What Works on a North Andover House

Few towns around here hold as wide a spread of housing as North Andover does. Near the Old Center you have eighteenth and nineteenth century houses with hand planed trim, small paned sash and clapboard painted so many times the shadow lines have filled in. Down in Machine Shop Village the cottages that went up for mill hands sit close to the street on stone foundations, with small rooms, narrow stairs and painted brick chimneys nobody has pointed in living memory. Cross town and it becomes sixties ranches and split levels with drywall, hollow core doors and aluminum storms. The old ones need patience, since the hand work lives in the sash and the casings, and running a sander on pre 1978 paint is a conversation we have first rather than afterward. The newer ones need efficiency, because the walls are flat and the whole win is clean lines and two honest coats. Both kinds take the same road salt through the front door from November to April, and both have granite or concrete steps that frost has already moved out of level.

Turnpike Street is where the commercial work lives. Plazas and standalone buildings there hold retail, restaurants, a bank branch, a dentist, a pediatric practice, and every one of them wants a crew in and out on a schedule that never touches business hours. Retail gets the early morning, ahead of the first customer. Restaurants get the hours after the last cover, when the grease on the hood, the fryer wall and the tile floor can be cut without anybody walking through it. Practices give us a Friday evening or a closed week in summer. The larger complexes off Osgood Street behave more like industrial property: high bays, painted block, long corridors, and a facilities manager who would rather map the whole year than call every time something chips. Buildings near the college move on the academic calendar, so interior work has to land between commencement and August. We walk the space with whoever holds the keys, write the scope area by area, and put one number on it before anything begins.

What we take on in North Andover

• House cleaning, deep cleans and recurring visits
• Move in and move out cleaning for owners and landlords
• Post construction and renovation handover cleaning
• Pre sale cleaning before the photos and the first showing
• Interior and exterior painting, and cabinet refinishing
• Repointing, chimneys, steps, walkways and patios
• Pressure washing for siding, driveways, decks and storefronts
• Offices, retail, practices and restaurants around your hours
• Common areas and unit turnovers for property managers

Getting a price

Every quote for North Andover starts with somebody standing in the actual place. Square footage over the phone is a guess, and on a wall it is worse than a guess, because the failure depth only shows when you put a hand on the joint. You get the scope written out area by area and one number for the job, usually the same business day.