Exterior paint costs in New Haven

In parts of New Haven, the water counts as a street. The Board of Aldermen has set up three local historic districts: Wooster Square in 1970, the Quinnipiac River district in 1977 and City Point in 2001. There, the Historic District Commission reviews physical changes to the outside of a building that can be seen from a public way, and the city spells that out as a street, a sidewalk or a body of water. Changes like that need a Certificate of Appropriateness before work starts. So if your house faces the harbor or the river, the back can matter as much as the front.

Across the whole city, age is what shapes a paint job. About three-quarters of the city's homes predate 1980, so a lot of New Haven repaints start on top of many old layers.

That's where federal law comes in. On any home built before 1978, a painter you hire to disturb paint must hold EPA certification and use lead-safe work practices. That covers scraping clapboards, sanding window sash and stripping porch rails, the very tasks an old house needs before fresh paint will hold.