Tag Archives: stucco contractor

Dealing with Unfriendly Neighbours: 4 Tips

Posted by Admin on August 18, 2011 None comments

Everyone has them at some point… a neighbour who you just don’t get along with. They can make your home renovation plans difficult, to the point of even putting a stop to them sometimes. Renovations made to the exterior of your home (such as stucco/EIFS renovations) are particularly difficult because of the exterior-nature of the project, and the fact that it frequently borders (very closely in downtown Toronto) with your neighbour’s property. Here are 4 simple tips to dealing with a neighbour who might cause trouble.

 1. Warn your stucco contractor

All contractors have been on projects with an irrate neighbour. Make sure you warn the foreman before the job so that the workers can be on their best behaviour.

2. Give the neighbour plenty of notice

Don’t surprise your neighbour with a crew of skilled trade workers one day. Let them know that you’re planning on updating your home (which will increase the overall value of the neighbourhood) and that it may take a couple weeks (depending on the size of your home).

EIFS renovations don’t typically involve too much noise from machinery, but some of the finishing processes (leveling the basecoat, floating the finish coat) can create scraping sounds. Try to figure out what times the neighbour is not home, and ask the contractor to do those pieces of work during the times they’re not around. Some crews of workers like to talk more than others and are generally more verbal, so speak with the foreman or owner about keeping noise levels to a minimum if your neighbour is troublesome.

What’s your neighbour’s favourite wine? Get him a bottle as a token of cooperation and good will.

3. Ensure your contractors will clean up their messes

Probably the biggest source of frustration from neighbours is the resultant bits of insulation that come flying off the wall and all over EVERYTHING during the sanding of the insulation boards. This can be managed by ensuring the contractor uses a portable vacuum to clean up all the bits.

The bits of styrofoam might even be something you want to forewarn about, and promise to have the contractor clean up his property if any does get on it. This is one of the few times I don’t advocate the “It’s easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission” motto.

4. Make sure the contractors follow building codes

We actually had one of  our own contractors not properly set up their scaffolding (tisk tisk, I know), and the neighbour called the city about it. A few adjustments and 3 hours later and the scaffolding was back in compliance with city requirements. Was there actually any danger? No. But the neighbour wanted to cause trouble, and they found a way to. This causes a delay on your project, irritates the contractors who have wasted almost half their day, and raises tensions between you and your neighbour. Play it safe – ask your contractor to make

Have a story of an irrate neighbour you had to deal with during a home renovation? Feel free to share it here!

Exterior Trim Supplier to Provide Free Design Consultation for EIFS/Stucco Renovations

Posted by Admin on September 15, 2009 None comments
Exterior Trim on Brick
Exterior Trim on Brick

Toronto, ON (PRWEB) December 1, 2009 — Decoramould Inc., a supplier of exterior window trim for the construction and renovation industries has partnered with TorontoStuccoContractor.com – a website dedicated to referring EIFS / stucco contractors for free to home owners looking to have their home retrofitted with EIFS (energy efficient stucco), in a move that will bring free professional design services to the average home owner without an architect.
Both companies service residential renovation projects. Home owners looking to lower heating bills or update the look of their home, love the aesthetic aspect of Exterior Insulation and Finish Systems (EIFS) – or “synthetic stucco”. Design options are limitless – from colour selection, to wall texture, to decorative elements – Decoramould’s specialty.

Customers would walk in or visit the online store and tell us ‘we love your products, can you design something for our home and refer us to a contractor?’

“Customers would walk in or visit the online store and tell us ‘we love your products, can you design something for our home and refer us to a contractor?’,” says Decoramould Inc. owner Skylar Bowker “being that the majority of our clients are the actual stucco contractors, we gladly passed the contact information along. It made us look good to our contractors, to be able to refer work to them.”
Then last year one of his contractors tipped him off to a website they had recently registered for. “They were getting referrals for free from this website and I thought, how can a company provide such a valuable service for free?”

“I was making money on my personal back-end services” comments TorontoStuccoContractor.com founder Jim Schwarznoff. “Even though I interview and qualify all of my contractors, the contractors are installers first, and business men second. For $15,000, home owners want more than just a simple makeover and a headache – they want to have a good experience.
I provide value-added services like sitting down with them to go over EVERYTHING involved in the project and realistically set up their expectations so that they are not blindsided by anything. I ensure they get the maximum possible rebate from the government programs available to all home owners. Oh, a contract too,” he laughs “you would be dumbstruck at how many projects happen without a contract or invoices, and when there’s a disagreement about details they supposed agreed on? The contractor usually comes out on top – it’s like the nightmare situations you see on ‘Holmes on Homes’.”

Even home owners who don’t go for the extra services are attracted to the site because they don’t need to spend hour after hour checking multiple contractors’ backgrounds. “I have interviewed and worked with dozens upon dozens of stucco crews on commercial and residential projects over the years. You do learn how to tell the professional, honest contractors apart from the shysters, but it’s a learning curve that just can’t be scaled on a single project.
It’s sad, but the majority of contractors pay themselves the same. Where you get the $2,000 difference in price is from a contractor using unapproved materials, applying the material in thinner layers or flat out skipping some of the materials. The home owner never knows the difference until something goes very wrong 5 years down the road.”

Both companies are relatively new, having just been started in the last two years, and growing exponentially. Where most stucco contractors go through about 15 projects throughout the year, TorontoStuccoContractor.com has had over 50 requests for their services in 2009.

“That number is expected to jump to about 200 for the 2010 construction season” says founder Jim Schwarznoff. “The majority of projects have gone to the core 5-6 contractors I have been working with for years,” he adds “but due to the sheer volume of projects next season, we will be carefully interviewing and expanding our roster, then keeping an eye on each project to ensure it meets our quality standards.”

Decoramould saw opportunity and jumped on it. “Here are stucco contractors – our potential customers – flocking to get a piece of the action, and dozens of projects for our products to be used on. We were initially only looking to partner with TorontoStuccoContractor.com, but as we discussed the possibility it was obvious there was such a synergy between us that we decided to combine our efforts.”

Any home owner seriously looking to modernize the look of their home with anything from a window sill to corner quoins or a keystone to a full blown exterior makeover can take advantage of the free design consultation from Decoramould. Digital pictures and a description of what they would like done can be sent to design(at)decoramould(dot)com.

Press release from: http://www.prweb.com/releases/2009/12/prweb3273514.htm

Renovating House Siding With Stucco: Substrate Considerations

Posted by JamesCarnegie on November 5, 2008 None comments

On renovations and other non-new construction, the potential for hidden problems (read: costs) is always there. This holds particularly true in renovating your siding, where you never know what condition your substrate is in. Does this mean you should avoid the issue altogether? No. As they say: Kill the monster while it’s small, before it has the chance to become a full grown problem.

Replacing old Siding
You may be looking at EIFS for a multitude of reasons; saving money on your heating bill, damaged siding, or you may just be looking for a more modern look. A good portion of homes built in the 70s, 80s and even 90s used unattractive and incorrectly installed vinyl or board and batten siding. These days, not only is the siding considered retro and shows signs of aging, but in most cases it wasn’t properly sealed and may be covering serious rot and mold. The fact is you don’t know if the subdivision builder slapped the walls together as quickly and cheaply as possible, at a time comparable to medieval age in terms of knowledge about weather resistance.

Stucco Substrate Condition
In replacing your siding with stucco, you will be forced to take a good look at your substrate and it’s suitability for synthetic stucco siding. Any instance of mold or rot will need to be replaced before the trowel-applied weather barrier can be applied. The substrate is required to be free of surface contamination, including (not not limited to); dirt, form release agents, efflorescence, oil, chalkiness, and cracks greater than 1mm. Even in situations where the substrate is fine, it may not be approved to have EIFS applied over it. EIMA defines a suitable substrate as: “gypsum sheathing in compliance with ASTM C 1396 (formerly C 79), glass-mat gypsum sheating in compliance with ASTM C 1177 (Dens-Glass Gold® or BPB GlassRoc), and gypsum fiber panels in compliance with ASTM C1278 (Fiberock® Brand, Aqua Tough™)” and certain manufacturers such as Durabond have products for exterior grade plywood (which also acts as lateral bracing). Felt paper or building wrap is no longer recommended because it requires mechanical attachment, which penetrates the weather barrier, allowing moisture in. Certain substrates such as exterior-grade drywall (gypsum sheating) may also require lateral bracing between studs. Lateral bracing is used to prevent excessive horizontal movement and assist in absorbing wind loads transferred to it from the stucco wall. When in doubt, you may want to have an engineer look at your walls so as to avoid having your siding crack down the road. A final note is that most EIFS manufacturers require less than 1/4″ deflection per 60″ span (L/240) — a feat that a good portion of construction projects wouldn’t meet if measured.

Retrofiting Stucco with Brick and CMU
With brick and CMU (concrete masonry units), your sheating and cladding may not need to be touched at all. Brick contains an air gap between itself and the substrate — usually covered in a building wrap. This means that while you may need to level the brick face with basecoat to properly adhere the styrofoam, you need not worry about replacing the substrate, adding a drainage layer or the stucco causing moisture problems. Along the same lines, CMU construction can not rot or support mold growth and usually acts as a partial weather barrier (note: they usually have poly installed between the masonry and interior drywall.) In this case, the styrofoam may be applied directly to the CMU. Even on brick and masonry, it is a good idea to to have the drainage channel to prevent water from becoming trapped behind the EIFS cladding; and they still need to comply with sheating requirements (free of dirt, form release agents, efflorescence, oil, chalkiness, and cracks greater than 1mm.)

Overview
It’s important to realize that whatever is currently on your house will have an impact on how any siding replacement proceeds, and stucco is no exception. It is a good idea to have some extra money budgeted and an agreement with you stucco contractor as to what will happen in the event you run into unsuitable substrate. Stucco Contractors rarely do sheating replacement and you will likely need to find a general renovation contractor to do this before they can proceed. You will also need to have a large bin on site to dispose of your old sheating and substrate, or specify this as part of your general contractor’s job. In the case of applying stucco directly over brick or masonry, you may even be able to save some money because there’s one less layer to be applied.