Residential License # 890459
Commercial License # 3667
Claim Your Free Painting Consultation Today
Residential License # 890459
Commercial License # 3667
Claim Your Free Painting Consultation Today
New Orleans homes take a beating most houses never see: humidity that never fully lets up, and wood siding on shotguns and camelbacks that’s original to the house. Repainting is a recurring cost of owning property here. Finding a painter who does the work right the first time comes down to seven checks you can run before you ever agree to a quote.
Run through them in order. The first two take five minutes and cost nothing, and they’ll eliminate most of the painters you shouldn’t hire before you’ve spent an hour on the phone with any of them.
TurnKey Painter put this list together from the questions New Orleans homeowners actually ask before hiring, not a generic checklist copied from another city. Contact us or call (504) 608-5528 with questions about your own project.
This article is for general informational purposes only. It isn’t a substitute for a written, in-person estimate from a licensed painting contractor. Licensing thresholds, insurance norms, and pricing can change — confirm current details directly with any contractor you’re considering and with the Louisiana State Licensing Board for Contractors (LSLBC).
Do this: Look up the contractor on the Louisiana State Licensing Board for Contractors (LSLBC) website before you call them.
What to check: Louisiana requires a home improvement registration for projects valued between $7,500 and $50,000, and a full residential contractor license for anything above $50,000. If your painting job is likely to land in that range once you add labor and materials, the contractor needs an active registration or license in the matching category, not just a business license or an insurance certificate. (Source: LSLBC FAQ and “Types of Licenses” pages — lslbc.gov, verified 2026-08-24. Thresholds and category names can change; confirm current figures directly with LSLBC before relying on them.)
Bad sign: A contractor who can’t give you a registration or license number, or whose number doesn’t come back active on LSLBC’s lookup, before you’ve asked twice.
Do this: Ask for a certificate of insurance (COI) that names you as the certificate holder, showing general liability coverage, not just a vehicle policy or workers’ comp alone.
What to check: Being named as certificate holder doesn’t extend the contractor’s coverage to you. It’s how you get documented proof the policy exists and is active, which is what you’d need if you ever had to make a claim against it. The COI should list an insurer, a policy number, and dates that are still active. Call the insurance agent listed on it if anything looks off. A fake COI is one of the easiest things for an unlicensed crew to produce and one of the easiest for you to verify with one phone call.
Bad sign: A contractor who emails you a COI with no agent contact info, or who stalls when you ask to verify it directly with the carrier.
Do this: Read the most recent 10-15 reviews across at least two platforms (Google, Yelp, Facebook), not just the overall star rating.
What to check: Look for a repeated complaint: missed start dates, no-shows mid-job, paint that failed within a year, disputes over final payment. One bad review is a data point. The same complaint showing up three times across different reviewers is a pattern.
Bad sign: A contractor with only 5-star reviews and no negative ones at all, especially if most reviews were posted in the same short window. That pattern is more consistent with incentivized or purchased reviews than with a real customer base.
Do this: Ask for an estimate broken into labor, materials, prep work, and any items excluded from the price, in writing, not a verbal number over the phone.
What to check: What’s not included matters more than the total. Does the price cover pressure washing, scraping and sanding failing paint, caulking gaps, priming bare wood, or two coats versus one? A low bid that excludes prep work usually costs more once the exclusions show up as change orders.
Bad sign: A contractor who won’t put the estimate in writing, or whose written estimate is a single line total with no breakdown.
Keep this checklist next to any estimate you’re comparing, including one from TurnKey Painter.
Do this: Ask directly how the crew protects plants, outdoor furniture, light fixtures, and any interior items during the job, and who’s responsible if something is damaged.
What to check: A contractor with a real process will describe it without hesitating: drop cloths, plant covers, fixture removal and reinstallation, daily cleanup. Ask what their process is if something does get damaged, and whether that’s covered under the liability policy you verified in Step 2.
Bad sign: A vague answer like “we’re always careful” with no actual protection process described.
Do this: Ask how they handle humidity-related drying time, and, for any home built before 1978, whether they follow lead-safe work practices.
What to check: New Orleans humidity affects paint cure time and can cause peeling or bubbling if a contractor rushes coats. For pre-1978 homes, ask directly whether their crew is EPA Lead-Safe certified. Federal law requires lead-safe certified firms for most paint-disturbing work on pre-1978 housing, though the EPA’s RRP Rule carries some narrow exemptions (for example, homeowners doing the work themselves aren’t covered by the rule the same way a hired contractor is). Don’t assume either way. Ask, and check current requirements at epa.gov if it matters for your project.
Bad sign: A contractor who’s never heard the term “lead-safe certified” or brushes off the question when your home predates 1978.
Do this: Ask for the payment schedule (deposit amount, milestone payments, final payment) and any workmanship warranty in writing, before signing.
What to check: A large upfront deposit relative to the total job size shifts risk onto you before any work happens. A warranty that only covers “materials” and not labor means you’d pay for a repaint if the workmanship itself fails.
Bad sign: A contractor asking for full or majority payment upfront, or unable to state a warranty period when asked directly.
Run these seven checks with any painter you’re considering, and you’ll have eliminated most of the risk before you sign anything. TurnKey Painter can walk you through a written, itemized estimate for your New Orleans project. Get your free quote or call (504) 608-5528.
Cost depends on square footage, surface condition (how much scraping, sanding, and priming is needed), number of coats, and whether it’s interior or exterior work. Rather than a single number, ask any contractor you’re considering for a written, itemized estimate broken down by labor and materials (Step 4) so you can compare quotes on the same basis.
Louisiana doesn’t publish a standard statewide rate, and pricing varies by region and contractor. One useful anchor: Louisiana requires a home improvement registration for work valued between $7,500 and $50,000, and a full residential license above that (LSLBC), which gives you a rough sense of where a full house repaint tends to land relative to smaller touch-up jobs, though your actual price depends on the scope specifics above.
Run the seven checks above in order: verify their Louisiana registration or license, confirm insurance that names you as certificate holder, read reviews for patterns rather than the star average, get a written itemized estimate, ask about protecting your property, confirm they handle local humidity and lead-safe practices where relevant, and get the payment schedule and warranty in writing before you sign.
Written by: TurnKey Painter · Last updated: August 24, 2026
Turnkey Painter 
