Maine: Salt Air, Clapboard and Coastal Brick

The coast is what makes this state its own problem, and it is the longest coast of the six. Salt air and wind driven rain work on clapboard, shingle and trim from York County up through Casco Bay and the Midcoast harbors, and a seaward wall loses its finish years ahead of the sheltered side of the same building. Paint is not the only casualty either, because the salt gets into open mortar and into whatever steel is still holding an old porch rail to the deck. Outside work up here books early, because the easy weather weeks fill first. When the cold comes in we keep going with heated enclosures, warmed materials and coatings built to cure at low temperatures, and the number for doing it that way is written down before the first day. The buildings sort into groups. Portland and the older mill towns on the rivers, Lewiston and Auburn among them, hold dense wood frame housing and nineteenth century brick blocks. Away from those it is farmhouses, capes, and the lake and coastal camps: places that started as summer camps, got insulated and dormered later, and now carry several substrates across one wall wherever the additions met the original frame.

This is the longest drive on our list, so the honesty has to come first. Work here is planned as a block of consecutive days with everything staged in advance, the walkthrough is scheduled with the job rather than on request, and we will not quote an arrival window we would have to walk back a week later. Name the constraint out loud and the rest of it works properly. One company takes the whole property: the brick, the floors, the paint and the cleaning at the end, in an order set on paper before anybody arrives, with one scope and one number attached. On a coastal house that sequence earns its keep, because the outside has to be sound before it is ever coated and the dusty interior trades have to be finished before a cleaner touches anything. Projects that run for weeks belong on a schedule like this, and that covers most brick work, most floors and most painting. A cleaning contract that needs somebody every week belongs closer to home. Insurance is in place on every day we are on the property, and whatever this state asks of a contractor coming in from out of state gets checked before the work opens.

What we take on in Maine

• House cleaning, deep cleans and recurring visits
• Carpet, upholstery, area rug and grout cleaning
• Post construction and pre sale cleaning
• Hardwood refinishing and new floor installation
• Vinyl plank, laminate, tile and carpet
• Interior and exterior painting, and cabinet refinishing
• Repointing, brick and block, chimneys and steps
• Patios, walkways and retaining walls
• House, driveway, deck and commercial pressure washing

How a Maine job gets scheduled

Everything starts with somebody standing in the actual place. We are based in Groton, Massachusetts, so work close to home runs on a weekly route and a same week window. Further out the job is held as a block of days on the calendar and the walkthrough is booked with it, not on demand. You hear which one your property is before you commit to anything, and either way the scope and the number come to you in writing first.