Cedar Deck in Our Seattle Back Yard
Go ahead, have deck envy! We just finished the cedar deck in our backyard. Just in time for the rains. Oh well, there is always the occasional sunny, fall day when I can grab a cup of cider, a hoodie and head outdoors.
I am fortunate to live with someone who knows about construction and his motto is ‘only if you want it done right.’ We joke that if the ‘Big One’ hits – meaning an earthquake in Seattle- we will run out to the back deck. It is there to stay!
I have had clients recently ask me about Trex, or really about plastic composite decking, Trex is just the best known brand. Most people know it as a ‘forever’ material that needs no maintenance. A very attractive proposition in our rainy Seattle where even rocks seem to deteriorate from being outside all winter. I have seen many of these types of decks and I will just say that yes, you don’t maintain them, you CAN’T maintain them, and they fade and start to look really junky fast and the only thing you can do is replace them. Think past the marketing hype when choosing this material, I am sure it has it’s place but do your research. You can start by reading some articles debunking the composite claims.
Then again I am a lover of anything ‘natural.’ But you can sand and refinish a wood deck and have a ‘brand new’ deck many times over. We use Penofin, which has Brazilian Rosewood oil, on our decks and have found it to be a great product. For the first year of the deck we will sand it again and give another coat of Penofin. Then we can likely sand/finish again every couple years. Really, the maintenance is not that intensive and we will have a beautiful deck to enjoy for many years and when we go to sell the home we can just sand/finish again and it will surely impress.