Monday, April 27, 2009

Vinyl siding and a good deal on real estate in Florida

The justification is easy. No more painting. You can put plastic on your house and “never have to paint your house again.” It's maintenance free!

Yeah. Right. And I’ve got some swampland down in Florida to sell you too.

Here’s an example of maintenance free vinyl.

This is a home not far from mine in New Albany. The resident did not apply the vinyl. He only has to clean up the mess as a result. Water was getting behind the vinyl and the homeowner had no idea.

The application of vinyl to a home, on top of the original surface, covers up original architectural detail. It diminishes the character of not just the individual home, but also the surrounding neighborhood. It also leads to hidden maintenance issues like this that could result in major structural damage.

Plastic has many great uses (like Wiffle balls and bats!). Keep the integrity of your historic home intact and keep the plastic off of it. Thanks.

Further reading:

New Albany Design Guidelines for Siding and Trim

2 comments:

B.W. Smith said...

Amen, brotha.

Alejamuel Sultz said...

I've never heard of such an issue with my neighbors' house since they usually do checks at every year. I just repainted my house this weekend, and we made sure that all of the parts of our house that needed repairs were done before the week starts again.

Alejamuel Sultz