Exterior Home Painting

Painting Prep Work for Your Seattle Home

At PNW House Painting, we know Seattle like the back of our hand. Our intimate knowledge of the various types of homes and weather conditions allow us to provide you with a high-quality paint job that will last for years to come.

While painting a house may seem like a simple job, countless little factors need to be taken into consideration before we apply the first drop of paint. Weather, vegetation, and the type of home all determine the right kind of prep work that will need to be performed before painting.

Below is the 5-step prep process that we use to help ensure that every one of the jobs we perform comes out looking perfect.

• Washing – We gently pressure-wash the exterior to remove the dust, dirt, mildew, and pollution from your home. This helps ensure a clean surface for the new paint to adhere to. When we pressure wash a home, some paint chips may fall off in areas where there is severe damage. However, paint removal via pressure washing is not intentional as it would force too much water into the siding of the home. When it comes to older homes, we offer a more delicate hand washing process.
• Scraping – We will hand scrape the sides of your home to remove all loose and peeling paint. Be wary of paint contractors who use abrasive means to remove the paint to save time. This can harm the underlying surface and prevent paint from adhering correctly.
• Sanding - Paint ridges between bare wood and existing paint are sanded to at least a 45-degree angle to ensure proper water runoff. Power sanding is not standard, and not available on homes with lead present. A “smooth” finish is generally not possible on heavy prep areas without the extensive use of wood filler and exterior spackling, which may be priced separately at the request of the customer.
• Caulking - We use high quality, elastomeric caulking in nearly every application. Caulking is performed in any area where it is missing, loose, or cracked around window and door frames, butt joints, and splits. Hardiplank siding does not require caulking at mid-wall butt joints, as per installation instruction by James Hardie - At customer request, we can caulk these without warranty.
• Primer - We use a variety of primers to ensure a quality paint job. We use an oil-based primer to spot-prime bare wood on prepped surfaces, to block tannin bleed of cedar, and to inhibit rust stains where nails or metal piping are present. High build latex primers are also used in cases such as delaminating composite boards, or over porous surfaces such as concrete and masonry.

Seattle House Painting

Once the prep work has been completed, it’s now time to paint the exterior of your home. Here’s how we do it:

• Siding – We apply the paint to the siding through the use of an airless sprayer. Rough and textured siding will be back-brushed to ensure maximum protection and coverage.
• Trim – Generally speaking, we will brush and roll the trim features after the application of siding paint. In instances where a house has many-paned wooden windows, deep trim-colored soffits, or other extensive trim features, these may be sprayed before or after the siding paint, depending on what will provide the best final look. For windows and doors, the surfaces visible when closed will be painted, as well as the sills visible when open.