What size machine you have?
To be completely honest, if you’ve got decent equipment, I’d go in there at $685. Once you do some jobs and get some more experience and run into some competing bids, you’ll get a decent feel for the pricing for the house washing side of it. But right now you need HW jobs, as much for the experience in that area, as the money.
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3600psi @ 4gpm
Ill just go in asking what her budget is and price myself accordingly. If shes expecting $1000, ill hit her at $800. If shes expecting $500 im going home - Had a lady with a MANSION off a golf course wanting a 10,000 sqft home, 3 story with a 3 level deck / pool area(shes on a cliff) and probably a 4000 sqft driveway tell me she got quotes for $500… for everything. I gladly left.
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Around here that’s $250 and 45 minutes. Looks like mainly brick. Don’t get caught up in sq ft and price per sq ft. You can have a 3600 sq ft vinyl box style house that takes 30 minutes to wash ir a cut up 1800 sq ft house that takes an hour. I price per neighborhood. Every 5th house is the same. All close to the same size. One price for all in the community.
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once i get better with houses and can judge them by time that will help. as of right now im very slow, but thorough.
Besides pricing, what chemicals do yall use for housing?
I was recommended ZEP for oil stains in driveways, is their house & siding concentrate worth getting while im at home depot?
No it isn’t
Ok, any recommendations?
Bleach and surfactant. Typically if you can but it at a big box don’t use it on a customers house
Won’t bleach kill the grass at the base of the house? Any recommended brands or websites to purchase from? All i can find on google is simple green zep etc “big box brands”
Keep searching these forums and reading. You’ll have a lot of your questions answered…
Thanks for the reply and helpful advice CCS. Again, I’ll reiterate. My search results have been mostly “big box” brands, or like stated by innocentbystander " suffacant and bleach", or sodium hydroxide. My question was are there any recommended brands or websites to purchase from. The amount of time you took to tell me to do something I’ve already done, would’ve taken you the same amout of time to say a brand, and a website. Not trying to be a jerk but if you’re not going to contribute why even bother posting?
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Actually you have read 2 hours on this forum searching and reading. Why should anyone here offer any advice to you if you are going to complain? Everything you need to know about chems can be found on this site by searching. Or you can sign up, spend 2 hours reading and ask others to do your research you for you and then be unkind. Or go pound sand. You actually have lots of options. I would suggest spending a month or so researching, studying and experimenting. Then come back if you have technical questions that you can’t figure out on your own.
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Actually I’ve done a lot more than just 2 hours. The internet has TONS of information, but one website may recommend one thing, and another my advise against it. Putting me right back to square 1. I came here to ask experienced professionals that have been in the business their opinions. If you’re not willing to help then just dont reply. Its that simple. Is that not the point of forums? To ask questions and share experiences? As for trying different things and experimenting, I do that. But if i take a job and wash a house with nothing but bleach because i saw it on the internet, and end up doing more damage than good that puts me in and my company in a bad position. Not to mention I dont have unlimited funds to buy a bunch of chemicals and test each one out.
Everyone learns differently. Some people can do hours of research and learn everything, others need to ask questions. If everyone could learn everything just by reading there would be no need for teachers. I’m nothing more than a student asking a teacher a question. If the teacher tells me to pound sand and do more research then they’re not doing their job. Y’all aren’t teachers, I understand that, but there’s really no point in replying to someone asking for help if you aren’t being helpful. That’s not complaining, that’s just being honest.
At the end of the day I’m trying to provide the best service I can for my customers. And " experimenting " with different chemicals on my customers houses is not the way I’m going to run my business.
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And thank you for the link SPC
Fair enough. At this point it doesn’t sound like you have a business or care enough to do the hands on and experiment to succeed. I wouldn’t experiment on a customers house either. I spent a long long time experimenting before I ever took on a customer. The industry is ripe with internet question askers with crap equipment working on customers houses with no clue what they are doing. I sincerely hope you learn and succeed quickly or fail quickly before you hurt the reputation of legitimate contractors. I set the timer and found 12 pages of house wash mix and recipes on this site alone in 7 seconds. Good luck or good riddance, whichever applies.
You sure do assume alot, don’t you? Assume I’m not doing research, that I don’t want to try and be hands on, and that I have crappy equipment. All from me asking about trusted brands and where to buy them. I didn’t ask for a detailed explanation on mixing recipes.
As for experimenting. I’m not a home owner, my apartment complex probably wouldn’t be to thrilled with me testing things on their property. If I owned a home I would gladly try new things. But I dont so I can’t.
Either way thank you for the information you did provide and to everyone else. My thread has gone from a harmless request for advice into something that’s wasted a bit of both of our days.
5 minutes of searching on any forum or any search engine would have answered your question about chems. You didn’t do that. You have obviously not bought different siding surfaces and washed them with different chems so not much of a hands on guy. You show me anything bigger than s 4 gpm machine with you in front of it in the next ten minutes and I’ll mail you a hundred dollar bill. I don’t think I’ve assumed anything. Come back with a different technique than wanting to be spoon fed and I’ll bend over backwards to assist you
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Man, you’re relentless. I stated above I had a 4gpm machine yet you mock me by asking me to send you a pic of me with one bigger… Another proving point to my next statement.
And apparently you’re not reading my comments.
I said, and I quote " I dont have unlimited funds to buy a bunch of chemicals and test each one out. " but you’re suggesting I go buy a sample of each type of siding, and a bunch of chemicals to test each one out… But I’m also not supposed to take on any customers if apparently dont know what I’m doing… idk about you, but I don’t have a money tree. Also, if its brand new siding how am i going to determine which one takes care of algae better if there’s none on it? Not to mention brand new materials are going to be stronger than old materials. So that experiment is basically void. Why would anyone do that as opposed to asking someone on a pressure washing forum about it? Saves time and money getting it right the first time.
Also, I stated that in my reseach, I’ve seen a lot of misleading information. A few posts recommending “big box brands” which you advised against. I’ve seen sites and posts NOT to use bleach. Which you recommended. Sure you typed something into search and found results. Were they all consistent? Am I saying you’re wrong? No, because you’re experienced. Talking to a real person vs reading something on a website, I’ll take a real persons word for it every time.
As for asking to be spoon-fed, you mean me asking for recommended brands and a website… Thrid time stating this. I didnt ask for a recipe, i didnt ask for a how-to on washing houses, the original post was mostly about pricing!! Which I got great info from people willing to help. At the bottom of the OP i said any tips or info would help.
The OP also says I’ve been doing surface cleaning for a while, and I’m expanding into house washing. Yet another point proving your not reading everything.
So this idea you apparently have of how I somehow asked you how to operate my business, and that I’m basically a potato isnt even an assumption on your part. You’re literally NOT reading. A little hypocritical considering all you’re telling me to do is read…
Either way, we dont agree with eachother. You obviously don’t know me, nor I you. So lets be men and agree to disagree and go our separate ways.
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^^ I found your problem. There are a lot of conflicting sites on the web. Stick with the pro forums, like this one, ptstate.com, and a couple of others. You won’t see big-box brands pushed on these forums.
SH is sodium hypochlorite, chlorine bleach. Not sodium hydroxide, which is lye- a heavy degreaser used in oven cleaner, drain opener, and a host of other caustic cleaning agents.
SH is your main ingredient. Get it in the highest concentration you can find, for the most reasonable price possible. I generally buy 8.25% concentrated bleach at the dollar store, because that’s the best bang for my buck around here without buying massive quantities.
(Edit: I see people still read these old threads, so I feel the need to mention that I was able to eventually find a distributor of SH/pool shock who will deliver smaller quantities in a rural area at a reasonable cost. Start with local pool supply shops, then call around to every chemical distributor within 2 hours radius. Check to see who services the pools in your area, as well)
Please keep reading. But be judicious in where you get your information. Stick with the pro forums, and contributors on youtube who have larger operations, or are distributors.
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