Should a painter or carpenter repair wood rot?
Specialist carpenters often replace the wood but refuse to prime or paint, forcing you to coordinate a second contractor. Meanwhile, painters and siding crews frequently claim they can handle the whole job using epoxy or during later project phases. This leaves homeowners doubting if a painter is actually qualified for the repair, or if delaying the fix will damage newly installed roof elements.
What people tried
Every workaround mentioned in the threads below. We haven’t tested any of them — and nobody here is claiming they worked.
Found another way around this?
Share your steps and trade-offs so fellow engineers don't have to reinvent the wheel. No account required.
- 1Hiring a painter who claims they can handle both the epoxy repair and the paintingDid this help you?
- 2Asking for references of past work to inspectDid this help you?
- 3Visually inspecting the roof construction and drip edge after the crew leavesDid this help you?
- 4Questioning the contractor immediately about skipped repairsDid this help you?
- 5Planning to intercept the foreman on the day of the subsequent siding jobDid this help you?
In their words
Unedited, grouped by where they were said, most upvoted first within each place, each linked to the thread it came from.
“I questioned why more wasn't replaced (there is still a lot of rotted wood left). The contractor explained that the roofing crew only replaced what was immediately necessary for them to complete the roof job, and that the siding crew would replace the remaining rotted wood when they do the siding.”source ↗
“I began looking at the construction of the roof and noticed that the fascia that was replaced does not interact with the roof deck, while none of the rake boards were replaced”source ↗
“I'm dubious of the claim that these can be replaced without adversely impacting the new drip edge on the rakes.”source ↗
“I was expecting it to be replaced during the roofing phase, not the siding phase, due to it being attached to part of the new roof.”source ↗
“I have a house from the 1930’s that has extensive wood rot around a couple windows.”source ↗
“The carpenter that works with historic windows does not prime or paint so I would need to get a painter.”source ↗
“The painter says they work with abatron and can do the entire job. I just don’t know if that is really something a painter can do?”source ↗
Where this came up
People with this problem also raised
- 13How to fix rotted wood landscape timbers
- 5Spot fix rotting wood siding or replace all of it?
- 14Rain ruined the wood floor in my rental, what happens now?
- 2Can you fix a dent in a rounded hardwood corner?
- 5How to replace a rotted section of a support beam
- 9How to fix a flexing wood floor without replacing it