Benefits of Hiring Designers

Hiring a designer to help choose the right colors for your home can be a smart investment, particularly if you want professional guidance, expertise, and a customized approach to interior design. While some homeowners might feel confident in their ability to select colors on their own, others can benefit from the insights and assistance that a designer can provide. Fenrich Custom Finishes has designers ready to refer to you before we start the painting process. Here are a few of our top reasons why we feel it could be beneficial to hire a designer to help choose the right colors for your home:

1. Expertise and Experience Designers know a lot about colors, trends, and design principles. They can look at your space, think about your preferences, and suggest colors that make each room look good and work collaboratively.

2. Tailored Solutions When selecting colors for your home, designers take a personalized approach by considering various factors such as natural lighting, room size, existing decor, and architectural features. They aim to create a cohesive color scheme that reflects your style and taste while ensuring a seamless flow throughout your home.

3. Visualization Tools Many designers use visualization tools, such as mood boards, color swatches, and digital analysis, to help you envision how different colors will appear in your space. These tools allow you to make informed decisions and see the potential outcome before committing to a particular color scheme.

4. Value and Investment A well-chosen color scheme can enhance the value and marketability of your home. By investing in professional design services, you can create a visually appealing and cohesive interior that appeals to potential buyers and maximizes the return on your investment.

5. Personalized Guidance Designers offer personalized guidance and support throughout the color selection process. They listen to your needs, preferences, and concerns, and work with you to create a space that reflects your personality and lifestyle while meeting your practical requirements.

Whether you're embarking on a major renovation or simply refreshing your interior with a new color scheme, a designer can help you achieve your vision and create a space that inspires and delights for years to come. Fenrich Custom Finishes has designers we have worked with since our inception.

10 Tips On Preparing For A Painting Contractor In Your Home

Move everything possible out of the area that is being painted. We don’t want to damage anything, and we want to be as efficient as possible.
Make sure the rooms are clean. Dust off woodwork and walls, Bathroom walls should be scrubbed free of shampoo residue. Floors and toilets should be cleaned in bathrooms (nobody wants to paint behind a gross toilet).
Offer the painters the chance to use the bathroom and show them where it is.
Sometimes the thermostat needs to be adjusted for optimal drying conditions. Show the painters where it is and how to use it.
Remove nails from the wall which you would like to have filled. The painter will gladly fill them properly for you.
Make sure your pets are out of the work area. The last thing you want is a dog to run away, or track paint all over your home.
If you are sensitive to odor, stay away from the work area.
If you have questions or changes to the job, try your best to bring them up before the job begins.
Disconnect and label any cable or network wiring appropriately so you can have an easy reassembling process.
Ask about the timeline of the job, and how it will affect being at home.

3 Tips For Hiring A Quality Paint Contractor

The following tips should be kept in mind when you are looking into finding a quality oriented professional painter:

Quick Timelines. Most painters that have an established reputable business will have their schedules booked out for some time. The days of calling contractors in any field and having immediate availability are gone. Trades people are in high demand due to a lack of workers going into the trades. If you are looking for estimates and a contractor has immediate availability it may be a red flag. However, jobs do get rescheduled or pushed off, and weather can be one of the hardest scheduling hurdles. If you want a quality job and to save a little money, please plan ahead on any project in your home.

Cheaper Is Almost Never Better. In the situation of seeking high quality, often the cheaper quote will not be what you are shopping for. A low costing quote signifies one of three things:
- 1: They do not plan on taking all the necessary steps to provide the grade of quality desired. Time is money, and if they did not figure in enough time, there will be shortcuts taken.
- 2: Overhead is low. An experienced painting company will know their worth, as well as pay their painters a good wage. Liability and workman's comp insurance are expensive, and you do not want someone underinsured working on your home. Reliable transportation and equipment are essential to completing your job on time. This isn’t to say that a one man show company with low overhead can't produce quality.
- 3: Materials: When having a painter work on your home, a huge percentage of the cost is the labor. Many times, a lesser quality product will be used to help offset some of the labor expenses. Depending on the type of job, materials can be as small as 5% of the total cost of a job. Why wouldn’t you want to use the best paint available?

Experience Is Important. Experience is valuable! Not only in the sense they know the correct procedures and materials to produce a good product, but they also have years of knowledge in what to do to avoid problems. Every paint company and painter has made mistakes, that is normal and part of learning. Accountability and learning from these mistakes are what helps them grow.

When you are reviewing estimates for a quality paint job, keep in mind; time frame, cost, and level of experience.

Why You Should Hire A Professional To Pressure Wash Your Home, Decks And Concrete Surfaces

Every home has surfaces which will need pressure washing. Exterior concrete surfaces such as patios, foundations, sidewalks, and driveways will aways look best if they are washed regularly. Over time, decks, siding, and gutters will have buildup of mildew and dust. Pressure washing will not only help extend the life of their coatings but also keep them looking beautiful.

I strongly encourage people to hire a professional to pressure wash their home as opposed to doing it themselves. Countless things that can go wrong when you pressure wash. If pressure washing is done incorrectly, you can seriously damage the substrate, sometimes beyond repair. Pressure washers come with different tips for different types of jobs. Chemicals are sometimes needed for washing, and other times they are not. If the wrong chemicals are used, they can damage coatings and even kill plants.

When washing decks, you never want to start and stop directly pointed at the wood. You will cause pressure marks, or even etch the wood. Those marks will show even more when you go to apply your stain. Patio washers are not recommended on decks, these will create swirl marks that will be etched into the boards.

When washing patios or driveways, it is best to use a rotary surface cleaner. (I call these patio washers) These are best when washing larger surfaces and will not leave stripes like a typical wand will.

Safety is a big concern as well. If you do not have the right equipment, you can put yourself in dangerous situations. When washing the entire exterior of a home you should be using a typical wand as well as an extension wand. The extension wands come in all sizes, and the good ones come with a sling to help prevent you from pulling muscles. It is best to do most of the job from the ground as opposed to climbing up on a wet roof or ladder. If a pressure wand is used incorrectly, it can cause serious injury and in some cases death. At all times keep the wand pointed in a safe direction. Also, make sure that the tip is clicked into place properly before use.

Some surfaces on homes are not meant to be washed with a pressure washer, sometimes a soft wash is required with scrubbing and a hose. Some soffits and dormers you need to be careful around as to not shoot water into your home. This can cause mold and rot on the inside of your house.

If you have a pressure washing project, please be safe and research product recommendations. It is always better to hire an insured professional to handle these projects. We also provide regular maintenance washing on an as needed basis. Give us a call to get your pressure washing scheduled.

Window Maintenance

If you have ever had to purchase windows for your home, you know that it is a large investment. At Fenrich Custom Finishes not only finish new windows, but we can also refinish your old windows.

When purchasing new windows in need of finish work be that stain or paint, we can finish them, so they look great for years to come. FCF will work with your contractor to have the windows prefinished prior to them being installed. Finishing them in our shop will give you a better finish as well as keeping the mess and odor out of your home. Any existing stain or paint can be color matched. If you have had or are going to have anyone finish your window for you, make sure they finish all the edges specified by the manufacturer. Many times, we find windows that have started to rot due to the exterior side of the frames never being finished. You would see this from the outside of your home when the windows are
open. We have also found window sashes that were never removed and finished all the way around the edges. This would also require all the hardware to be taken off then reinstalled. If your home was built in the winter or your contractor was lazy, there is a high probability of this.

Existing windows may require cleaning and recoating. Stained windows will show wear and tear from the sun beating on them as well as condensation over time. Sometimes this requires a complete strip and refinish, and other times we can't touch up and apply and a fresh coat. Technology in coatings has come a long way in the last couple decades, the best products for durability are catalyzed spray only finishes such as a 2K polly or a conversion varnish.

Gaskets can deteriorate and go bad over time. If we notice any bad gaskets during the finishing process, often we can source and install new gaskets. If your gaskets are bad, it will cause drafts in your home, as well as rot out your windows. The difference from the interior temperature to the exterior will cause condensation to form causing failure overtime.

Staying on top of your window maintenance will be a great investment over the long run.

Maintenance Program

Just one of the extra services that sets Fenrich Custom Finishes above the rest is our maintenance program.
The exterior of every home takes a beating from harsh winters, rain, humidity and sun. We encourage each exterior client to fill out a maintenance form. With this form you get added to our exterior list and we will follow up with you when it is time for maintenance. This will keep your property in tiptop condition, which will alleviate those large expenses from neglect. Everything from recoating your deck, re-sealing front doors, re-coating a side of the house, or pressure washing siding and driveways.

Give us a call and we will get your home added to this list.

920-627-6633