Painting in Citrus Heights, CA

Citrus Heights is where this business is based, and it is the densest of the ten cities on this list — 6,159 people to the square mile across only 14.22 square miles. That density is the whole character of the place from a painting point of view: it is a city of post-war and 1960s-70s subdivisions on compact lots, where houses sit close enough that a neighbor's wall is often six feet from the one being sprayed.

Compact lots change how an exterior job is run rather than what it costs. Overspray control matters more here than it does on a half-acre in Granite Bay, so more of the day goes on masking and shielding and on choosing when to spray versus when to brush and roll. Fences, shared driveways, anything parked close to the work — all of it gets covered before anything is opened.

The housing stock is the other half of it. A lot of Citrus Heights was built between the 1950s and the 1970s, which means wood siding, fascia and eaves that have been through several repaint cycles, and trim that has usually been painted more times than anyone can count. Old paint that has been recoated repeatedly is where failures start — layers that no longer bond to each other let go in sheets. Scraping back to something sound and spot-priming the bare patches is what makes the next coat last.