LP SmartSide Siding in Kansas City: Installed and Painted by One Crew

LP SmartSide is engineered wood siding, and it's what my crew installs on Kansas City homes. It looks like real wood, it resists rot, termites and hail far better than real wood, and it takes paint beautifully. We install it primed, seal every edge, and paint it with two coats of premium exterior paint while it's fresh. One crew does the siding and the paint, so the job looks finished, not patched, and the paint lasts.

I'm James Griffin. I've been painting and siding homes across Johnson County, the Northland and Lee's Summit since 2013. Here's why SmartSide is my go-to, and why the painting is the part that makes or breaks it.

Why is LP SmartSide a good choice for Kansas City homes?

Three things beat up siding here: hail, humidity, and the freeze-thaw swings between December and March. SmartSide handles all three.

• Hail. Engineered wood has a little give. Where vinyl cracks and fiber cement can chip, SmartSide usually takes a hailstorm without a mark. After the spring storms we get most years, that's the difference between a quick touch-up and replacing boards.
• Moisture. The wood strands are treated and sealed during manufacturing, so the board doesn't drink water like cedar or pine. No rot from the inside, no termites.
• Looks. It has a real cedar-grain texture and comes in lap, panel, and board-and-batten styles. The black board-and-batten look that's everywhere in new Kansas City neighborhoods right now is usually SmartSide.

It's also lighter than fiber cement, which makes a careful install easier and a repair on an existing wall faster.

Why does paint last on SmartSide?

Most "paint failures" I get called about on wood houses aren't the paint. They're the wood underneath: a sill that soaked up water and swelled, a trim board that rotted behind the paint. Take rot out of the picture and the paint has an easy life.

SmartSide doesn't swell and shrink the way plain wood does, so the paint film stays put. Painted right, with a premium exterior paint, you get years longer between repaints than cedar, and when it's time, it's a wash and two coats with no rot repair hiding in the bill.

Why should the same crew install and paint it?

Because with SmartSide, the painting is part of the install. The board comes primed, and the two things that make it last are sealing every cut edge and getting the paint on within the first few months. When a siding company hangs it and a painter comes along later, that's exactly where things slip: edges go unsealed, boards sit bare through a summer, and the finish never gets a fair start.

My crew does both. We strip the house to the studs on a full re-side, put down sealed sheathing so the wall itself is watertight, hang the siding with every cut sealed, and paint it with two coats of premium exterior paint as soon as the weather allows. The person who installed the board is the person who painted it. You get one walkthrough, one written price, and one person to call.

What SmartSide work do you do?

• Full re-side. New siding over sealed sheathing, painted any color you want. This is most of our siding work.
• Repair. Damaged or rotted boards replaced, edges sealed, and the whole wall repainted so the repair disappears. SmartSide is common in newer Kansas City-area subdivisions, so a repair usually matches the original profile.
• Repaint. Faded or peeling SmartSide gets washed, spot-primed and painted with two coats of premium exterior paint. If the original paint failed early, we check the edges first, because that's usually where the water got in.

SmartSide or James Hardie: which should I pick?

Both are excellent. SmartSide is lighter, easier to repair, better against hail, and it's what I install most. Hardie is harder and won't burn. I'll tell you honestly which fits your house. I wrote about the other one in our guide to James Hardie siding in Kansas City.

Tell me about the house and I'll walk it with you, no pressure and no sales pitch. Call or text 913-704-4418, or request a free quote.