What makes all the difference is the landscaping.

You mention dark timber garage door - I hope you mean a grey, similar to the tiles. I would also paint the planter a similar dark grey.

A good lesson for all of us in how clever sales images work. The plain greyness of the basic house is alleviated by: two outdoor light fittings casting an exaggeratedly yellow light, a big area of bright gold-mustard internal lighting (more yellow than normal domestic lighting), a big stripe of reddish wood chips and more red-brown in fence to left, dark brown in area under bowl-shaped planter, two vivid white planters/pots, green turf, light textured finish on the screening near front door, and bright (heightened?) white on garage door. I think this gives us clues to how to add colour and effects to choose a desired first impression. Do you want darker? More contrasts and textures? Light and glowing? Hope you get some good advice from other Houzzers.

If you decide to go with a timber garage, you may like to consider a timber front door in the same stain to tie the two together. If you do the fascia and guttering in a darker grey and then the feature tile, planter box and window frames in the same/similar colour you will create more contrast with the lighter render. alternatively do the roof the darker grey and keep the guttering and fascia a similar colour to the render. if you are really after a pop of colour, you could try an earthy orange around the edges of the tiling and on the planter box. hope this helps. I used to advise on external colour for a builder and the more striking facades had contrasting hues of the same colour with the occasional pop of colour if you are brave. Remember if you get sick of a render colour it's much easier to change than tiles or the steel.

We have similar colours. We've got a timber door and faux timber garage doors. We've used similar plantings as on your sales picture- the purple grass plant in a mass planting really highlights the timber and gives it a wow factor. It's hard with that big expanse of white garage door, but I think landscaping would help it all- it's not bland it's a blank canvas!

Thanks for the tips everyone. Given a different perspective on all this.

I would like a timber door to match the faux timber garage but I believe it's not an option with our builder. So it would have to be a painted colour.

We plan to have to have a tiled roof either in black or dull matte black. We are happy to change the colour of the tiles or render to suit the roof and garage. Three options were given for the feature tiles. a beige, brown or a dark grey/black ( as in the photo ).