Window and Siding Replacement in Phippsburg, ME

Phippsburg at a glance

Permit to re-side

Depends

Window, same opening

Depends

New or bigger opening: depends

Window must meet

U-0.30 or lower

2021 IECC (statewide)

Built before 1980

44%

Homes in Phippsburg, Census 2020–2024

People: 2,238
Homes: 1,763
Size: 28.8 square miles
From downtown: About 22 miles east
ZIP codes: 04562, 04565
Founded or incorporated: 1814

Phippsburg is a long peninsula reaching into the Gulf of Maine between the Kennebec River and the New Meadows River and Casco Bay, ending at the ocean beaches of Popham and Small Point. It is a string of separate villages, from Phippsburg Center, the old shipbuilding center, to the old summer resort at Popham Beach. The town applies its shoreland zoning to the 250-foot shoreland zone along its many shores.

The houses in Phippsburg

Before 194019%

1940–19599%

1960–197916%

1980–199928%

2000 or later28%

In Phippsburg, 44% of homes went up before 1980 and 19% before 1940; the median one dates from 1984. 86% are detached single-family houses, and owners live in 82% of the occupied ones. A sizable share of homes here date from before 1980, the era the federal lead rule covers (homes built before 1978). What the lead rule requires of a contractor.

53% of the homes in Phippsburg have three or more bedrooms. The median owned home is worth about $335,800 by its owner's estimate, the figure to weigh any siding or window quote against.

Half the homes in Phippsburg were built before 1984, which makes its housing about 7 years newer than across Sagadahoc County as a whole (median 1977). Set against Sagadahoc County as a whole, owners live in 82% of occupied homes here against 78% county-wide, the median owner-estimated value is $335,800 here and $333,300 across the county and detached houses are 86% of the homes, above the county's 75%.

Rooms in the median home: 5.4
Heated with gas / electricity: 2% / 2%
Townhouses and other attached homes: 1%
Homes in buildings of 2 to 4 units: 2%
Homes in buildings of 5 or more units: 0%
Mobile homes: 11%

Source: U.S. Census Bureau, American Community Survey 2020–2024 5-year estimates (tables B25034, B25035, B25024, B25003, B25077, B25041, B25018 and B25040), read through Census Reporter. These are survey estimates, not a count of every house.

Mostly single-family homes, with mid-1800s Greek Revival capes at Parker Head and Winnegance, summer cottages at Brightwater (1920s to 1940s) and Sebasco, and nearly as many seasonal homes as year-round ones.

What that vintage turns up

The largest group of homes in Phippsburg, 28% of them, was built in the 1980s and 1990s, so that is the house described here.

Double-glazed vinyl or clad wood windows with a nailing fin, many now thirty or forty years old. The common failure is the seal between the panes: once it lets go the glass fogs between the layers and the gas fill is gone. When the frames are still square and dry, new sealed glass in the old frame is the cheaper repair; when the frames are cracked or the sills are soft, it is time for the whole unit.

The capes, colonials and raised ranches of the subdivisions that spread across the commuter towns, sided in vinyl or cedar clapboard over plywood or particle-board sheathing, with felt paper or an early house wrap behind it. The siding itself usually holds up; what to look at is what water has done at the corners, around the windows and under any deck ledger fastened through the siding.

The one to watch on a house of this age

Windows of this era were often sealed to the wrap with caulk and little else. When the siding comes off, check the sheathing below each window's lower corners: that is where a failed caulk joint shows up first, as dark, soft wood.

And on the 28% built in 2000 or later

Houses built to recent Maine codes are tight, and Maine now holds new houses to a lower air-leakage limit than the national code. A tight house with too little ventilation fogs its windows all winter; before blaming the glass, check the humidity and the bath and kitchen fans.

Neighborhoods

We work across Popham Beach, Small Point, Sebasco Estates, Phippsburg Center, Parker Head, West Point, Winnegance, Cox's Head, Ashdale, Dromore, Meadowbrook and Stoneybrook.

Next door

Phippsburg shares a boundary with Harpswell, West Bath, Bath, Arrowsic, Georgetown, Kennebec River, New Meadows River, Casco Bay and Atlantic Ocean.

Worker on a lift painting new shingle and lap siding on a house gable

The rules in Phippsburg

Siding replacement Conditional

Yes if the job is worth more than $1,000. Phippsburg's Land Use Ordinance makes it unlawful to construct, add to or alter a building where the work exceeds $1,000 in value without a permit from the Code Enforcement Officer, and the town's codes page says any project over $1,000, inside or out, generally needs one.

Window replacement, same opening Conditional Enlarging or cutting an opening Conditional

Windows follow the same $1,000 rule, and almost any new opening clears it.

Maine sets this, not Phippsburg: U-0.30 or lower

Phippsburg, with 2,155 residents in the 2020 Census, is not required to enforce the state's code, but its own pages tie its permits to it.

That is the 2021 energy code’s window figure, with no solar heat gain limit.

ENERGY STAR’s own figure here is U-0.22 or lower with an SHGC of 0.17 or higher, stricter than any code edition in force. When the code applies to a replacement window, and when it does not.

What the permit costs

$75 for work valued $1,001 to $10,000, and $100 plus $4 per $1,000 above $10,000; the Code Enforcement Officer may assess a renovation at $150 per square foot if the stated value seems unreasonable, and work started before the permit costs four times the fee.

Local quirks

Permits must be posted on site.

Who to call

Building dept: 207-389-2653
Official: Jonathan Beane, Interim Code Enforcement Officer
Permits: Department page

What is behind the siding: every layer explained

Gothic-style house with carved bargeboard trim, a pointed window and diamond-pane sashes

Kitchen window with potted plants on the sill and a snowy yard outside

Yellow clapboard house with black shutters behind a white picket fence

Blue clapboard house with a front gable, a covered porch and a green lawn

How Phippsburg compares with its neighbors

Place	Permit to re-side	Permit for a window	Window must meet
Phippsburg	Depends	Depends	U-0.30
Harpswell	Yes	Yes	U-0.30
West Bath	Yes	Yes	U-0.30
Bath	Depends	Depends	U-0.30
Arrowsic	Not published	Not published	U-0.30
Georgetown	No	No	U-0.30
Richmond	Not published	Yes	U-0.30

All 10 Sagadahoc County places side by side →

Work we have done in Phippsburg

We have no finished work in Phippsburg to show you yet. This fills in as jobs land, and not before.

Common questions about Phippsburg

When were most of the homes in Phippsburg built?

28% went up in the 1980s and 1990s and 28% in 2000 or later; the median Phippsburg home dates from 1984, and 44% are older than 1980 (19% older than 1940). ACS 2020–2024.

Do I need a permit to re-side a house in Phippsburg?

For siding, it depends. Phippsburg's rules make it depend on the job whether you need a permit to re-side, to replace a window in the same opening or to cut or enlarge an opening. Yes if the job is worth more than $1,000. Next door in Harpswell, a re-side needs a permit.

What U-factor does a replacement window need in Phippsburg?

Maine sets it statewide, not Phippsburg: a U-factor of 0.30 or lower under the 2021 energy code Maine adopted, with no limit on solar heat gain. Phippsburg, with 2,155 residents in the 2020 Census, is not required to enforce the state's code, but its own pages tie its permits to it.

How much is a building permit in Phippsburg?

Where these facts came from

Sources: phippsburg.com · phippsburg.com · phippsburg.com · phippsburg.com · phippsburg.com · phippsburg.com · legislature.maine.gov · www2.census.gov · maine.gov

Window and siding replacement in Phippsburg

What we do in Phippsburg

Replacement windows

Siding replacement

Vinyl siding

Fiber cement

Hail & storm damage

Older homes