A One-Year-Old Home Already Covered in Spider Webs
You wouldn't expect a new-construction home to need professional exterior cleaning already — but heavy webs, egg sacs and insects had taken over the covered porch. Here's how Baha Softwash cleaned it safely, without aggressive pressure.
Project Overview
A One-Year-Old Home Already Covered in Webs
The first thing that made this project interesting was the age of the house. This wasn't an older St. Cloud property that had gone years without a wash — it was a new-construction home only about a year old, yet spiders and insects had already become a noticeable problem around the exterior.
The home sits near a pond in Twin Lakes. Properties around water and newly developed areas can see significant insect activity, which in turn gives spiders plenty of opportunity to establish webs around protected exterior spaces. The covered front porch had become the biggest problem: webs and egg sacs were visible across the white stucco surfaces and, more importantly, across the porch ceiling itself. Because that ceiling contained recessed lights and other fixtures, the job required far more control than simply reaching for a pressure washer.
The goal wasn't just a clean house. The homeowner wanted their one-year-old home looking new again — without a new problem created in the process.
The Challenge: Cleaning a Delicate Porch Ceiling
Spider webs can be surprisingly difficult to remove. Once established, they adhere tightly to textured exterior surfaces. Removing stubborn webs through water pressure alone can mean far more force than we want around painted stucco, soffits, ceilings, windows, lights and electrical fixtures — which made the front porch especially important. Before beginning, we inspected the exterior and flagged the areas that needed extra protection:
- Electrical outlets
- Exterior lighting
- Recessed porch lights
- Doorbell
- Door locks and keyways
- Windows
- Entry doors
- Landscaping and vegetation
The goal wasn't simply to make the house clean — it was to clean it without creating another problem in the process.
Why We Used Soft Washing Instead of High Pressure
For this home, our approach was to let the cleaning solution do the difficult work instead of relying on excessive water pressure. We used a low-pressure soft washing process designed to loosen and break down the organic buildup across the exterior.
This was particularly useful for the spider webs. Rather than trying to mechanically blast sticky webs away from the porch ceiling, the treatment was given time to dwell and loosen the material — so we could then rinse the affected surfaces at much lower pressure. The same process also helps address organic buildup like algae, mold and mildew developing alongside the visible webs. For a painted stucco home with delicate fixtures and a covered porch ceiling, that gives us considerably more control.
How We Protected the Home Before Washing
Preparation is one of the most important parts of a house wash. Before applying our cleaning solution, we walked the property and protected sensitive areas — electrical outlets, lights, the doorbell, door keyways and other vulnerable components were masked or protected as necessary.
We then saturated the surrounding vegetation with water. Windows were pre-wet before application, providing an additional water buffer before the soft-washing solution reached the exterior surfaces. Only after the house and surrounding property were properly prepared did we begin applying the treatment.
Our House Washing Process
We worked systematically around the property rather than attempting to clean everything at once.
Inspected and prepared the exterior, identifying electrical fixtures and delicate areas needing protection
Pre-wet the landscaping, windows and other surrounding surfaces
Applied the soft-washing solution at low pressure, focusing on concentrated webs and egg sacs
Allowed appropriate dwell time so the solution could loosen the organic material
Carefully rinsed the stucco, ceiling and surrounding areas at low pressure until webs and eggs were removed
Re-inspected the property and made sure the protected areas were left clean
That dwell-and-rinse approach became especially important underneath the front porch, where blasting the ceiling was never an option.
The Front Porch Transformation
The difference was immediately visible. Before cleaning, numerous dark spots, spider eggs, webs and debris could be seen across the otherwise white porch ceiling — and because the surface was white, even small amounts of buildup stood out. After treatment and rinsing, the ceiling returned to a much cleaner, more uniform appearance — all without aggressive pressure around the recessed lighting or textured ceiling.
This before-and-after shows something a wide exterior photo wouldn't: exactly what we were removing, and how clean the delicate surface became.
Why We Recommended Cleaning This Home Twice a Year
After completing the wash, we talked with the homeowner about why a relatively new house had developed this problem so quickly. The home's environment matters. With the property located near a pond, completely preventing insects and spiders from returning isn't realistic — exterior cleaning removes the existing buildup, but it doesn't change the environment surrounding the house.
Rather than letting the webs and eggs become heavily established again, we recommended a biannual exterior cleaning schedule for this particular property — maintaining the house before the exterior reaches the condition we encountered during this first cleaning. The homeowner agreed and set up recurring service with Baha Softwash.
"In and out, amazing job. Set up reoccurring. Gunner gets it done."
Beyond getting the house clean, that's the outcome we're after: identify what's causing the recurring exterior problem, clean it properly, and create a realistic maintenance plan so the homeowner doesn't have to start from scratch every time.
What This Twin Lakes House Wash Demonstrates
This project is a good example of why house washing isn't always about using more pressure. Some of the most difficult areas to clean are also the areas where you want to be the most careful. A textured porch ceiling surrounded by recessed lighting, electrical fixtures and painted surfaces requires a different approach than cleaning concrete.
Using the right treatment, letting it dwell, protecting the surrounding property and then rinsing at controlled pressure let us remove the heavy spider activity while treating the home appropriately. And because this was a one-year-old house, it demonstrates something we frequently explain to St. Cloud homeowners: a newer home doesn't necessarily mean a clean exterior. The environment surrounding the property can matter just as much as the age of the house.
Need Your Home Washed in St. Cloud?
If your stucco, siding, soffits, entryways or covered porches are collecting spider webs, algae, mold or mildew, you don't necessarily need aggressive pressure to get it clean. Learn more about our house washing — or contact Baha Softwash and we'll take a look.