About Pro Student Painters

Pro Student Painters has been painting homes and businesses in Greater Vancouver since 1992. We are a local company built around a straightforward idea: give students real, paid experience in a trade, pair them with painters who already know it, and pass the saving on to the customer.

That model is why most people choose us. Every job is a chance for a student to learn the trade properly — the washing, the filling, the sanding, the patience to cut a straight line — from someone who has been doing it for years. Hiring us puts work and training into the hands of young people from this city, and it is how a good number of our own experienced painters got started.

It also costs less than a large painting company. We carry less overhead and we do not run a sales team, and our estimates reflect that. What does not change is the preparation, the products or the standard of the finish. Most of our work now comes from repeat customers and their neighbours, which is the only measure of that we really trust.

We also stand behind the work after we leave. Our workmanship carries a two-year written warranty: if something we did fails inside that time, we come back and put it right.

Who will be painting your home

It is a fair question to ask before you let anyone into your house, and the name invites it, so here is the straight answer: trained students are paired with experienced painters on every job.

No student works unsupervised. An experienced painter sets the job up, works alongside the crew, checks the preparation before any finish coat goes on, and signs the work off at the end. That is how the quality stays consistent whoever is holding the brush — and it is how most of our experienced painters learned the trade in the first place.

Everyone on site is covered by WorkSafeBC, whatever their experience. And if we bring in a specialist trade for part of a job, they work to the same standard and the same warranty applies.

The products we use

We use professional-grade coatings from the major manufacturers, including Benjamin Moore paints, chosen for the surface and the exposure rather than for what is cheapest on the shelf. Premium paint covers in fewer coats, holds its colour longer and stands up to being washed, which is most of the reason a finish still looks right years later. The same goes for the primers, fillers and caulking underneath it.

If you have a brand or a particular line you prefer, tell us at the estimate and we will quote on it.

How we work

Preparation is most of the job and most of the reason a paint finish lasts. Washing, scraping, filling, sanding, caulking and priming are not the glamorous part, but they are what separates a repaint that holds up from one that needs doing again in three years.

We also try to be easy to have around. The crew arrives when we said, protects your floors and furniture, cleans up at the end of each day rather than only at the end of the job, and walks the finished work with you before we invoice.

Colour help

If you are not sure what you want, we can help you narrow it down and work through sheens and colour schemes for the space. There is no extra charge for that conversation as part of an estimate. Our notes on choosing colours are a reasonable place to start.