We live in a small house on a lake in East Texas. We chose to put 1x12 cedar bat and board siding with 1x2 seams. We want an old barn look. We didn't want to have to continually paint or stain so we chose this siding and now people are telling us we should but water repellent on it because of the moisture and humidity at the lake. But, we are afraid if we start that we will have to redo it every couple of years, and that was our point in choosing cedar siding -- NOT having to paint or stain. We are getting older and wanted a minimum maintenance finish on the exterior of our retirement home.

Do we really NEED the repellent?