How To Properly Paint The Exterior Of A Home

Many homeowners ask me how much it costs to paint the exterior of a home.  I am always a little reserved in giving them a price over the phone, I would rather meet with the homeowner personally, see their home, inspect the condition of their home to make sure I know exactly what they want painted and if they are going to have a color change.  I personally look at every job to give an estimate.

One thing I have learned in the last 40 years that I have been painting is that there are many ways to paint the exterior of a home, but there is only one way to do it correctly if you want the paint job to last.  You never proceed to the next step until the step you are working on is dry.  You are probably wondering what is this guy talking about.

On the home page of my website, there is a video you can watch on “How We Do Exterior Painting”. I always recommend all homeowners watch this video to help them understand the correct process.

Click here to watch “How We Do Exterior Painting”.

Now that you have watched the Ron’s Painting video on How We Do Exterior Painting, if you noticed we do the exterior painting in the following steps:

• Before we begin the painting process at all, I always like to meet with the homeowner to discuss color selection.  One thing many painting contractors and homeowners don’t understand is, that picking the correct paint color determines how long a paint job will last.  If the wrong color is chosen, the paint will fade quickly.  Therefore, I work closely with homeowners on color selection.  This is not seen in our video.
• We give homeowners a copy of our workers compensation, liability insurance and a copy of our painting licenses.
• When we arrive to pressure clean your home, we move any furnishings on rear lanai and make sure anything that may be damaged by chlorine is moved out of the way.  We then begin the pressure cleaning process. We always rinse the vegetation down with clean water before we start using a bleach and water solution, then rinse vegetation again after pressure cleaning is done.  We always allow all surfaces to dry overnight.  If there is a privacy wall that needs to be painted on the top, we make sure these surfaces are pressure cleaned at this time. There is always heavy mildew growth on these surfaces.
• We then cover all windows, doors, and screens with plastic, protect concrete floors or pavers where they meet stucco walls, with paper and tape.
• Apply a chalk sealer to all chalky surfaces that will be painted, then allow chalk sealer to dry.
• Caulk soffits where they meet stucco walls, wood joints in fascia if fascia is being painted using an elastomeric caulk.  Allow caulk to cure overnight.
• Patch cracks in stucco walls and top of privacy walls using Sherwin Williams elastomeric patching sealant.  Allow to cure overnight.
• If there is damage or cracks to drywall ceilings, we do our repairs at this point.
• If there are rusty corner beads on the exterior of the home, we grind down the rust with a wire brush attachment then apply POR-15 over rust to seal in rust and allow this to dry overnight.  Many times, homeowners have rust on their front doors, we also apply the POR-15 to the rust on the front door.
• Its day 3 now, this is when Ron’s Painting starts our painting process using Sherwin Williams premium exterior Duration, in a satin finish, on stucco walls  We apply the paint by spraying the paint on the stucco walls and at the same time we also roll the paint into the stucco walls, filling in all surfaces.  Many times, the soffits are not being painted, so we hand paint the top of the stucco walls with a brush and small roller.  Front and rear lanai ceiling and walls are painted with a brush and roller. 
• Once the stucco walls are painted, we start painting the banding and fascia, using Sherwin Williams Duration in a gloss finish.
• As we finish painting a side of the home, we remove the plastic that we put on the windows during the prep process and caulk the perimeter of the windows using an elastomeric caulk.  We allow the caulk to cure for at least 6 hours.
• Once the caulk has cured, we hand paint the stucco on the window returns.
• We pull back the dirt from around the foundation, then hand paint the stucco foundation with the stucco paint color.  Once paint is dry, we push back the dirt at the foundation.
• We now paint the exterior side of all doors and door casings using Sherwin Williams Duration or Resilience, in a gloss finish.  Many times, in the color selection meeting with homeowners, I offer an alternative for front doors, possibly painting the front doors using a metallic paint.

• Now that the painting is completed, we clean up all paper, plastic and drop clothes.  Sweep floors and put furniture back in place on the lanai.

I hope you have enjoyed this blog on exterior painting.  No matter what painting contractor you hire, if you have watched this video and read this blog, this will help you better understand how a proper exterior paint job should be done and to make sure you get what you paid for.  Many times, contractors cut corners, use inferior products,  their employees are not covered under workers compensation or the painting company is not licensed. These are some of the way’s painters cut their prices to give homeowners a low-ball price.

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