Five Common Problems on Home Exteriors: How to Identify and Alleviate the Problems

One: Bubbling Paint. If you have paint that is bubbling on the surface you probably have moisture trapped inside that is simply trying to find its way to the air. If you scrape these areas immediately upon identification you have an excellent chance of solving the problem before it gets much larger. If you do not happen to notice this bubbling or blistering, it can lead to more of the same and in the end require entire sections of the home to need repainting. If the area you find bubbling is already large in size, you may have to strip paint to the base wood and begin anew. To prevent this from happening in the future be sure to take great care in applying a top quality primer and allowing it sufficient time to dry before you proceed with painting.

Two: Mold. If you have green mold on the side of your home you need to rid the surface of it immediately. Fortunately, this is the easiest of the five problems to fix, as all you must do to eradicate the mold is pressure clean the home. You can do it yourself with an owned cleaner, rent out an industrial cleaner, or have a professional come in and do the job for you. Once cleaned, you have an instant fix. To help prevent the mold from growing back again, check house regularly and keep clean. You can spray home with a garden hose on a regular basis to rid it of excess debris.

Three: If you have mildew, which is not green like mold, but rather black, you have bigger problems. Pressure cleaning may alleviate some of the problem, but most likely you will have to apply some type of bleach and water solution to rid the home of the problem entirely. If doing the latter, be sure to thoroughly rinse all areas touched by the chlorine bleach with clean water. Mildew occurs in areas that receive moisture but not a lot of sunlight. If it happens once, it is likely to happen again unless you can eradicate the cause of moisture entirely and/or get more sunlight to the source (one way to do this might be to cut down tree branches blocking sun access to the spot in question).

Four: Large Blisters and Peeling of Paint. This type of problem is a clear indicator that you have a problem with dampness invading your home. Check to see if vapor barriers are in proper working order, and if they are not, replace them immediately. The look if this is a plausible cause, will be similar to that of a peeling sunburn. You will see big flakes that are partially hanging on and partially hanging off of the exterior of the home. It will be easy to scrape the peeling away. If there are large areas of paint blistering and peeling as such, you may need to strip all paint to the base wood, and prime carefully giving primer ample time to dry, and then repaint. If you have this problem occurring only in a single area, it could be an indicator that you have a gutter that is cracked, leaking or otherwise compromised. You must fix the gutter to avoid further damage to your paint and in all likelihood, if it continues to leak, your home.

Five: Small caked and cracked areas of paint. If you have paint that resembles alligator skin on the exterior of your home, it probably means there are too many layers of paint on the home. If this is the case, repainting over the cracked areas will of course, not help alleviate the problem. You have no choice but to scrape the paint down to the bare wood, primer carefully (allowing ample time to dry) and repainting the home from scratch.