Wheeling Siding for Old Houses and Historic Streets

Pre-war housing is common

Wheeling is the Ohio County seat and, with 27,062 residents at the 2020 census, the largest city in West Virginia’s northern panhandle. It lies along the Ohio River in the Appalachian foothills (city overview). Its housing is older than anywhere else in the Weirton area: the median year built is 1949, and about 41% of the 14,569 housing units date from before 1940. Weirton’s figure is about 12%.

So a typical Wheeling call involves a house that was built with wood siding, trim and cornices, and that may since have been covered in aluminum or vinyl, or never covered at all. Old painted wood also brings in the federal lead rules. The EPA’s Renovation, Repair and Painting rule requires lead-safe work practices from firms paid to disturb paint in homes built before 1978.

Historic districts and the Certificate of Appropriateness

This is where Wheeling differs most from Weirton and Steubenville. West Virginia law (W. Va. Code §8-26A-7) lets a city’s historic landmarks commission require a Certificate of Appropriateness before exterior architectural features of a property in a historic district are altered. The law defines those features as the parts of the exterior open to view from a public street, way or place. Wheeling’s Historic Landmarks Commission uses that power.

• The city’s Certificate of Appropriateness application asks for a letter describing the project, photos or elevations of the facades visible from a public way, a rendering of the change, and the materials, colors and construction methods to be used.
• Applications are due at least two weeks before the commission’s monthly meeting, held on the first Thursday of the month.
• The North Wheeling design guidelines say the commission is unlikely to approve simulated materials on the front or public facade of a building in that district, and they name aluminum and vinyl siding specifically. Centre Market Square has its own guidelines.

If your house is in one of these districts, plan the siding work around the meeting calendar and talk it through with the contractor before you choose a material. Building permit and Certificate of Appropriateness forms are on the city’s Building and Planning forms page.

Calls from Wheeling

Typical calls include wood siding that no longer holds paint, aluminum siding with dents and chalking, vinyl loosened by wind, and houses where water is getting behind the cladding at windows or rooflines. Call (304) 317-8115. You may be asked to enter your 5-digit ZIP code (26003) so the call reaches a contractor who covers Wheeling. Scope, scheduling and terms are set between you and the contractor.

Up the river, see siding services in Weirton, WV and siding services in Steubenville, OH. Nearby Ohio County and Marshall County ZIPs are listed on siding service areas near Weirton.