Before you yell at me… let me just say this: I agree. Painting exterior stone is a sin. Okay, now that that’s out of the way… on to my tips of choosing a color, price & some before / after photos.
When we bought our home in Bryson City, NC it was a journey. This was not in our plan. You may know, we had upended our entire lives and moved from Miami, Fl to Asheville, NC with a very specific purpose. Actually, with a very specific house to purchase. Asheville was always a temporary stop until we could wait for the timing to work and purchase Jaime’s grandparent’s home. That… didn’t happen.
A quick house shopping story
It was a crushing disappointment and a story for another day. This happens with house hunting, of course, you fall in love and sometimes that home wasn’t the one for you. In the end, things worked out for us (as they always do) and we ended up with our present home. It was not love at first sight. We bought this home under the gun (our lease was up and we had 1 month to find a home after our dream house fell through) and we also had a checklist of things we were looking for in our first property.
- – It had to be extremely close to town (to make convenient rentals and because it was our first time living in a rural area and we weren’t sure what to expect… would we be snowed in? Hell NO…)
- – It needed extra acreage to expand upon in the future that was flat and usable
- – It needed some way to make quick vacation rentals in the interim of our bigger tiny house expansion plan
So, as luck would have it (or fate if you believe in that), we found our current home. It had all the things we were looking for. BUT it has a stone house painted in dark gray with a maroon tin roof. Let me let that sink in for you. This house was painted in dark gray with a maroon roof to match the local town’s high school colors. Not ideal, to put it lightly. I hated it.
But the housing market in Bryson City did not have an ample amount of choices, and since this was always going to be our starter home / investment property, I got to set aside my disdain for the egregious design choice. We bought the house and quickly began to make plans to convert the basement into two apartments. And then we began to slowly DIY our living space.
Making changes when it’s not your forever home
I’m sure many of you can relate to this: is it really worth making drastic costly changes when you know you’re not in your forever home? This is so tricky for me. We ultimately decided there were a few things we simply could not live with and a few others that aren’t worth investing in changing as they don’t increase the value of the house. Re-painting the exterior dark gray: a must. Repainting or purchasing a new roof: out of the question.
Choosing a color for your exterior stone: considerations
So step 1: asses what your design considerations are. What color is your roof? Windows? Shutters? And can you change them? We were not working with a blank canvas, so again, we had a maroon roof to take into consideration. Ultimately, I went with a warm white color to lighten the house. I researched online and was comfortable with Marshmallow white by Sherwin-Williams because I had conveniently seen it used in A Beautiful Mess to paint of exterior brick.
Cost of painting exterior stone
Guys… painting stone takes so much. Stone is porous and it seems to suck the paint right in without absorbing much. In our case, we needed to use paint brushes (not rollers) dabbing several coats over and over. We spent at least $1,000 maybe even $1,500 (this will also depend on the size of your home – ours is 1,600 square feet). Budget accordingly and try a small piece so you can get a sense for how much paint and how many coats it takes to achieve your desired color. You’ll notice pretty quickly how much and how labor extensive this would be.
Exterior stone painting tips
We didn’t hire out. We painted our home with the help of my dad and some help from Jaime’s brother. It sucked, but we saved ourself some money. If we did hire out, I would assume it wouldn’t have cost us less than $3,000 maybe more if they saw it was stone. In retrospect, we would have bought a paint gun and tried that. The set up is way more on the front end: you have to cover up anything you don’t want sprayed over with the gun so it can be tedious. But it may have made it FAR easier on us. There are some corners and sections where that’s simply not possible, but some of the bigger sides of the house could have taken us less time.
So to recap, you still get to tape all the windows and places you don’t want paint on. Thick brushes worked best for our stone. However, if you have brick, we hear a thick roller (1.25″) can work. We tried that and it helped some but ultimately we needed that thick brush for the little grooves. Let it dry and then observe it with the lighting of the day and then keep going until it looks even to you. That’s all there is too it. Try not to go crazy. Choose a podcast and listen to that while you work!
Before and after video
I hope this supports you on your stone exterior painting endeavors. As always, leave a comment or reach out with questions or shared experience / tips!
xoxo,
c.