I think neutral CAN look modern and stylish.

Since you already have neutral colors, I would leave them and personalize your space with accessories you like that are modern and stylish. Just make sure they are not "trendy" because by the time you go to sell your house, they will be outdated. Pick things you truly like that you would take with you when you move.

Don't live your life for some theoretical "if". Live in your home in the NOW. If or when it's time to sell, you'll want a fresh coat of paint and to edit the clutter anyway. That's standard for listing, so a 5 year old paint job will be painted again then anyway. You can always choose to tone things down a bit then if you have an extreme style.

The bigger worry is keeping up with home maintainence rather than the paint color you chose 5 years in the past. Make sure your furnace and water heater are serviced annually (keep records!), you keep your filters changed, stop any water leaks immediately, and repair any holes in walls or dings in woodwork immediately. A well kept decluttered and clean home shows so much better than an "updated" house with obvious water damage on the ceiling and gouges in the woodwork from rambunctious kids. People look at the little things and extrapolate. "If the lacquer is peeling off of this doorknob, I wonder how many other things that we can't see are on the verge of breaking down."

I don't understand the logic of leaving rooms plain just because you're going to sell in a couple of years. Houses are meant to be homes and if you're not selling for a couple of years, enjoy the house while you can and make it your own. When you're ready to sell, your Realtor will tell you what, if any changes are needed to help with appeal. Just keep in mind, any house will sell if it's priced correctly for it's market regardless of decor or even maintenance issues.