Deck skirting installation

The open space under a deck is housing, and something will move into it. Deck skirting closes that space off, hides the framing and the mechanicals, and keeps the area under your deck from becoming a den. Our deck repair carpenters build and install skirting on existing decks, with a barrier that actually goes into the ground rather than stopping politely at the grass.

This is an add-on scale job, which is why it lives in the Repairs division alongside the other small exterior work. Repairs runs W2 carpenters, not subcontractors. If you are planning a deck that does not exist yet, skirting gets designed into it from the start on the deck services side. If the deck is already there and the space underneath is a problem, this page is for you.

What deck skirting actually does

Skirting is the panel that runs from the underside of the deck down to the ground. It does three separate jobs, and homeowners usually only think about the first one. It makes the deck look finished. It keeps animals out. It also controls how much wind-driven rain and snow gets thrown up into the framing, which is the part that quietly decides how long your deck lasts.

Done badly, skirting does the opposite of the third job. A tight, unvented enclosure traps humid air against joists and beams and holds it there through a Michigan summer. Rot follows. We would rather install nothing than install something that shortens the life of the deck it is attached to, and we will say that at the estimate if the design you want will do that.

The animals that move in underneath

In Washtenaw and Livingston counties, the usual tenants are groundhogs, skunks and raccoons, with the occasional opossum and, in the older neighborhoods, feral cats. A deck gives them a roof, a dry floor and two or three feet of headroom, which is a better burrow than anything they would dig in open ground. Once a groundhog finds it, the same spot gets reused year after year, by that animal and then by the next one.

You usually learn about it by smell or by sound. A skunk under a deck announces itself. Raccoons make noise at dusk. Groundhogs are quieter, and the first sign is a fan of fresh dirt beside the deck where a hole has appeared overnight.

What they do to the grade and footings

A groundhog burrow is not a hole, it is a system, and it runs deeper and farther than the entrance suggests. The animal moves a serious volume of soil, and it prefers to tunnel alongside something solid, which means alongside your footings. The dirt piled at the entrance came from somewhere, and that somewhere is the soil that was bearing on or bracing your posts.

The second problem is water. Excavated soil and a changed grade under the deck send roof runoff toward the house instead of away from it. Every burrow entrance is also a place for water to enter and sit, which is why we look at downspout and drainage runs whenever we are quoting skirting, and why this work belongs in the same family as preventing water damage around a foundation.

The dig barrier that has to go below grade

Here is the thing most skirting gets wrong. A panel that stops at the dirt stops nothing. A groundhog does not need a gap, it needs soil, and it will go under a beautiful cedar skirt in an afternoon and never touch the wood. Skirting that only handles the visual problem is a fence a determined animal walks under.

What works is a barrier that continues below the surface. We trench along the skirt line, run galvanized hardware cloth down and then turn it outward in an L away from the deck, and backfill over it. The outward leg matters more than the depth. An animal digging at the base hits wire, follows it down, hits more wire going away from the deck, and gives up. Digging straight down deeper is something they will do. Digging out and around is something they mostly will not.

Trenching is also why the calendar matters. Once the ground is frozen you cannot dig that trench properly, and a skirt installed without it is decoration. That is the same seasonal limit we run into on other outdoor repair work.

Lattice, solid panels and board and batten

Lattice is the traditional choice and the most forgiving. It breathes on its own, it builds easily into removable frames, and vinyl lattice will not rot. The knock against it is that thin lattice looks thin, and a raccoon can work a cheap panel loose. We build lattice into solid frames rather than stapling sheets to the posts, which is most of the difference between a skirt that lasts and one that sags.

Solid skirting in composite or treated boards looks heavier and reads as part of the house, particularly on a deck that sits high off a sloped lot. Board and batten is the version people ask for by name, because the vertical rhythm matches a lot of the newer exteriors around here. Any solid approach has to be vented deliberately, which is the next section.

Matching the house usually settles the choice. If the siding is a particular profile or color, we can often carry it down onto the skirt, and our siding work gives us access to the same materials. Where the deck is part of a larger exterior plan, the skirting detail gets decided alongside everything else on the exterior remodeling side.

Airflow, and why sealing it tight rots the framing

Wood under a deck needs to dry. Ground moisture rises constantly, especially in the high water table areas across Washtenaw and Wayne counties, and the only thing carrying it away is moving air. Close the perimeter completely and you have built a humid box with your joists inside it. The framing will hold more moisture for more of the year, and it will fail sooner than it would have with the space wide open.

So every solid skirt we build gets ventilation designed in. That can be a continuous gap at the top under the rim, screened vents spaced along the run, or a lattice band set into an otherwise solid panel. All of it gets screened, because an unscreened vent is a door. Laying ground cover or stone under the deck helps too, by cutting how much moisture leaves the soil in the first place.

Keeping wood dry is the same argument we make about finish on the walking surface. A maintained coating through deck staining and upkeep and a dry underside together do more for the life of a deck than anything else you can pay for.

Access panels and the day somebody needs to get under

Sooner or later someone has to get under that deck. A hose bib drips. A dryer vent needs replacing. A cable line gets run. A post base needs looking at, or a chipmunk dies where you can smell it. If the skirting is a permanent wall, that visit turns into demolition, and whoever is doing it will not be gentle with your panels.

We build at least one real access panel into every skirt, sized for a person and a bucket of tools, and we put it where you can reach it rather than where it looks tidiest. It gets a proper frame, hidden hardware and the same dig barrier detail behind it as the rest of the run.

Why storage under a deck usually goes wrong

People close in the space and immediately start putting things in it. We understand the appeal, and we will tell you why it disappoints. The ground under a deck is damp, the space is unconditioned, and anything with metal, fabric or paper in it comes out worse than it went in. Snow blowers rust. Cushions mildew. Bags of fertilizer become a food source, which undoes the whole point of the skirting.

If the deck sits high enough and you want that space to work, it needs a real floor, drainage, a ceiling above it and a door, which is an addition rather than a skirt. That is a design-build conversation and it goes to the same team that handles new deck construction. For most decks, the honest advice is to keep the space empty and easy to inspect.

What has to happen before we install anything

Wright’s does not do animal removal. We are carpenters, not a wildlife service, and we will not seal an animal in under your deck. If something is living under there, it has to be gone before we start, which means a licensed wildlife removal company and, usually, a wait while young are old enough to leave with the adult.

That order of operations is not negotiable, and it is worth knowing before you plan the work. Sealing a den shut traps an animal that will either die under your deck or tear its way out through the new skirting. We are glad to schedule the install for the week after the removal company confirms the space is empty, and we will check it ourselves before the first panel goes on.

While we are under there we also flag anything else worth knowing, such as soft framing that belongs in a board replacement scope or a post connection like the one described on our page about a railing post that moves.

• Repairs works Monday through Friday and promises the next business day, never same-day service.
• We confirm the space under the deck is empty before a single panel goes on.
• We trench the skirt line and turn the barrier outward, away from the deck.
• Every solid panel gets screened ventilation designed into it.
• The work carries a written one-year workmanship warranty.

Skirting a deck before the ground freezes

Late September is the right time to be reading this. Exterior work in Southeast Michigan has an end date and it lands sometime in November. Below a certain temperature, construction adhesives stop curing the way the label promises, fasteners driven into cold wet lumber split it, and concrete stops being reliable. The trench for a dig barrier needs workable soil, and frozen ground is not workable.

So we will sometimes tell you to wait until spring. If you call in late November wanting skirting installed, the honest answer may be that we can do it in April and it will be a better job. We would rather turn that work down than take your money for something that will not hold through a freeze and thaw winter, and a skirt with a barrier backfilled into frozen clods is exactly that.

There is also a wildlife reason to move now. Animals are looking for winter quarters in October, so a space closed in this month never gets claimed. The same calendar governs our winterizing service and the spring maintenance round that picks up whatever waited.

Where skirting stops and design-build begins

Skirting is a repair scope. Panels, framing, venting and a barrier on a deck that is staying exactly as it is. Once the answer involves enclosing the space as a room, changing the deck footprint or building a roof over any of it, the job moves to design-build with drawings and permits. That is where a screened porch enclosure, a rebuilt front porch or a broader outdoor living plan gets handled.

Homeowners often pair skirting with lighting so the finished perimeter reads at night, and low voltage exterior lighting is a natural companion. You can see how we scope combined jobs like that in our process.

What we hand to a licensed trade

Our carpenters do carpentry. Any new circuit, any wiring run out to the deck and anything touching the panel goes to a licensed electrician. Anything gas fired and any new plumbing requiring a permit goes to a licensed plumber. Structural work gets reviewed before a price is given. Where the house predates nineteen seventy-eight and painted surfaces are being disturbed, federal rules require a certified firm to follow specific work practices, and we do not claim that certification.

Window wells around the same perimeter are a related nuisance, since animals fall into them and water collects. If that is part of your problem, our egress window work covers the well and its cover. Folding several of these items into a yearly home check gets a carpenter around the whole property in one trip.

Skirting work across Southeast Michigan

We work out of Platt Road in Ypsilanti, and the wooded lots west of town keep this crew busy. In Dexter and Chelsea, decks back onto tree lines and field edges, which puts a groundhog within easy walking distance of every one of them.

Around Whitmore Lake and Brighton, lake and wetland lots mean softer soil and easier digging for anything that wants under a deck, and taller decks on sloped ground mean a lot of skirt to build. Older properties in Saline often have decks added onto houses that never had a skirt at all.

We serve Washtenaw County along with Wayne, Oakland, Macomb, Livingston and Monroe, and the rest of the deck repair list travels with the same crew.

Close in the space under your deck

If there is a fresh pile of dirt beside your deck, the repair only gets bigger over the winter. Call Wright’s Renovations at (734) 540-0347 and we will get a carpenter out on the next business day to look at the grade, the footings and what it takes to close the perimeter properly. View our Portfolio to see finished exterior work nearby, then contact us now for a free quote while the ground is still diggable.