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Check out some before and after pictures on our new Flickr page! We are continuously adding massive amounts of content, come see what your house could look like with a permanent exterior solution – our Smart Color exterior coating.

People often ask me to compare our Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color product to those of our competitors – Easy Choice Exteriors and Rhino Shield of New England. The simple answer that I give them is this: Our product and our entire exterior coating system were developed in New England, for New England weather. The other companies out there – namely Easy Choice Exteriors and Rhino Shield of New England – have ceramic coating materials that have largely been used until this point in hot weather areas. When you look at where the vast majority of Rhino Shield franchises are located, you will find that the bulk of them are located in southern states with hot weather climates. As for Easy Choice, they are  not affiliated with any larger entity, they are simply a small business out of Woburn, MA. I would rather not get into the legalities of our history with Easy Choice Exteriors but it suffices to say that there is a history. So…do your research and see who actually makes each of these exterior coating systems – some acrylic (Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color) while others are ceramic based exterior coating systems with a history in hot weather climates. See who has been in New England the longest, and your answer should be clear!

 Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color: Save Money & the Environment!

Painting your home is an endless cycle.  It seems like every time you turn around it is time to either touch up or repaint the house again. These days, an average paint job typically lasts about 3-5 years. Naturally, with inflation, each time the cost to have this done has risen.  Not only are you hurting your wallet but you are also hurting the environment.  With each paint application volatile organic compounds, or VOC’s, are being exposed to the environment. The more times you paint, the more VOC’s will be released.  Lifetyme Exteriors has a solution to both save you thousands of dollars and protect our planet at the same time.

Let’s consider the average cost and length of time that a traditional paint application lasts for a typical colonial style home.  As mentioned above, recent statistics show that an average paint job lasts 3-5 years. For the sake of our presentation, we will be optimistic and use 5 years as our benchmark.  It is also safe to say that an average colonial home will currently cost about $5000 to wash, prep, and coat with traditional paint. Keeping in mind a modest increase in price of about $150 per year, which does not even equate to a 3% inflation rate, you can expect to pay an additional $750 every 5 years to have your home painted.

Our Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color application comes with a lifetime warranty for as long as you own your home. If you happen to sell your home, it is transferable to the new owner for a period of 20 years. At the very least, we guarantee one application of our product to last for 20 years from the date of its completion. If you had chosen traditional paint, you would have painted 5 times in 20 years where you would have only coated your home once with Smart Color.

As a rule of thumb, the cost of our product will generally run 2½ times as much as a typical paint job. If we are using $5000 as the price for a paint application, our coating will be approximately $12,500. Now let’s look at what happens over the next 20 years.  Our model tells us that you will paint 5 times within this 20 year period but only that one time with Lifetyme Exteriors.  Taking into consideration the inflation, you will pay $5000 for paint the first year, $5750 in year five, and so forth. By the end of the 20 year period you will have paid a total of $32,500 (See graph on next page for illustration).  In that same period of time, you would have only spent the original $12,500 with Smart Color. Using Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color you would have saved an astounding $20,000. And we know that figure could be higher if we weren’t using simple interest calculations for our increases in inflation.

Now that we have seen how Lifetyme Exteriors can protect your wallet, let’s see how it can protect the air that we breathe. Again, we will use the same pattern of painting as we did above to demonstrate the vast difference in the amount of VOC’s (volatile organic compounds) being exposed to the atmosphere between our Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color products and the recommended primer and paint of an industry leader.

If we look at the MSDS (material safety data sheet) for each of these recommended paint products, you will see that their primer contains *2.72 lbs of VOC’s/gallon and their paint contains *.95 lbs of VOC’s/gallon. A typical colonial home will use both 10 gallons of primer and 10 gallons of paint to coat the entire home. Simple mathematics tells us that this will expose 36.7 lbs of VOC’s to the environment. This is by no means excessive with regard to paint products. However, we must remember that we will be painting 4 more times in 20 years when using our model. This will expose a total of 183.5 lbs of VOC’s to the air we breathe. These figures are very common for traditional paint but can seem staggering when compared to Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color.

Our Smart Coat Exterior Acrylic Primer contains **.75 lbs of VOC’s/gallon and our Smart Coat High Build Coating Satin Sheen contains **.71 lbs of VOC’s/gallon. Like traditional paint, 10 gallons of our primer will be used but 30 gallons of High Build coating will be needed.  Again, mathematics shows us that for one complete application of Smart Coat, 28.8 lbs of VOC’s will be subjected to the atmosphere. That number alone when compared to 36.7 lbs with a recommended traditional paint is not that different. However, when we multiply that figure by 5, the amount paint applications over 20 years, we can see the dramatic difference (see graph on next page for illustration).  Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color will have exposed only 28.8 lbs of VOC’s to the environment in 20 years while the traditional paint products will have exposed 183.5 lbs. That is over 6 times as many lbs of VOC’s as Smart Color.

The most important concept to remember from the information provided is repetition. Repeating the painting process over and over again can be costly both monetarily and environmentally.  One application of traditional paint can appear to be inexpensive and fit for the environment. However, when you look at the amount of times you will have to repeat this process, not only over the period of 20 years as described in our model but over the span of your home ownership, you begin to see the effects on your bank account and our planet. Choosing Lifetyme Exteriors Smart Color over traditional paint will allow you to save a nice chunk of change for your child’s education fund while at the same time expose less harmful substances to the air they breathe growing up.

Preparation and Application of SmartColor 

Before the experienced, highly trained installers at Lifetyme Exteriors begin applying SmartColor, your home will receive the necessary preparation to ensure the life of the coating. This may include some minor carpentry work. Scraping and sanding will also be done to prepare the surface for the SmartColorä application process.

Power-Wash

The first step in the process is to power-wash your home with a solution of bleach and mildew-cide to remove any existing dirt, grime and/or mildew from its surface. This allows our primer maximum adhesion, and sets the groundwork for a smooth finished look once the entire process is complete.

SealSmart™

When the surface of your home is clean, we will use our SealSmart around doors, windows, and any other areas with cracks that might otherwise allow moisture to get through. SealSmart is a superior, industrial quality sealant made to last as long as SmartColorä, and can also be used to fill in unsightly cracks or crevices.

SmartPrime™

Once your home is washed and sealed, we will be ready to apply SmartPrime, our primer and bonding agent. This can be sprayed, brushed, or rolled on depending on the surface material and area to which it is being applied. Once this step is complete, you are well on your way to an attractive and protective new exterior!

SmartColor

Once SmartPrime has been applied, we will be ready to transform your home using the color of your choice (we offer over 1500 colors, as well as custom color matching). Like SmartPrime, SmartColor can be sprayed, brushed, or rolled on depending on the surface material and area to which it is being applied. This layer will give your house a freshly painted look, but will not crack, chip, peel or fade like standard paint! Depending on the color you choose, a thinner topcoat may be applied additionally. This topcoat does not extend nor lessen the life of SmartColor, and only serves to attain certain deep colors.

Clean-Up and Walk-Around

Even when our crew has finished applying SmartColor, your job is not done yet. All trash and construction materials will be removed, and the property surrounding your home will be left just as it was when we arrived- sometimes better! Once the clean-up has taken place, a crew foreman or member of our production department will join you for a walk-around to confirm that all work was completed to your satisfaction. You will then be asked to complete our Job Completion & Customer Satisfaction Form. Only then will your job be considered finished, and we will leave you to soak up the compliments on your fresh exterior from your friends and neighbors.

Customer Service

Lifetyme Exteriors will continue to provide you with reliable, efficient customer service from your job’s start to finish and beyond. You have the right to have all of your questions answered during the process, but also long after we finish applying SmartColor to your home. Whether you complete some new construction and need new areas coated, or have a general question, we are committed to your needs. Any time you call us at 888-USA-FREE, one of our representatives will speak with you or return your call expediently to ensure you and your home are well cared for.