Protecting Our $33,000 Deck | Ready Seal Wood Stain 

The overhead views of your deck shows lap marks every 6 feet every time you stopped and started a new section. Products like Ready Seal Stain need to be stirred thoroughly before applying to wood and stirred occasionally as you apply it. This is because the stain pigments settle to the bottom over time. Stirrers for 5 gallon containers that attach to a drill are about 10 dollars. But in 2 or 3 years when you reapply the stain, do 3 or 4 boards at a time, but also apply it to the full length of the deck. Stirring for a few seconds before refilling the roller tray, and staining 3 or 4 boards the full length of the deck will eliminate those lap marks because the color of the stain will now be more consistent.

As soon as I saw those mountains I knew you were in VA, I live in the Shenandoah Valley. Thanks for sharing this. We recently had our deck installed, waiting to stain it, but in the meantime, we need to stain our fence which was installed in 2020. Estimates we've received for staining are around 3k, that's almost as much as the installation. I'm determined we are gonna do this ourselves. Your video is proof that we can.

I’m a painting and deck restoration contractor. In the northeast Massachusetts. We love this product. Nice deck great job.

It looks so nice! That deck is worth every penny to have. What a great space to enjoy your view. Such a big job!

Some things are worth the money spent, I think that deck and the products to maintain it are for sure worth it

Great job on your deck staining project and thanks for sharing your video!

I would love to see an update on this, after 2 years showing how this has aged.

Oil base is the only way to go. All water base will eventually peal, causing a guy to have to strip the old finish. TWP is very similar. Good choice.

That turned out REALLY NICE!

There is a link to the stain in the description people. The color he used was light oak

Hey that's me and my friends! Still one of the wettest nights of my life with all that rain! Trying to put that tent together in a torrential downpour with hysterical. Your old deck probably had what our current deck had before we bought it, which was Behr Deck Over. It was one of the worst products ever made resulting in a class action lawsuit destroying decks all over the world. Our deck is heavily damaged because of it as well but we missed the lawsuit settlement. Anyway, unfortunately they "reformulated" the product and continue to sell it, but it hasn't been any better. I'm shocked that they can get away with still selling it.

Looks very good. You might want to address what color you used in the information area of the video. I've seen multiple people post asking what color you used, because I too like your color choice. Problem is though, I've seen you answer both natural cedar and light oak, at the very least. So maybe some clarification because what you did choose looks perfect for my tastes.

Looks great. 33k is a steal right now.

How is the Ready Seal after 2-3 years?

Thanks for mentioning that this can be reapplied without stripping it. I just picked up a 1 gallon to do my deck that's a lot smaller haha.

Your view and home is stunning. What a dream.

How’s the stain now that it’s been over 2 years? Did you apply just 1 coat? Thanks!

That turned out amazing Don. I’m sure you and the family will be enjoying that deck for years to come.

Hi Deck looks great. I was just getting ready to stain mine. I see the video is 2 years old. Can you give an update on how the stain is holding out? Thank You for the videos.

Looks amazing, Don! Congratulations!

I love this stain. I just put a coat on every year to maintain the color. So much easier than semi transparent stain. I hated that upkeep

Thatdeck looks great. The stain really brought the grain out. I used a similar product that Valspar puts out that I had similar results as you but I like the ready seal better. Looks great.

Whats the color of the stain?

Just bought a new pre-hung mahogany front door from ETO DOORS in LA. I intend applying Ready Seal Mahogany 130, per a DIY project, before the contractor installs

What color.ready seal did you use? Thanks

Looks great. Can you please tell us what color you used?

Being a General Contractor in Canada I'm trying to justify the 33k price on your deck. Were the lumber prices still outrageous when you bought the material? I assume roughly 80-85% of the price was material? Beautiful deck btw! Cheers from Canada !😁🇨🇦🔨

It really is a great deck. My dream is to have a wrap around style deck and roof.

I’m also researching Ready Seal on RU-vid😆 Love the color! You mentioned it’s pressure treated wood. To confirm, is it pressure treated pine!?

What color of the ready seal did you go with?

I guess I shouldn't complain about the price of my Fence which totaled over 1800 sq feet for less than 1/3 the cost of the deck. The fence is cap and trim too.

Your deck looks great!

What color shade is that one?

Love that deck!

Is there any need to do Thompson's water seal AFTER staining with Ready Seal ? It's a stain but it is a sufficient seal/protectant?

How long did you wait before applying the ready seal? How does it look after a year? My deck is three months old about to ready seal this weekend

I like your deck and house. I wish you all the best in your beautiful house. My question is that what kind of brush did you use it and which brand 🤔 ? Thanks in advance.

Thanks for the video. I’m about to build my deck out of pressure treated lumber and I wanted to see how this stain would look on it.

Beautiful deck what color did you use

We are having deck work done and the guy got pre-treated wood and he's going to use stain but I have a framer friend who's built houses and he says to make sure you use a good sealer and he said when you put a screw in it makes it vulnerable and that's where the wood can rot so is it sealer that I should get?

What a beautiful deck! So which color did you use? Natural cedar or natural light oak? The 65K question.

Beautiful Deck! Sorry if you've covered this in your other videos but if your deck cost $30k, how much did the envelope (with all those beautiful doors & windows) of your pole barn cost?

Dumb question: do you need to stain the underside of the deck? Or the sides of the lumber?

What colour you use on your deck ?

Would you recommend it after a year? Still look good?

What color was the stain you used?

What color did you use?????

what kind of brush did you use to apply it to the deck and rail?

What did you build that out of mahogany

What tools are you using to spread the stain?

How's the color holding up after all this time?

How much material did you use to complete that whole job and one coat or 2

Hows it holding up since applying?

My experience with Ready Seal wasn’t positive. Looks great the first season but after that my project looked worse than before applying RS…never again. There are many other products that in my opinion are much better.

Really curious how the stain has held up over 9 months.

What type of material did you use to fill the space between the handrails and posts. Where can you purchase it. Thanks.

I live in Toronto, Canada were Canada I buy Read Seal here?

How long did you let the new wood weather before you stained it?

Beautiful deck and nice job. But 33k?

What color is that?

Did you use light oak color?

Looks really nice how many coats did you apply?

How long you been working for ready seal?

Only one coat?

Only 1 coat? I thought normally 2 coats on new wood....

Video is two years old. Have you reapplied yet?

YIKES! Lumber prices today are clearly a rip off. Inflation? No! Price gouging? Yes! Back in 1996 we had a 1100 sq ft custom deck built. The wife and I even decided to pay extra to have the entire deck built using #1 Grade pine which is near blemish-free (no knots or cracks and usually reserved for railings and/or highly visible areas). Smart? Thats debatable considering it added another $1,200 to the price of the deck. However I paid the extra cost because I hated my old deck with its oozing knotholes, dead knots falling out, shakes, twists and wanes. Looking back I kick myself because the contractor actually offered me two choices - building entirely of #1 Grade pine for $1,200 more or building it using western red cedar for $3500 more. At the time we couldn't justify another two grand to make the jump from pine to red cedar because the total price of the deck using #1 pine out deck was $11,000. Granted that was 26 years ago so considering inflation and the equivalent in purchasing power of compared to todays dollar it would be about $20,000 for our 1100 sq ft deck. NET: 33K for 800 sq ft clearly confirms todays lumber prices are out of line.

First mistake. Wood must have no move than 13% moisture in it for oil based stain.

You got scammed... no way it should cost that much.. but it is a beautiful deck.

I'll build your next one for 32k

That's too much

hi handsome what a beautiful deck. I would like to pay in crypto to spend the night. what a beautiful view. Great job.

Deck staining professional here. If you get a year and a half out of that I'll give you $100 if you post a follow up video in 18 months. Ready Seal while being consumer friendly does not last. I would recommend Stain and Seal Experts stain. They have a higher pigment count in their oil based stains which protects for much longer.

It’s not expensive readyseals under 200 a 5 gallon in 2023 in most us markets some sikkens/prolux stains are 6-700+ for a 5 gallon

You did it wrong