Thanks for sharing these pictures. There is so much potential here. I suggest checking out our latest blog post: 9 Ways to Add Instant Curb Appeal for inspiration. A lot of the things on our list can be very cost-effective.

http://goodfellasconstruction.net/blog/9-ways-to-add-instant-curb-appeal

I've been working on some ideas for landscaping, just waiting for a hard rain so I will know just where the "swamp" forms to plan correctly. Does anyone know of any plants that are both drought tolerant or can handle weeks of steady downpours? I'm extremely lacking in the green thumb department.

@deco, yes and no. The storm/security doors help prevent the driving rains we get way too often from ruining the solid wood doors and within any of the 7 cities here, they are recommended.

Even in my condo, located in one of the lowest crime areas in that city, people would still bust car windows, break into backyards and vandalize just to do it. Better to be safe than sorry.

I say add more white! Try planter boxes with corbels under some of the windows. There is no detail to the house.

The stone around the front door is a big no, no. I would do wood paneling in white. Here is a photo of a home with just the right balance of black and white.

Here is one with planter boxes and corbels.

Just add more details in white!

People are asking about security needs because it would be much nicer to have a storm door without all the iron bars -- plain glass in winter, maybe partly screen in summer. Then you could make that brown or gray like your trim and paint your actual front door a nice color.

(Note: don't agree with "keeping entrances consistent" -- it's good to have visual cues that distinguish the actual main entry to the house so people know where to go in. Let the utility entrances blend more with the house, like a painted garage door does.)

So, by "security" you mean storm doors. I would most definitely change the ones you have to full view. But that will eat up all your $1,000.00.

Remove shutters. They really don't belong on your style of home. That's a freeby.

Agree with painting everything which is white...windows included, to something darker...a brown black, in particular, BM Vinton Brown.

As for the two doors and garage, I think those and the storms should also be brown..although a gloss for the doors.

I would highlight the front door with a gorgeous walkway which comes from the driveway. When the walkway gets to the garage door it splits off and leads to the front door.

Honestly we don't like the full glass doors, we prefer for people not to be able to see directly into our house, even if all they would see is the hallway leading to a bathroom, guest bed and office.

If you must keep security door, (I have them on my home) do not paint the interior door another color. The security door will then become very obvious. I painted my front door a satin black and also painted my security door with a good rustoleum paint. The security door is less obvious now.

This is my front door. As you can see our house colors are similar even if the materials are different. The siding has a cream color running thru it that we picked up in the soffit. The roofing has dark brown that we picked up in the trim. Using cedar post for the front porch helped break up and frame the front wall and window. I would do the same things with your house. Use the different colors in your brick and stone work. Maybe in the long term a pergola along the front walk and landscaping would soften look.

Eventually we do want to add a cover to the stoop and expand on the sidewalk but that is going to be around $6-7k even doing it ourselves.

We've been looking into your suggestions and have agreed on:
Doing the wrought iron black
Front door either a medium teal or a warm red. I lost on lime green.
Finding vintage style lights in either oil rubbed bronze, copper or black as the current ones are mismatched.
Changing out doorbell to something nicer.
New house numbers

still in negotiations:
Painting the garage door, gutters, shutters and utility door something between a smoky brown or an olive brown.
Flower boxes
any of the landscaping

I agree with adding more white or a color the contrasts the green of the grass. You could even do yellow but not too bright.

Take some walks around the neighborhood and get pics of landscaping you like. You'll see what does well in your zone.

I would build a pergola over the front door which would give the house some dimension, and then as mentioned before, some landscaping, a maple tree would look beautiful with the brick, just over 100 dollars for one and in a few years it will be really big!

The pictures nmp19 and reupser shared showed two interesting ornamental trees. One is a Japanese red maple, but I don't know what the other one is.

You might not want to paint the storm doors black, but I think it would look good with the gray red I suggested. I think the storm doors another bit of decoration and black would be consistent with the railing.

With brick cottage I like muted greens and dark grayish brown like in this link http://eatsleepdecorate.blogspot.com/2012/06/exterior-paint-choices.html

I like dark blue with red brick

We have narrowed down our color choices to these three. As most of the area we are in is a bit older and more conservative I have forgone on the idea of a brighter colored door as to not be "those neighbors" but will revisit the idea in the future. The trim is going to stay white for now as the weather is extremely hot and humid so any major exterior painting is on hold until spring.

landscaping: hostas, begonias and boxwood bushes seem to be the most common. Very few of the houses have any landscaping done at all besides just the bushes so running into a few issues on trying to copy the neighbors.

You might be able to guess what I would do since it's what I did myself. Use the olive color in a high gloss on the doors. I like the red but since it is the dominate brick color I wouldn't repeat in on the doors. Then I would paint the gutters and fascia the brown. Since your soffits are quite low in relation to your windows I would help add an illusion of height by using a lighter color for them, something that complements the cream color brick around the front door. In the long term I would add a walkway that connects the two doors. It's seems weird that there is no walkway to the garage man door. If the slate on the front step is available I would incorporate it. I don't know where you are located but as you plan your landscape I would recommend finding a local nursery that specializes in native plants. They are highly adapted to your climate and therefore much easier to maintain. I also wouldn't worry to much what your neighbors did years ago because landscape theory is evolving along with the climate. If you plan to say here long term, spend your money on foundation plants such as trees first. They take years to mature where as small bushes and flowers are quick to grow. I also still think a pergola between the front and garage man doors would look good. I hope you have as much fun making your house a home as we have done building ours! As my neighbor told me when I first moved in, "it's a journey not a race, you don't have to do it in a day."

Would building a rounded or half moon shaped patio between the two doors be too much? I love front porches but don't think one would look right on the house. Building the patio would allow us to do some colorful planters, perhaps a small birdbath/fountain, place a conversation set and provide a path between the front door and utility door. I'm thinking it would be a way for us to add some color and texture since I don't have a very green thumb.

I'm not sure if you mean a covered porch or an uncovered patio. Either way I think either could be a great addition. I really enjoy a covered patio. In our neck of the woods a cover adds several months of outdoor enjoyment. I think one would look great on your house. One thing to remember is a curved anything will most likely add a lot of expense. The sun was in a bad place so the picture is not the best but this is the patio we added to our ranch.

Uncovered patio for now up front, we have a Florida room and off the back, with a decent sized deck and concrete pad as well.

I'm just afraid that adding a covered patio up front would look odd considering it requires several steps to get to the front door. So still learning towards an eventual cover over just the stoop.

I can see something like this across the front of your house. It could be designed to extend out over the doors as porch covers

That's interesting. I can't lie, I can see it more at my mother's house more so than mine but that's because I'm not a fan of ranches, but he is, so I'm completely lost with this house. I'm a fan of Contemporary, with cooler tones and he prefers warm tones.

How we decided not to paint the brick: best 5 of 8 for rock, paper, scissors. I lost the tie breaker. We would have had the only painted brick house in the neighborhood too.

New Roof has been installed. Autumn Brown was our selection. We move in hopefully this coming week as a few issues had to be taken care of first.

Are there any products made to wrap the top of the wrought iron railing on the front stoop to look like its framed out in wood? Or would something like that need to be custom made? After browsing 50 million Houzz photos, I think it would be a simple update that could make a huge difference.

Still following your project. I have never seen a ready made product like you are looking for so I would guess you would have to have it us custom made. It would be fairly simple until you get to the curved end of the rail and then some real skill would be involved.

New user name, my old email was hacked and I've been fighting to get everything straight but new logins were necessary. We've done a few minor upgrades, other issues came up which ate up our original budget for the exterior.

The metal storm doors with the scrollwork have been painted black, the front and side door have a new coat of semi gloss white, new caulking (which is completely unnoticeable but necessary), we repainted the iron railings in gloss black, added a few native plants that the neighbor gave us, lots and lots of weeding, cleaned the gutters out and bought a power washer to wash everything in the spring. Removed the broken birdbath from the corner, had the hurricane take out the two diseased pecan trees and we just need a saw to cut the rest of the trunks and chain link fence that they grew through. Overall the neighbors have stopped to thank us for just the simple updates.

We are planning on updating the exterior a bit more in the spring, lots of power washing will be happening then and of course adding some colorful planters with herbs for gardening. After talking to many neighbors with window boxes, most of them have said that the hassel of dealing with the water bugs burying in them isn't worth the work and we did a mockup of window boxes and just didn't like how they looked. The front door was painted 3 different times before going back to white, I'll revisit the idea again possibly over the summer.

We found new porch lights and a matching post light so those will be added in the spring as hoping the price will drop during the winter. Photos to come soon. Autumn hit so most of our days have been spent raking.

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These are the lights we will be upgrading too next spring. They're more substantial and have a stronger traditional style that matches better with the house. The post might get an upgrade with a built up box around the existing pole or by just adding an address hanger. We had considered adding some flowers around the base but seeing how many people walk their dogs, finding something tolerant enough to withstand high winds (we're across the street from the bay) , heavy rains, the possible droughts, my black thumbs and pets seems difficult.

Looking at the after pictures now, it doesn't seem like all that much was done but there was. As I mentioned earlier, our original budget was eaten up elsewhere (oh the joys of a fixer upper) but a bit of sweat equity and lots of swear words to remove stripped and rusted screws has made a small difference. The removal of the pecan trees opened up the side yard and allow for light to come in on that side of the house so I doubt we will be doing any other large trees there.

While the original ideas didn't happen, we still love walking up to the front door and definitely looking forward to being able to power wash everything. We went from summer to a month and a half straight of rain to autumn/winter. At least spring is right around the corner.

found a picture of the house from almost 20 years ago. Early 2000s... Now we can actually develop a decent plan for landscaping based off how the heights looked against the house prior too. One thing that will be different is some color, I'm definitely adding in some flowers.

Looking forward to seeing your landscaping this spring!

Nothing fancy so far. Cedar mulch was a much needed improvement for a low cost. We have finally began our 3 to 5 year plan for landscaping. For plantings we are keeping the original shrubs and huckleberry but my mom and neighbors have donated lilies, hosta, monkey grass and some Iris'. Our one tree that was on city property (the hell strip) has been cut down due to disease and a lightning strike. As per the city we cannot plant anything there.

Also city is going to be tearing out part of the sidewalk to add in handicap accessible ramps so we're holding off on decorating the corner and anything along the sidewalks.

Thanks for the updates! So often we never get to see the results of these Houzz discussions.

Unfortunately what we had planned went out the window with so many other issues.

I'm slow to update but I do try to keep everyone's advice in pocket. You also reminded me, I need to take a closeup of the new lights because we did upgrade the original set to something a bit nicer within budget.

As of 6/25/17

Pots on the porch bring a more welcoming touch, the dying bush that was on the far right corner has been replaced with a hardy hibiscus. Pineapple Lillies and day lillies have been added in for some color. The new lights are up (can't remember if they were in the last photo or not).

Most of the landscaping was free, divisions from neighbors or bought on sale. The front door is staying white (I offically lost that battle so we won't have to redo all of the trim) but I won the battle to find some vintage hardware and a new doorbell.

For the garage entrance, iris', a trellis for the weed (the vine) because it was never ending to pull them, another pineapple lilly and some more canna(?) lilies from my neighbors. Wanted to keep the area simple.

To bad you lost the painted front door battle! These days a front door painted a different color than anything else is not unusual but does add pop. Like your progress. As your yard evolves don't be afraid to widen your planting beds. I've helps several neighbors to widen their beds and a funny thing seems to happen. Once people start cutting out lawn the planting beds get wider and wider with the lawns obviously getting smaller and smaller.

Our biggest issue is that being on a corner lot, the front door and garage entrance are both on the front of the house. Having two different colored doors seems odd even in all of the mockups I did. I had considered a deep burgundy but then the wrought iron door seemed too dark and looked muddy and even with a light tan door color, it looked like too much brown against the stacked stone. In a few years I suggest a sage green again and see if his mind changes but I know I just have to keep working on him slowly.

I actually prefer to have a smaller flower bed, nothing too wide. The bushes will be kept smaller allowing for height to come in through the flowers and I haven't given up on my bottle tree or a msll mirror on the front porch. If we ever cover for the stoop, the ceiling will be haint blue. I'm still deeply rooted with my superstitions.

Haint blue is great. Keep the spiders from making their webs. I used it on the ceiling of my lanai and it works! Insects just hate it.

I think you might want to reconsider the wider beds. I would go back to the size they used to be. It keeps your house a bit of volume to offset the squareness. You can still keep the shrubs trimmed to whatever size you want. Maybe a smallish tree just to give the front yard some interest.

I put together a quick sketch of what I thought would look nice. Exact plants and how flowery/colorful everything gets is up to you, but I thought it would be nice to line the walkway with a grass, small bush, or flowers along with a few little lanterns. Then, I would bring out the beds into a noticeable curve, adding a little seating space for enjoying all this yard! I liked that they had a little something at the corner in the old picture, so I incorporated a few bushes and either a tallish bush or small tree to add a bordering effect on that side. I also thought it would be nice to utilize the space on the other side for a small tree, maybe even a fruit tree depending on what works where you live! Whether you really flesh out the beds or keep them a little less occupied is up to you, as well, but the curves and borders give a homey, inviting, and usable feel to the yard.

I like Kimberly's plan. If you're newer to gardening you may not fully realize all of the sizes and shapes of the plants which are available today. Some of my favorites are mini and dwarf conifers. They can grow as slow as .5 inch a year. I'm not familiar with haint blue?

Kimberly love the sketch, wish I could see things as easily. When the city redid the sidewalk curb to make it handicap accessible we received a guideline for what can and cannot be planted at the corners. No large bushes and trees are on a case by vase basis and we had/have to submit a plan for city approval now. I tried to redo a quick sketch here in the office for what was approved for the hardscape. I'm still working on the landscape plans for submission to the city.

hardscape: an anchor, some vintage or reproduction buoys, and a bit of fancy work (nautical line/rope)

For plants I was thinking three of the following: citronella (it would be in a container), Coleus canina, poker, bee balm, a chocolate silk tree (pending approval) or hardy hibiscus. The area receives sun for about 65% of the day. I'm zone 7b, so we can get down to 0º and up to the high 90's.

@reupser haint blue is a southern tradition for porch ceilings. I learned the history as coming from the Geechee (and I apologize if misspelt that) people of SC/GA. A Haint is a haunt or a spirit and the color was used on ceilings to help draw spirits towards to sky or ceiling so that they wouldn't enter your doors or windows. Others believe spirits cannot cross water, so again the blue came to be. Depending on the area, the blues will change slightly. I noticed depending on one's roots the haint blue can be more indigo (indigo was used to ward spirits and protect from negativity) to more of a sky blue - drawing up to heaven.

I can't wait to see how that turns out! My only suggestion would be to consider curving the ends out toward the other edges of the yard rather than making that section look like a piece cut out of the yard, if that makes sense. I did that for my sketch because to me it makes it feel more a part of the overall space than a separate display. It's a small thing, but I like the connection.

I didn't even think about that. That way I could fade the plants into the yard rather than it feeling like a abrupt edge

Yeah!

Just some thoughts on your plants. Chocolate bird of paradise will be a very large tree, if the one my neighbor planted a couple years ago is typical. Hardy hibiscus are very late to break dormancy( mine are only 2 inches tall now). That's not a bad thing but can leave a big hole in your spring garden. Unless you're talking about a Rose of Sharron,which I've seen called a hardy hibiscus, which is totally different from what I think of as a hardy hibiscus. I'm not sure why anyone would want a plant that's nicknamed ScaredyCat and smells like dog urine but to each their own ( I had to look the coleus up). Love red hot pokers which come in a great variety of colors.

With the exception of the poker, all of your choices are really only interesting in the summer. With some careful planing your garden beds can be interesting for 3 or 4 seasons. I'm guessing your in North Carolina and there is an awesome nursery there called Plant Delights,which while kinda spendy, is a great idea source.

My house is about the same color. I just painted my front door this color...(see attached) and the side door is black because it enters the kitchen which I did black and white! Both look great!!

I'm up in the Tidewater area of VA. the scaredy cat and citronella would have been used to help deter people's pets from using the corner landscape as a bathroom. Most dogs do not like the smell of those two and scaredy cat is not a noticeable scent to humans unless crushed/mottled.

As for the hardy hibiscus, I picked up a Midnight Marvel that's roughly 3' tall already for around $20 the other day on clearance. Seeing that I have another large pot, I'm thinking about going back to get another from the nursery. People in my area mostly plant hedges and annuals so the nurseries seem to always have an abundance of clearance flowers.

I've thought about adding in some Camellia but I've heard from many they don't like high winds or salt air. Sadly I'm about 200' from the bay so we have an abundance of both.

Added in a potted hibiscus and some lillies in another pot by the garage door. Slowly everything is coming together. The lilies and hibiscus were both free as well.