Few things make a house look more tired than paint that is bubbling, flaking, or peeling off in sheets. The good news is that peeling almost always traces back to one of a handful of root causes, and once you know which one is yours, the fix is usually straightforward.
Spokane's climate is a particular flavor of tough on exterior coatings. Bright, dry summers bring strong UV. Freeze-thaw winters swing humidity wildly. Shoulder seasons leave surfaces damp longer than people realize. Each of those conditions accelerates a different failure mode, so the pattern of the failure is usually a clue to the cause.
The five most common causes
1. Moisture intrusion behind the coating
Paint needs a dry surface to bond to. If water is getting behind your siding from a leaking gutter, a hose bib without a back-flow seal, splash from grade that sits too high, or a bathroom vent dumping into a soffit, the wood underneath can stay wet long after the surface looks dry. Paint applied over that, or paint trying to seal in moisture that wants out, will lose its grip first.
2. Poor prep on the prior coat
Most exterior failures we get called out on have one thing in common: prep on the previous job was skipped or rushed. Loose paint that was not scraped, glossy areas that were not scuffed, chalky surfaces that were not washed and primed, any of these put the new coat at war with the old one. Fresh paint sticks to whatever it lands on, including the loose stuff that was about to let go anyway.
3. UV degradation on south and west exposures
Spokane sees a lot of sun, and the south and west sides of most homes take the brunt of it. Over time, UV breaks down the resins that hold paint pigment together. The early signs are chalking and fading. The later signs are micro-cracking and full peel-back. If only one or two sides of your house are failing while the others look fine, exposure is almost always the reason.
4. Freeze-thaw cycling under porous coatings
Water that gets into a hairline crack in winter expands as it freezes. Repeat that cycle dozens of times across a Spokane winter and a hairline becomes a peel. Older oil-based exteriors are especially vulnerable because they get brittle as they age and stop flexing with the substrate.
5. Incompatible coatings stacked on top of each other
Putting fresh latex over old oil-based paint without proper bonding primer is one of the fastest ways to guarantee a peel. The same goes for elastomeric coatings over standard acrylic, or any coating applied over a chalky surface. The two layers refuse to behave like one film, and the weaker bond gives way first.
How to diagnose your peeling paint
Before you decide what to do about it, walk through these five steps. They take about an hour and they tell you what you are actually dealing with.
- Identify the elevation and aspect. Look at where the failures are. Are they on one side of the house, around windows and doors, near the ground, or near the roof line? Pattern is the first clue. South and west exposures point to UV. Failures near the ground or under gutters point to moisture.
- Check moisture sources. Walk the perimeter. Look at gutters, downspouts, splash zones, hose bibs, and grade. Anywhere water collects or hits the siding is a candidate. Note any spots where mulch or soil contacts the siding directly.
- Examine the failure pattern. Is the peel coming off down to bare substrate, or is it lifting between coats? Inter-coat failure points to a bonding issue from the last paint job. Down-to-substrate failure points to moisture or substrate damage.
- Test surrounding areas with a tape pull. Press a strip of painter's tape firmly onto a still-attached area near the failure and pull it off in one motion. If paint comes with the tape, the bond is compromised farther than you can see.
- Photograph and measure. Take wide shots and close-ups, and note rough square footage of affected area. This tells your painter, or you, the scope of the prep that is actually needed.
When to call a pro
Small, isolated failures, say a foot or two around a window, can be spot-prepped, primed, and feathered into the existing coat. Once you are looking at multiple square feet across one or more elevations, or any failure that goes down to bare wood, it usually makes more sense to repaint the affected sides as a whole unit. Spot-repairs on an aged paint job often look like spot-repairs.
One important note: Apex Painting does not service homes built before 1978 with confirmed or suspected lead-based paint. If your home is in that range and you are seeing failures, please get a lead test before any prep starts.
If you would like a free walkthrough on the failures you are seeing, you can request a quote here. We will tell you what we see, what we think the cause is, and whether you are looking at spot-repair or a full repaint.
For the prep details that prevent peeling on your next paint job, see our guide on prepping a home for exterior painting. And if you are trying to figure out how often you should be repainting in the first place, our repaint timing FAQ has the ranges we see in the Spokane area.