House Painters in Willow Grove, PA

The split level is the signature house here, and it creates a specific painting condition that a ranch does not.

Split levels have staggered floor heights, which means staggered ceiling heights inside and awkward wall heights in the stairwells. The stairwell wall in a split is frequently the tallest interior surface in the house and the hardest one to reach safely, and it is where most homeowners stop when they try to paint it themselves.

We set up for it properly. It is priced in the estimate rather than becoming a conversation on day three.

These houses were built with wood siding, and most have been changed at least once. Aluminum in the sixties and seventies, vinyl since. Some have had the front elevation done in stone or brick veneer.

Aluminum needs the chalk washed off completely and a bonding primer. Vinyl needs vinyl-safe product and no color darker than the original. Veneer stone and brick need breathable coatings if they are to be painted at all. That is three products and three prep methods on one house, which is why a single blanket number for an exterior here tends to be wrong.

There is a lot of commercial frontage here, and storefront and small office work is a normal part of our business in this area.

That work runs on different rules than a house. The business stays open, so painting happens early, late, or in phases. Signage and glazing get masked. Exits stay clear. Materials get secured rather than left in a public space. See commercial and specialty coatings.

A house built in 1955 has typically been through four or five owners and just as many rounds of decorating.

What that produces is layers. Wallpaper under paint. Paneling over plaster. Textured ceilings applied in the seventies over drywall that was never properly finished. Trim carrying oil enamel under three coats of latex that never bonded to it.

None of it is a problem, but all of it is work, and it has to be found at the walkthrough rather than on the first day. Ed checks corners, closets, and behind switch plates precisely because that is where the history shows.

Nearly every house here has a garage, attached or detached, and a concrete slab in it.

Flake epoxy floors are a popular upgrade and one Ed does properly: mechanical grinding to profile the slab, contamination removed, cracks filled, base coat, broadcast flake, clear topcoat. Not a rolled-on kit, which lifts with the first hot tire.