Painting Your Home Exterior: How Long Does Painting Take?
They say there are no shortcuts in life. That said, you don’t want things to take longer than necessary either, including exterior painting. The best exterior painting jobs do require significant preparation and effort, of course. But how long should it take, exactly? Whether you plan on painting your own home or hiring Raleigh house painters, this is an important question to ask. After all, you want your home to look its best as soon as possible. Here are some factors that may affect the duration of an exterior paint job.
How Big is Your Home?
First and foremost, the size of your home plays the biggest part in exterior painting. The more surface there is to cover, the longer it will take, naturally. All things being equal, a standard-sized two-story home should take about 3-5 days to fully paint, including prep work.
Preparation is Half the Battle (Literally)
That aforementioned prep work can add up, too. In fact, preparing your home for exterior painting might take about as long as the painting itself. It’s a worthwhile effort, though, as proper preparation will make for a better looking, longer lasting coat in the end.
For Anderson Painting contractors, the most important part of preparing a home for paint is pressure washing its exterior. Thoroughly cleaning your home helps remove dirt, mold, and mildew. This not only keeps your home safe and healthy, but will help the new coat of paint adhere to the surface. Once finished, the home must be left to dry, which can take a day in some cases.
Additional prep work like covering bushes and light fixtures, taping off edges, removing old paint, or making minor repairs can take another day, if not more.
Environmental Concerns
The weather might throw a wrench into your exterior paint job as well. It’s always best to check the forecast for rain, wind, and extreme temperatures beforehand, but the unexpected can certainly happen. These environmental factors can make it difficult or impossible to properly paint a home’s exterior. Enough bad weather can even ruin parts of a newly started paint job, prolonging the project even more. Make sure you go over this possibility with your Raleigh house painting service before hiring them so you aren’t surprised by any additional labor costs.
Method Matters
Different painters will use different paint application methods depending on the circumstance. For some exterior painting jobs, spraying is a better option than rolling or brushing. Paint sprayers do deliver more paint at a faster rate, but they can also lead to uneven paint jobs. Brushing may take longer initially, but it’s immune to the wind’s effects and offers more precision. Many Raleigh painting companies employ multiple methods for a single paint job for the best results and optimal efficiency.
Cleaning Up
Barring some natural disaster, the prepping and painting should take about 3-5 days. Once that’s done, all that’s left is to clean up the mess. This usually only takes a few hours at most.
If everything has been done to the highest standard, that new exterior paint job should last quite some time, potentially a decade or more. At Anderson Painting, we know that our customers want the job done quickly but professionally. We deliver fast, high-quality painting services so you can enjoy your freshly painted home for many years to come. To learn more about us and all our services, call Anderson Painting today at 919-610-1855 or email us at info@andersonpaintingnc.com!