Pressure Washing in Portland, ME

Pressure washing in Portland is our home ground, and it is different from washing a newer suburb. The city sits on a peninsula in Casco Bay, its humidity averages about 71% across the year, and a large share of its buildings were put up in the 1800s. Painted clapboard, soft old brick, slate and asphalt roofs and granite steps all sit side by side on the same block. Each needs its own pressure, its own cleaner and its own plan for where the rinse water goes.

Why so much of the peninsula is brick

The Great Fire started on July 4, 1866, and destroyed about 1,800 buildings, 1,200 of them homes. Portland was almost completely rebuilt in the next two years, and most commercial and multi-family buildings went up in brick and granite to lower the chance of another fire. Many followed the Italianate and Second Empire styles of the day. That is the masonry we clean along Congress Street, in the Old Port and across the East End today.

Old brick is softer than modern brick and its mortar is softer still. A narrow, high-pressure tip can cut grooves into a face that has lasted more than 150 years. The National Park Service's guidance on cleaning historic masonry is to start at 100 psi or below, rarely go above 300 to 400 psi, and always test a small patch first. We follow that approach: a test area, the mildest cleaner that works, and a wide fan tip held well back.

Painted wood and lead

Portland Public Health reports that about half of Portland-area homes were built before 1950, and that dust from old paint is the main source of childhood lead poisoning in Maine. Maine law (38 M.R.S. section 1296) names uncontained high-pressure washing among the activities that can release lead into the environment. So on a house that may carry original layers of paint, we do not blast chips off the siding. We wash at low pressure with a soft-wash mix that lifts mildew and grime, lay ground cloths along the foundation, and tell you plainly if the paint is failing. Stripping and repainting is a separate job for a lead-safe painter, and we will not pretend a wash can do it.

What we clean in Portland

• House washing for clapboard, shingle, vinyl and painted trim, done at low pressure
• Roof soft washing to remove the dark streaks and algae that thrive in the city's damp air
• Brick and masonry cleaning for row houses, chimneys, foundations and granite steps
• Deck and fence cleaning for back porches, roof decks and the wood fences between tight city lots
• Driveway and concrete cleaning for walks, patios and narrow side driveways
• Commercial pressure washing for storefronts, entries, dumpster pads and sidewalks downtown and in Bayside

Where the rinse water goes

Portland is close to the water everywhere, and that changes how we work. Friends of Casco Bay points out that some storm drains here empty directly into the bay. In older parts of the city, stormwater and sewage share the same pipes, and in heavy rain that mix overflows into Back Cove, Portland Harbor and local streams. The city's non-stormwater discharge ordinance, in Chapter 32 of the code and enforced by Public Works, allows things like lawn watering runoff and home car washing, but building and pavement wash water is not on that list.

In practice we cover nearby catch basins, steer rinse water onto lawns and planting beds where it can soak in, and keep detergents to the smallest amount that does the job. On commercial flatwork with grease or oil, we can collect the water rather than let it run down the gutter.

Working around a short season

Portland's climate is humid continental, with July highs near 80 degrees and January highs near 32. Snowfall averages about 69 inches a year. That leaves a working window from roughly late spring to mid-fall. Masonry is the most time-sensitive: the Park Service warns that a wall can take more than a week to dry and should not be water-cleaned if there is any chance of frost, so brick work is best booked for summer or early fall. Humidity peaks in September, which is also when mildew is at its worst on north walls, so many homeowners book a house wash then and a roof treatment at the same visit.

Neighborhood by neighborhood

The Western Promenade Historic District holds about 420 buildings in styles popular from 1850 to 1920, from Italianate to Shingle style, many designed by John Calvin Stevens. Munjoy Hill has a dense mix of single-family houses and triple-deckers, often with several owners or tenants sharing one exterior. Deering Center, Back Cove and the off-peninsula neighborhoods have more stand-alone houses with yards, decks and driveways. We plan parking, ladder access and water supply around each of these before the work day.

Getting a quote

Call (207) 393-2121 or send a few photos. We come look at the property, point out anything fragile like loose mortar, failing paint or old window glazing, and give you a free written estimate listing each surface and the method we will use on it.

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