Virginia Beach
Painters for Alanton and Bay Colony
Waterfront elevations on Linkhorn Bay, where the side of the house nobody sees from the street takes all the weather.
Alanton and Bay Colony sit on and around Linkhorn Bay, on deep lots with dock access, close to the Cavalier Golf and Yacht Club. The houses are larger than the Virginia Beach average and the mix is wide: 1950s through 1970s custom brick and stucco, substantial rebuilds, and newer construction on lots that were cleared and started over.
What they have in common is scale and a water-facing rear elevation. Both of those change the job.
The back of the house is the hard side
On a bay-facing property the rear elevation gets the wind, the moisture and the salt, and it is also usually the side with the most glass, the most trim, the deck or the screened porch, and the least protection from an overhang. It is the elevation that fails first and it is the one nobody photographs.
It is where we spend the time. Soffits and the underside of overhangs, the top edge of every horizontal trim board, the joints at the deck ledger, the railings and the door thresholds. Water finds all of them and it finds them from below and behind, not from the front.
Stucco is not siding and should not be treated like it
A number of houses in Bay Colony and Alanton are stucco or have stucco elements. Stucco is porous by design. It takes on moisture and releases it, and when it fails it cracks along stress lines rather than peeling in sheets.
Those cracks have to be opened up, filled and sealed properly, and the coating has to allow the wall to breathe. Sealing a stucco wall too tightly traps water inside it, and the damage that causes does not show on the outside until it is expensive.
Big interiors, and the rooms that are actually hard
Houses of this size come with two-story entries, long hallways, stairwells with high walls that cannot be reached from a stepladder, and formal rooms with substantial millwork. The high stairwell wall is the one that separates crews. It needs staging to reach properly, and it is highly visible from below at an angle that shows every lap mark.
Cabinet refinishing comes up often here as well. Kitchens in these houses are frequently large and well built, with solid boxes and doors worth keeping. Refinishing them is a fraction of the cost and disruption of replacing them.
Straight answer
The part everybody underestimates
Scale changes the arithmetic. A house with a rear elevation twice the width of a standard build, three sets of French doors, a screened porch and a wraparound deck has far more linear footage of edge than its square footage suggests, and edges are where the labor is.
It also means a job that is genuinely worth doing thoroughly. A house at this level that gets a one-coat exterior looks acceptable in the first summer and obviously thin by the third.
Alanton and Bay Colony questions
Painting in Alanton and Bay Colony, answered
Do you paint stucco exteriors?
Yes. Stucco cracks along stress lines instead of peeling, so the cracks are opened, filled and sealed, and the coating has to let the wall breathe. Sealing stucco too tightly traps moisture inside the wall.
Can you reach a two-story stairwell wall?
Yes. High stairwell walls need proper staging rather than a stepladder and a long pole, which is why they are so often the worst-looking wall in an otherwise good repaint.
Is refinishing kitchen cabinets worth it in a house like this?
Usually, yes. Kitchens in these houses tend to have solid boxes and well-made doors. Refinishing keeps the joinery and changes the finish, at a fraction of the cost and disruption of a replacement.
Get a Alanton and Bay Colony estimate
Pick a time that suits you, or tell him about the project and he will call you back. Either way he comes out, looks at what is actually there, writes down what he would do, and gives you a number.