The Ultimate House Wash, LLC. Southport - Oak Island Pressure Washing
Nice work as usual John. I need to start taking more pics. I have been doing a lot of wood this year. Decks and fences make great b-4 and after pics. Are you doing any staining on them or just the cleanings?
Thanks Jeff I appreciate it. Many of my customers live out of the area and this is their second home. Taking before and afters has become typical operational procedure for when I send an invoice. I meant to watermark these per advice of someone on here, and didn’t think of it until after my first post in this thread.
Right now there are two deck staining projects on the schedule for this year and two more for next year as well. I will personally get the deck to the point where all that is left to do is sand and apply stain, and leave that part of the process to someone I trust and have worked with for a few years now. I enjoy spraying soap and water too much to abandon that for the time it takes staining some of these decks. Especially roof cleaning. I’d do nothing else if I could market it.
Oak Island has a layout with the streets typical of a downtown city. Pick any street, drive down and most of what you will see are houses on pilings due to code with respect to hurricane precautions. At least one deck that wraps two sides of a home or two to three decks per home. Of all those homes you see on pilings, nearly every deck you see is as pictured in some of the before shots. I am the first service provider in this area providing consistent results like this ever. It has definitely caught the attention of homeowners walking by, riding golf carts or riding their bikes not too far from their own homes. One street at a time. (Facebook, website and forums like this are giving me a little more exposure) and I’m getting requests specifically seeking results such as those I have posted. Point is, I expect to have an almost overwhelmingly amount of requests for this before too long.
Just for fun, think of a number to sand and apply stain to one of these decks. Removal and replacement of screen, top of flooring, all exposed sides of 2x12 joist, stairwell top and bottom, rails and pickets. Cost of material. Add on cost of cleaning. I give every customer the option with a number included, but I don’t push it past that. I was going to save these for another thread, and still may make another later, but, include the crossbeams and pilings, another screened porch and stairwell plus outside shower area to this one. Instead of the deck this year, we will take care of repainting her exterior trim because the prior painter did not prime, so it is all failing.
Sounds like you have a nice little niche market over there. Keep up the good work and the phone will keep ringing.
Are you asking for a price on what to charge to stain? Once you clean them is someone else coming in to stain or do you just leave it?
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Hey Charlie. I provide a price to stain to each customer whose deck or fence I clean. Sometimes it is just a round about figure during the initial consultation. If they are not taken aback too awful much and still have an interest, I get more in detail of prep involved. I brought numbers into it just to present the idea that it isn’t inexpensive, and I get a lot more that say no than yes. Also, just to say that decking here is not typical of most areas due to the pilings. $1,500 might cover the cost of a not so involved deck staining with some profit leftover, but take that same deck and lift it 15’, expose the underside, add pilings and crossmembers, removal and replacement of screens… I enjoy the work don’t misunderstand, but not so much that I want to do it without fair compensation. What I consider fair compensation is less often preferred to replacing whatever needs replacing as it needs replacing in the customer’s eyes.
With the current set up in operations, if the customer wants to have stain, I have a guy that comes in behind me as a representative of the company, although I give him lots of freedom and input into determining how it will be done (within a certain standard) and how much time he will invest into it. In return, very little management from me is required after all of the work is done that will occur with the washer. If the customer does not want stain, I leave it as is and allow them to reconsider as time goes on with the information I have given them.
Some customers have seen their deck clean for the first time, become inspired and then ask if I can stain it, like, the following week. I explain that going in to clean isn’t the same as preparing for stain, so I educate them about that and prepare them for doing it next year when we can set aside time on the schedule to do all it takes in one trip.
Hope that answers your questions. I like the work you do and appreciate the input on all the boards. I’m always interested in what you have to say.
