Lumber and Siding - What color should I paint this house?

I just purchased this split-level as a rehab/flip project and I'm wondering what color(s) I should I paint the exterior of the house. I'm just brainstorming right now, but I'd love some input.

Rossiter house ext 2 on Flickr - Photo Sharing! (http://www.flickr.com/photos/15739702@N04/4020155720/)
Rossiter house ext 1 on Flickr - Photo Sharing! (http://www.flickr.com/photos/15739702@N04/4019394821/in/photostream/)

How about Black and Gold for the Steelers? ;)

Most paint stores will have brochures with suggested color groups. SWP has several and they even go as far as to say this for the body, that for the trim and then an accent color if wanted.

Picking colors is mostly about personal choice although any house for sale needs to be painted a generic enough color scheme so that it won't scare away any potential buyers.

I'm not familiar with them [I never owned a pc until after I retired] but there are programs that allow you to load a photo of the house and then try different color schemes. Like color chips and samples, it may not give you a complete visual how it will look for real but it's a tool that can help you decide.

It looks like the house has vinyl siding. I think I read someplace that you should stick with light colors when paint vinyl.

It used to be that vinyl could only be painted a color that was the same shade or lighter because vinyl is temperature rated and a darker color could increase the siding's temp. This is still true if using conventional latex paint. SWP has come out with a new line of latex paint, formulated for painting vinyl siding. This paint helps with adhesion and can be used with most colors. I don't know if any of the other paint manufacture's have come out with a similiar coating.

Thanks for the heads-up, Marksr. With my luck I woulda painted the whole house and it would flake off 2 days later!