San Francisco handyman & home maintenance, on a membership

What San Francisco homes need

Most of the city’s housing is wood-frame and older than anyone working on it — Victorians and Edwardians in the Mission, Noe Valley, and Alamo Square; Marina-style stucco over wood in the north; sand-and-fog Sunset and Richmond rows to the west. Wood buildings in a marine climate need steady, unglamorous attention: the bay window that takes the weather on three sides, the redwood trim that predates the paint by a century, the stair treads and door casings worn soft by decades of use.

Dry rot is the recurring theme. Fog-side facades, bay-window sills, rear stairs, and deck ledgers stay damp for months at a time, and rot works quietly under intact paint. We cut out the failed sections, splice in matched material, prime every cut end, and seal the water path that caused it — repair scale, done properly, before it becomes a rebuild.

The other constant is original woodwork worth keeping. Old-growth fir and redwood trim, double-hung sash windows, paneled doors — this material is better than anything at the lumberyard today, and it repairs beautifully. We match existing profiles, re-rope sashes, ease binding doors, and touch up to the paint line, so the repair disappears into the house instead of announcing itself.

Add the ordinary list — patching plaster and drywall, tightening hardware, mounting, caulking the wet rooms, swapping fixtures — and the whole house gets covered by a crew that arrives already knowing it, visit after visit.