They generally are, but you still have to get up near the soffits…granted, no outlets there (well, I know a few houses that have them there, but still, lol). The bigger thing is HW mix can creep into places water alone will not due to the surface tension thing. In reality, it’s probably more valuable for optics sake than for actually protecting some of those things.
It’s probably how homes are built down here . It rains almost every day and storms about half the time . Waterproofing a house is probably a bit different down here . I’ve never seen anyone tape anything. The most I do is occasionally throw plastic over a front door.
This is right now and basically what it looks like every day
On the house i had the outlet smoke, it’s because there was a small crack between wood panels over the lamp. A tiny bit of water got in and followed the wire on the stud down to the connections to the outlet. We couldn’t know there was this tiny crack and in this case taping outlets did not help there, but i will continue to tape outlets if this reduces the chance of this happening again.
I am now very wary of wood siding though. Thankfully it’s very rare here.
Edit: here is a picture of a similar crack i found on the other side after this happened. But this is twenty some feet up, can’t see it from the ground.
back to the OP…it matter very little whether you use SF, or LF, or eyeball…ultimately it boils down to your time and materials, and what your total price will be. SF pricing is based on analyzing where you need to be on a few homes…then it becomes your estimating tool, which you recheck from time-to-time.
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Maybe we.should charge by passes.
We all should have a pedometer…
Y’all ran right over this nugget and didn’t even give it the respect it deserves. Pure gold.
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If one of y’all doesn’t make a book with all of his one liners I will. Solid gold. Book, pamphlet, newsletter. “Grumpalations 6:90 There wouldn’t be any exceptions if there weren’t any”
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Sometimes, the obvious is so elusive. Sometimes, it’s right there in your face.
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Look at how neat that is! Wow!
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You wouldn’t be the first person to take info from here, put it in a book, make money off of it and then disappear.
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Don’t worry I have a hard enough time spelling as it is. I try and stay away from words over 3 sillabulls
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Hold up a second here. For those using calculations based on area, are you using the floor area of the house or the combined areas of the surfaces cleaned?
For a hypothetical 30’x40’ rectangular single story house:
A. Floor Area = 1200 ft²
B. Short Walls = 40’x10’ x2 = 800 ft²
End Walls = 30’x10’x1.5(Rectangle plus Triangle) x 2 = 900 ft²
800 ft² + 900 ft² = 1700 ft²
It seems to me that method B is the best way to go by charging for the actual area cleaned. If you were cleaning a walkway that had stairs, you would charge for the vertical surface area too, right?
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It’s really not that complicated, nor does the square ft matter. Every house in a neighborhood should be basically the same price. Learn your neighborhoods or ballpark based on what side of town it is. You can’t make money going and looking at a house in person. You can’t make money just washing one house in a neighborhood. I only accept houses within about 15 miles of the shop and just charge everyone the same price regardless of size. Some take 30 minutes, some take 45 but it all balances out
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Ide be out of business if i put that much thought into spraying customers water on their home.
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Yep, really not that complicated. Decide what method you want to use to differentiate between houses to make it simple for you. We use SF of the home above ground, but you can use wall area, LF of the perimeter, eyeball test, whatever. It’s not a science, and it’s 100x more important that you know your costs to know what you need to charge…
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Have you ever tried the stretchable plastic footie covers or shower cap covers? That’s what I use and never had a problem. Super cheap (pennies actually) and super quick to put on and take off. Whatever is covered is dry underneath when removed.
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Nope. A box of 1000 t-shirt bags are $20 and they work good for me. Good suggestion though
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There is a difference. You’re in one of the most expensive markets in the world for housing. I’m lucky to get .12/sq ft and I do everything you do.
