Shutter (s): paint, restore or throw out.

Shutters on some homes can make or break the house.

A newly painted or purchased set of shutters are often the finishing touches on a window and can change the front of a home from a “ho hum” look to an eye catching drive by double take.Is it time for shutter shopping?

BUT……

When do you restore an old wood shutter, just paint an older pair of vinyl shutters or just throw them out and purchase new?

Let’s break the choices down with regards to cost and labor involved with each choice, plus a couple of other factors thrown in.

Restoring older wooden shutters:

• The cost of purchasing authentic period shutters to match your house can run into the hundreds of
  

  restoring shutters for an Andover home

  dollars per set of shutters.

• Shutters with intricate design are often hard to replicate and restoring is often less expensive
• older shutters are often made with hard wood and can sustain the restoring which include scraping, sanding as well as repairs and removing and reinstalling
• The cost of repairing, prepping and painting a wooden shutter can vary on the condition but replicating an older wooden shutter is often much more than the cost of restoring the shutter

Vinyl Shutter Painting:

• Painting vinyl shutters are often the most cost saving solution to changing or refreshing a shutter.
• The procedure is to remove the shutter, wash the shutter and most times spray the shutter with a paint spray set up.
• one gallon of finish paint can often paint two coats on 8 sets of shutters
• often the labor time to remove and reinstall shutters are less than the time it takes to spray them (minus dry time) due to moving ladders to reach the higher sets

Time to Purchase new shutters:

• Often times when older vinyl shutters are in direct sunlight for a long time the shutters will become
  

  vinyl shutters

  brittle and by removing them and in the course of normal handling them, they fall apart or break.

• We often also find damage shutters that can not be repaired as they are plastic.
• If you have older vinyl shutters and they are peeling from an earlier paint project are usually more time consuming with labor and less expensive to purchase new.
• we find the louvers to the shutter are often quite fragile and broken when removing older shutters and can not be repaired.

Cost versus Reality

1. When is the time to paint versus replace?  We find wood shutters are worth restoring, most times.
2. if vinyl shutters are in good shape, feel rigid when taking them off the house, then they are worth painting.
3. Broken or fragile vinyl shutters should be replaced with new shutters as this is the most cost effect.

Tips when removing shutters from the house:

1. When using a ladder, make sure it is firmly planted and safely situated, bark mulch is not a good place to set a ladder (experience talking).
2. WATCH OUT FOR BEES, HORNETS AND WASPS. the backside of shutters make for a very protected and comfortable place for them to build nests (experience talking)
3. When removing shutters label them with a piece of tape with a system you will remember as all shutters may look the same but quite often they are an inch or so difference and you will spend hours trying to figure were they go (experience talking).
4. If you shutter is attached by plastic “tap in” screws they will likely break off when trying to remove them. replacements can be ordered on line. (experience talking)

We have purchased shutters from this site and recommend it and have been very pleased with the selection: http://www.architecturaldepot.com/shutters.html

If we can assist with your next painting project or answer any questions you may have, please schedule an appointment or send us a message at https://ramsdenpainting.com