How to Repair Old Porches

Tips and techniques for restoring and repairing old porches, including repairing porch posts, columns, flooring, skirting and more.

Porches are subject to the insidious force of all weathers, from driving rain and bleaching sun to wind-driven snow and high humidity. If not kept in good repair using water-resistant materials and strategically applied coats of paint, the key elements of a porch—floors, framing, posts, railings, and decorative elements—will deteriorate quickly.

Two Reasons Original Porches Survive:

  1. The first is that many were built with old-growth lumber that’s dense and sap-rich, resistant to both penetrating water and insects, with longevity that ranges from decades to centuries. As OHJ has been repeating for more than 40 years, lumber of that quality is nearly impossible to find today, so it makes sense to preserve and re-use as much of the original material as possible.
  2. Less well known but equally important is the fact that older porches were constructed with techniques that encourage water to escape quickly and that permit ventilation between individual components. Many of these details are subtle and easily overlooked.

A porch is covered, yet exposed to the elements. High-quality materials and construction details that encourage the structure and all of its many components to shed water will help give this outdoor room a long life.

Before Restoring, Document Everything

Before beginning any restoration or rebuilding, it’s worthwhile to document existing joinery and spacing details with photographs and/or a sketch that includes measurements on all components, even when the parts are beyond saving. What’s left may provide clues to construction techniques that gave the porch its initial long life.

When the historic Judge William D. Fenton Residence’s ornate porch was restored, all components were labeled and numbered for later reassembly.

Full Circa

Repairing Porch Foundations

A good porch starts with good footings. While the earliest porches were built on large stones set deep into the ground or full masonry piers of fieldstone or brick, contemporary building codes call for footers of poured concrete.

Some Tips for Porch Foundation Repairs

  • Porches that have settled or sagged should first be raised as close as possible to the original position using jacks, shims or 2×4 props. (Take care not to raise it so high that you disturb or damage intact structural or trim elements.)
  • Excavate space for new footings below the frost line, then pour the concrete and allow it to fully cure. Then reuse the historic stone or brick above grade to conceal the exposed part of the footings.
  • Set posts of naturally rot-resistant wood, chamfered and notched to support the upper framing, on the new footers. Choices include eastern white pine, high quality cedar or cypress, as well as pressure-treated lumber.

Repairing Deck Framing

Deck framing is the most common area for rot damage on an old porch.

Before about 1860, deck frames were often built of large logs called “sleepers.” These sturdy logs were hewn flat on one or two sides, with one of the flat side facing up to act as floor joists.

Some Tips for Deck Framing Repairs

  • If your porch has sleepers that are rotted, replace them with supporting beams of comparable heft.
  • Before ripping out wood that’s too far gone to repair, take note of all the connections and spacers.
  • When doubling up of support beams is called for—say when replacing an old beam with a pair of 2x10s—place shims between the boards every few feet to allow water to pass through. The shims needn’t be large: a piece of rot-resistant wood that’s ¼” thick and 2″ long is enough to create a gap for water to drip through and permit ventilation.

Repairing Porch Corners

On a porch with changes of direction (for example, on a verandah that turns a corner and continues on a second side of the house), cut the boards where they meet along a diagonal. There are two classic join patterns: miter joints (shown at top) and herringbone joints (bottom).

The two classic join patterns for porch corners: Miter joints & ringbone joints.

Illustration: Rob Leanna

Read more from Old House Journal:

Repairing Porch Posts & Columns

Whether turned or chamfered, porch posts support the roof-framing system (a topic for another story) and act as anchors for attached railings. If they’re made of old-growth wood and positioned correctly, they should last indefinitely—provided they are properly ventilated.

If your porch columns aren’t solid wood, they should be vented at the top and bottom.

Some Tips for Porch Post & Column Repairs

  • It’s important that wood posts and columns not come in direct contact with the wood floor of the porch.
  • Columns that are not solid wood should also be vented at both bottom and top.
  • For posts, use a concealed post support of metal or PVC.
  • Mount new wood columns on an aluminum, composite, or masonry plinth or base.
  • Epoxy: While methods to repair rotted porch posts and columns could easily fill an entire issue, consider making repairs using epoxy.
  • Another alternative is to install plain cedar posts covered with custom-made sheathing, or replace severely rotted posts with composite materials that can be shaped to historical specifications.

Repairing Old Porch Floors

Historically, porch floorboards were milled from vertical grain 5⁄4″ tongue-and-groove Douglas fir, which meant they were fully 1″ thick. The ends were often shaped in a half-round bullnose by an onsite carpenter, the better to shed water. After World War II, board thicknesses shrank to ¾”, and the ends were typically square-cut, both compromises in terms of the expected lifespan of the wood.

Some Tips for Porch Flooring Repairs

  • For best longevity, choose 1″ thick tongue-and-groove vertical-grain boards, preferably at least 5″ wide. The wood should be a high-quality, rot-resistant species such as cedar, cypress, Douglas fir, mahogany, or another tropical wood. Traditionally, boards are laid running perpendicular to the house.
  • Make sure the porch floor has a slight slope to it—between 1⁄8″ and ¼” per linear foot for tongue-and-groove floors. (If the porch is deeper than 8′, use a slope closer to 1⁄8″ per foot to avoid a pronounced slant.)
  • If the porch floor isn’t tongue-and-groove, allow at least ¼” between new or replacement boards as you lay them, to permit water to flow through the decking. Many construction experts say there’s no need to factor in a slope for spaced floorboards, since the water can drain through easily.
  • Before laying the boards, prime every surface on every board, including the tongue and groove.
  • To further limit the penetration of water, add a bead of paintable caulk to the interior groove as you lay in each board before nailing it into place. Wipe away the excess with a clean wet rag; otherwise, you may need to do some spot sanding before finish-painting the porch floor.

Stair treads should overlap risers and stringers by about 1″ and slope forward slightly to drain water.

Repairing Stairs & Skirting on Old Porches

Stair treads should overlap risers and stringers by about 1″ and slope forward slightly to drain water. Use a router to create bullnose edges on both tread ends and edges.

The ventilated skirting underneath the porch allows air to circulate and keeps animals from invading the space under the house.

Ventilation is crucial for preventing dampness, which can attract wood-eating insects and encourage decay. “You want the bugs to crawl in,” says Andrew Curtis, an exterior restoration specialist, “and you want them to crawl back out.”

It is crucial to ventilate skirting underneath porches to avoid decay. 

Skirting aprons usually have ventilated panels that are hung, hinged, or tacked to the framing or bandboard. Clever ones are designed so at least one panel is removable for access to underneath the porch.

Repairing Balusters & Rails

The balustrade is an assemblage consisting of top and bottom rails and the connecting vertical balusters. Balustrades are especially vulnerable to weather, given the structure’s position at the edge of the porch. When rebuilding a balustrade, copy or approximate the sloping profile of the top rail so that it sheds water easily.

Some Tips for Repairing Balusters & Rails:

  • Match joinery details as closely as possible too, and cut new pieces from wood of comparable quality, preferably of the same species. Rails, balusters, and any decorative component should interlock soundly, like a three-dimensional puzzle.
  • Before assembling parts that mate, prime or seal the hidden sides of all joints.
  • For rails spanning more than 8′, place one or two small, painted support blocks between the bottom rail and the porch floor.

This Eastlake-style gingerbread millwork is the star feature of the ornate porch on the Judge William D. Fenton House. 

Case Study: Historic Gingerbread Porch Restoration


Restoring the ornate porch on the Judge William D. Fenton House, a Queen Anne on the National Register of Historic Places, in Portland, Oregon, posed a series of construction challenges for the team from Full Circa Inc. The floorboards were rotted, supporting joists had separated from the decking, and many of the intricate fretwork panels were damaged beyond repair.

While the team restored and reused as many of the fretwork 1′ x 16″ panels they could, simply removing the old paint was tremendously labor intensive. “In some places, the paint was more than 1⁄8″ thick,” says Andrew Curtis, owner and president of Full Circa. “We actually had to cut paint out of the crevices with a scroll saw.”

On a project spanning more than a year, the team erected a temporary shelter in the yard to stage the work: all components were transferred to the shelter, where they were labeled and numbered for later reassembly. Much of the paint removal was done by a lead abatement firm. That way, the work was in full compliance with local and national codes for the removal of lead paint. Where replacement structural elements were needed, the team used clear vertical grain cedar or Douglas fir, opting for salvaged wood when available.

One of the most challenging construction puzzles was what to do about the fretwork panels. The originals were cut from old-growth wood. Comparable wood was not available, and Curtis knew from experience that new wood wouldn’t hold up for more than five years.

New decorative panels made from solid PVC sheets replaced damaged old-growth wood panels on the porch. 

Full Circa

Curtis also knew that synthetic PVC composite might be a good compromise solution. Working with the flat, non-textured side up, the new decorative panels were cut from solid PVC sheets made by AZEK. The material won’t shrink or swell, and takes paint well. “It looks just like wood when you brush paint on,” Curtis says.

Liquid Strength From Epoxies


When restoring a 120-year-old porch with components that include curving horizontal members that have been turned on a lathe, replacing original wood is usually the last option.

To strengthen reusable structural elements, the Full Circa team treated damaged, dry, or paint-resistant wood with epoxies, using both liquid and paste versions from Abatron. Depending on the problem to be addressed, liquid epoxy parts A and B are mixed to different viscosities. Dry rotted or “punky” wood, for example, might get a brushing of liquid epoxy mixed to the consistency of thin syrup.

Paste epoxies make excellent fillers and extenders. The team also scrubbed miter and scarf joints with Gorilla Glue. The glue foams up when applied with a wet rag and acts as both epoxy and primer, says Curtis, especially over hard-to-remove paint. The result is a stable surface that won’t move.


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