Where I paint — Amherst, Williamsville, Clarence, Getzville, Tonawanda, Grand Island.

Amherst

Amherst is the largest of the towns I work in and the most varied. The older parts — Snyder, Eggertsville, the streets near Main Street — went up between the wars and in the years right after, so you find painted wood siding, deep trim profiles and porches that need scraping more often than they need replacing. North Amherst and the eastern subdivisions are mostly 1950s to 1970s ranches, splits and colonials: manageable single-storey elevations, but a lot of window trim and soffit, and forty years of sun on the south side.

Practically: on the older stock the money goes into prep, and on the post-war stock it goes into trim and fascia.

Williamsville

Williamsville splits into two jobs. In and around the village there is genuinely old housing — nineteenth-century and turn-of-the-century homes with tall windows, detailed cornices and multiple trim profiles. That is slow, careful work, done with a brush more than a roller, and it is also where lead-safe practice matters most if the house predates 1978.

Out toward the Transit corridor it’s a different town entirely: 1960s and 1970s subdivisions with repetition of the same few house plans, which means square rooms and predictable work. What comes up here is usually worn hallways and a kitchen that’s been cooked in for twenty years rather than anything actually failing.

Clarence

Clarence is where the jobs get bigger. Larger lots, larger houses, more of them built from the 1980s onward with tall two-storey foyers, open stairwells and long runs of trim on casings and door heads. Around the Clarence Hollow, near Main Street, the housing is older and much more detailed — the opposite problem in a smaller package.

Because the rooms are taller, a foyer or a stairwell here takes longer than the same wall area in Amherst. Two-storey walls mean more ladder and staging time, and that shows up in the quote.

Getzville

Getzville sits between Amherst and the Niagara County line, and most of it is later suburban building — 1970s through 2000s, generous floor plans and a lot of open hallways and stairwells. There is also older farmhouse stock along the county roads, which is the opposite end of the spectrum and usually needs the most prep per square foot.

The newer houses mostly need maintenance rather than repair: the caulk at window casings and trim dries out before anything else, and a hallway wall takes the scuffs that a bathroom wall doesn’t.

Tonawanda

The City of Tonawanda is the densest and oldest part of my area. Bungalows, doubles and two-storey frame houses from the 1920s through the 1950s, sitting close together, many of them with the original plaster and trim still in place. Houses here also commonly predate 1978, so lead-safe work practices are part of the job, not an add-on.

Tight lots mean more careful dust control, more protection of anything that can’t be moved, and more hand-work in rooms where a ladder can’t be set. It is slower work, and I price it that way rather than discovering it halfway through.

Grand Island

Grand Island’s housing runs from 1950s cottages and ranches to much newer builds on large lots, but what distinguishes it is the weather. Sitting in the Niagara River, the island gets more wind and more freeze-thaw cycling than the inland towns, and that shows up inside too: windows that sweat through a cold snap, and caulk failing first at the frames and on the south and west walls.

That means the caulk and the paint at those windows are worth looking at sooner rather than later, and worth doing with a proper caulk and primer rather than the cheapest of either.

Not on that list?

Call and ask. I’d rather turn down a job two towns away than do a bad one because I was driving forty minutes each way and cutting corners to make the day work. If you’re just outside the six towns — Buffalo, Kenmore, the Town of Tonawanda, East Amherst — it’s worth a conversation, and I’ll tell you honestly whether it makes sense.

I’d rather be the first person you think of in six towns than the fortieth in twenty. That’s the whole reason the list is short.

What painting costs in this market →