Before you start
- Painters in the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue area earned a mean $30.00 an hour in May 2025, BLS says.
- Primer plus two top-coats lasts about twice as long as primer plus one.
- Pre-1978 homes need lead-safe work by certified firms.
Two painting quotes for the same Everett house can be thousands of dollars apart. That is not always a sign that one painter is overcharging. Exterior painting prices are driven by labor, preparation and the number of coats, and those vary enormously from house to house. This guide explains the parts of a quote so you can compare them fairly. We do not publish price-per-square-foot figures, because no single number fits every house.
Labor is the biggest part
Most of an exterior paint job is hours: washing, scraping, repairs, masking, priming and painting. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reports that painters in the Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metro area, which includes Everett, earned a mean of $30.00 an hour and a median of $29.06 in May 2025, above the national mean of $26.64. Those are wages paid to painters, not the price a contractor charges; a contractor’s rate also covers insurance, bonding, equipment, travel and overhead.
| Area | Mean hourly wage | Median hourly wage |
|---|---|---|
| Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue metro | $30.00 | $29.06 |
| Washington State | $29.28 | $28.68 |
| United States | $26.64 | $23.75 |
What makes a quote higher
- Prep: heavy mildew, peeling paint and weathered wood take more washing and scraping.
- Repairs: replacing decayed trim, sills or siding.
- Lead-safe work on a pre-1978 home: plastic sheeting, containment, careful cleanup and certified workers.
- Height and access: second stories, steep lots and ladders or lifts.
- Cedar and other woods with extractives: stain-blocking primer.
- More coats: primer plus two top-coats instead of one.
Coats and the long view
The cheapest bid may skip a coat. The U.S. Forest Products Laboratory’s Wood Handbook says primer plus two top-coats of paint typically lasts 10 to 20 years on siding, and that a two-coat system, primer and one top-coat, cuts that service life to about half. A slightly higher price for a full three-coat job can be the better value over time. See How Long Exterior Paint Lasts in Washington, and What Makes It Last Longer.
Ask every bidder to state the number of coats, the products by type (primer, top-coat, sheen) and what prep is included, in writing. Then compare like with like.
Materials
Paint is a smaller share of the total than labor but not trivial. The Wood Handbook gives a typical coverage of about 400 square feet per gallon when repainting, which lets you sanity-check the quantity in a bid. In Washington, a PaintCare fee is included in the price of each container of new paint; it funds the state’s paint recycling program, and leftover paint can be dropped off free.
Older homes
If your house was built before 1978, paid work that disturbs paint must be done by a firm certified under the EPA’s Renovation, Repair and Painting Rule, with ground covered at least 10 feet out from the work. Those requirements add time and should appear in the quote. A bid that ignores them is a red flag; see Painting an Older Everett Home: Lead-Safe Rules, Prep and What to Ask a Painter.
Comparing bids
- Get several written bids, as Washington’s Attorney General advises.
- Verify each contractor’s registration, bond and insurance with the Department of Labor and Industries.
- Check what is excluded: repairs, gutters, decks, fences.
- Agree on a schedule that fits Everett’s dry season.
Scope that should be in writing
A clear scope is the best protection against surprise costs. List every surface to be painted: siding, trim, doors, window frames, soffits, gutters, decks and fences. Say who repairs decayed wood and how extra repairs found during prep will be priced. Agree on how plants, walkways and the yard will be protected, and on daily cleanup. On an older house, ask how lead debris will be contained and disposed of, because the EPA’s rules require containment and careful cleanup.
Repainting costs less than a first full job
Once a house is in good shape, keeping it there is cheaper. The Wood Handbook notes that when top-coats begin to wear thin, one or two new top-coats are enough if the old paint is sound, and that prep may be little more than washing off mildew, dirt and chalk. Sides of the house wear at different rates, with the north side lasting about twice as long as the south, so you can repaint the sunny walls first and spread the cost. For sheltered spots such as porches and soffits, repainting every other time the house is painted is usually enough, which lowers the cost of later jobs.
Finally, ask how leftover paint will be handled. Washington’s PaintCare drop-off sites take house paint, primers and stains at no charge, and PaintCare offers a free pickup service to painting contractors with 100 gallons or more.
Keep copies of every bid, the signed contract and the product list. They make it easy to order matching paint for touch-ups and to brief the next painter years from now.
The next step is choosing who to hire; see How to Hire a House Painter in Everett: Registration, Bonds, Bids and Red Flags.
How long will your paint or stain last? Try the paint life check.