Exterior Painting serving Brockton and Metro West MA.

The shoe boom shaped what the outside of a house here looks like. Between 1870 and 1915 the population grew from 8,700 to 62,288, and the city's Housing Strategy Plan describes the worker housing of that era as multi-family wooden structures on small individual lots, a period dominated by low-cost Victorian building, most notably the triple-decker. Later trolley-line subdivisions added single- and two-family houses on former farmland.

That history leaves a lot of tall wood walls on small lots. The same plan notes that local three-deckers commonly stand freestanding next to lower houses, so staging for a three-story wall may have to fit beside a much smaller neighbor.

Access on three-story buildings

Three full stories plus the roof put a triple-decker's upper walls and gable beyond a standard ladder setup. Reaching them safely takes extension ladders with stabilizers, ladder jacks and planks, or a rented lift where the yard allows, and narrow side yards sometimes rule out the lift. Planning the access is part of the estimate, because it changes how many days the job takes and how much of a neighbor's driveway or yard needs to be protected.

Where a building has a porch on each floor, the work multiplies: ceilings, columns, railings and floors on every level, all of which take more weather than the siding behind them.

Clapboard, shingle and the siding that came later

The South Street Historic District in Campello gives a good picture of the older wood houses: twenty dwellings from the mid-19th to early 20th century in Italianate, Queen Anne, Shingle and Colonial Revival styles, sheathed in clapboard or shingle and tied together by porches and bays. Its National Register nomination also records one 1879 house whose detailing had been stripped and covered with aluminum siding.

Aluminum siding can be painted with the right cleaning and primer, though chalking has to be washed off first or the new coat will not bond. Original clapboard and shingle need the most hands-on prep: scraping failed paint, sanding edges, replacing split boards, and caulking only the joints that should be sealed, never the laps that let the wall breathe.

Old paint outdoors

Because 81.4% of local housing predates 1980, scraping old siding and trim may well disturb lead-based paint. Outdoors, EPA lead-safe rules apply once paid work disturbs more than 20 square feet. In practice that means ground sheeting, misting while scraping, no power washing that blasts chips into the soil, and a daily cleanup of debris. With houses close together, containment also protects the neighbor's yard. The details are on our lead-safe painting page.

Historic listings and review

The city has several National Register districts, including South Street, Centre and Montello Streets downtown, North Downtown, Blanchard Plat and School Street–Main Street. National Register listing is honorific; on its own it does not put private repainting through design review. South Street was described in 1982 as the city's only local historic district, and we have not been able to confirm whether any local review applies today, so if your house is on that block, ask the city's planning office before changing colors or details.

Between about 1870 and 1914 the downtown was rebuilt almost entirely in masonry, largely after a series of deadly fires in wood-frame buildings. Painting brick or stone is a different specification from wood, and masonry that has never been painted is usually best left that way.

Timing the job

Most exterior coatings need surface and air temperatures above roughly 35 to 50°F, depending on the product, and dry siding. In practice that means a season from spring into fall, with dew-heavy mornings in late season shortening each day. Can you paint a house in November in Massachusetts? covers the late-season limits. If the deck also needs work, deck staining is best done after the house.