If you’re considering hiring a painting contractor to repaint your home, you’re making a great move. Professional painting contractors have the skills, experience, and tools needed for producing high-quality and durable results. They have probably handled hundreds of projects like yours before and can help you save time and money, and avoid the frustration that often comes with DIY residential painting.

Having said that, when hiring a painting contractor, there’re a number of things that they will need to know in advance before deciding if and how to go about your project. This is important because it helps them plan and come up with a more accurate painting estimate that reflects your painting needs. Here are the most common things they will be looking for:

What Needs to be Painted
It may sound obvious, but this area can be quite confusing if the project scope is not well communicated down to the specific details. For instance, “I need the interior of my house painted,” might not provide a true picture of exactly what you need done. The contractor might further ask about the number and size of the rooms, and whether or not you will need the ceilings, cabinets, trim, doors, and stair railings painted as well.

The Condition of Your Walls
This is one of the biggest reasons the residential painting contractor will request to make a personal visit to your home before issuing a painting estimate. The nature of your home’s walls influence the type and extent of prep work required, and even the type of products to be used.

If the surfaces have signs of severe paint failure such as paint peeling, cracking, and bubbling along with mold and mildew, it will require extensive paint stripping, scraping, sanding and pressure washing. That means more labor and resources, which have to be accounted for in the estimate.

Surface Damage and Repairs
While professional painters will handle the usual surface paint failure during surface preparation, certain surface damages might need special attention. For instance, if your siding has consideration structural damage or rot, they would need to know the extent of the damage in advance to assess if they can fix it or have you hire a third party handyman. Most painters can fix minor carpentry and drywall defects, but this is still something you have to check with them.

Surface Area to be Painted
During a painting estimate session, your painter might want to measure the surface area that needs to be painted in order to estimate the amount of paint they will need for the project. This also helps them estimate how much time they will need for their planning purposes. Any special cases such as high ceilings and walls, multistory homes, narrow spaces, and severe mildew infestation will also have to be accounted for when creating an estimate.

Color Scheme
Figuring your preferred colors in advance can help the painting process move on much faster. The contractor won’t be able to purchase the paint if they don’t know your colors. If you don’t have a color scheme yet, but you have some color ideas, they can help you solidify your color palette at no extra cost.

The Bottom Line

In essence, the painting contractor has to physically visit your project for them to figure out most of the details they need to prepare a painting estimate and plan for your project. This first meeting is also important to you in case you want to understand a little more about how the painting process will proceed.

If you need any help with your residential painting needs, Eason Painting would be more than happy to help. Our services are currently available in Macomb Township, Washington Township, Ray Township, Rochester, Rochester Hills, Romeo, Armada, Troy, Shelby Township, Harrison Township, Chesterfield, and Clinton Township, MI.

Call us today on 586-465-5081 to find out what creative ideas we have in store for you!