Deck Painting & staining throughout Somerville, MA.

Two- to four-unit buildings hold 55.2% of the city's housing, and single-family detached houses just 10.5%, so many decks and porches here belong to a shared building: one back porch of several on different floors, a common stair, or a yard deck that more than one household uses.

That changes the job in practical ways. Upper porches are worked from ladders or staging rather than from the ground. Stairs and railings carry the most foot traffic and wear through first. And in a building with more than one owner, someone has to decide who pays for which level before any stain is bought.

Reading the wood and the old finish

Decks and porch floors are commonly pressure-treated pine, cedar, or a painted softwood, and a few newer ones are composite. Each takes finish differently. Pressure-treated lumber needs to dry out after installation before it accepts stain evenly. Cedar takes penetrating oil stains well but turns gray quickly if left bare. Composite boards are generally cleaned rather than stained.

What is already on the surface matters even more. A deck that was stained with a penetrating product can be cleaned, brightened and recoated. A deck that was painted or coated with a solid stain that is now peeling has to be scraped or stripped back to sound material, because new coating applied over loose film peels with it. The paint vs. stain comparison explains why a peeling solid finish on a walking surface is so hard to keep up.

• Cleaning, brightening and mildew removal
• Scraping or stripping failed film finishes
• Penetrating or solid stain on floors, rails and stairs
• Paint on porch ceilings, posts and trim

Sun, shade and drainage

Somerville's tree canopy covers 14.6% of the city, based on 2018 imagery, with the lowest share in Ward 1 and the highest in Wards 6 and 7. A deck in full afternoon sun fades and checks faster, and its stain breaks down on the horizontal surfaces first. A porch under an upper floor or beside a close neighboring wall stays damp longer, grows mildew and is slow to dry after cleaning.

Those conditions decide product choice as much as appearance does. A lighter penetrating stain can suit a shaded porch that needs to breathe; a heavier pigment protects better on a sun-baked deck. Water that pools against a house wall or at a stair stringer is worth pointing out before staining, because no finish protects wood that stays wet.

Permits and historic districts

Somerville's Building Division states that painting is one of only three kinds of work exempt from its building permit requirement, along with tiling and flooring. Restaining a deck is generally treated as painting work under that exemption. Replacing rotted boards, railings or stair parts is construction work, so it is a question for the Building Division before it starts.

If the porch faces the street on a Local Historic District property, the Historic Preservation Commission reviews visible changes to design, materials or appearance; it does not review in-kind maintenance. Restaining or repainting a front porch the way it was is maintenance. Swapping turned balusters for plain ones, or a painted wood floor for composite, is the kind of change the Commission looks at. The Prospect Hill and East Somerville pages say more about those areas.

Lead on older porches

Porch rails, posts, ceilings and floors on a house from before 1978 may carry lead paint. Since 79.8% of Somerville housing units date from decades before 1980, a painted porch here is often on a house old enough for the federal RRP rule. On those houses, scraping means certified renovators, ground covers, wet methods and careful cleanup. See the lead-safe painting page for how it is handled.

Timing

Stain needs a dry deck, a dry forecast and temperatures within the product's label range. Our article on deck stain and New England winters explains how cold and freeze-thaw cycles break finishes down and how to judge when the working window opens and closes. The house itself is covered on the Somerville exterior painting page.