Seattle Spray Foam Pros is Paul Kohn and a small crew who do one thing: spray foam insulation in Seattle and the Puget Sound area. Fifteen years of it, in this climate, on these houses. No siding, no gutters, no roofing on the side.
We built the company around an uncomfortable fact about this trade. The product is rarely the problem. Almost every spray foam horror story you have read is a story about an install: foam mixed off ratio that still smells months later, open-cell sprayed where closed-cell was paid for, six inches laid on in one hot pass because the crew had another house to get to. The chemistry is unforgiving, and by the time anyone notices, the mistake is behind drywall.
The short version
Fifteen years of spray foam work in this marine climate. Top-quality material only, and the product on the quote is the product that goes in the house. And we stand behind the install, because a bad foam job cannot be patched, it has to be cut out.
Who you are actually hiring
Paul learned this trade the way most people do, on a rig. Fifteen years later the work itself has not changed much: attics, crawl spaces, rim joists, stud bays, and the unglamorous job of finding where the air is moving before you decide what to spray. What has changed is how much of it he has seen go wrong.
A meaningful share of our work is now pulling somebody else’s foam back out. Soft, sticky material that never cured. A crawl space where the rim joist got sprayed and the band above it was skipped, so the cold floor stayed cold. Closed-cell laid a half inch thick and sold as a vapor retarder, which at that depth it is not. After a few years of that you do not need a sales script.
Fifteen years in one climate
This matters more than it sounds. Seattle sits in climate zone 4C, marine. Our dew points stay well below indoor temperatures, so the moisture math in a Puget Sound crawl space behaves nothing like the same assembly in Georgia. Plenty of the advice homeowners find online was written for the humid Southeast and is quietly wrong here.
Why we stayed small
Paul is on the job, not in an office, and the person who looks at your crawl space is the one responsible for what gets sprayed in it. That caps how many jobs we take in a month, and it means nobody hands your house to whichever sub was free that week.
The three things this company is built on
1. Top-quality materials only
There is cheap foam and there is good foam, and the difference is invisible once it is on the wall. We do not shop the bottom of the market and we do not substitute. If the quote says closed-cell, closed-cell is what goes in, at the thickness on the quote. We put that in writing because the loudest complaint in this industry is people paying the closed-cell price and getting open-cell with a skin coat over the top.
2. Done right the first time
Spray foam is a chemical reaction that happens on your house. Substrate temperature, mix ratio, pressure, and pass thickness all have to sit inside a narrow band, or the foam that comes out is not the foam you bought. We check the surface temperature rather than the weather app, build depth in controlled lifts, and ventilate properly. That takes longer, which is the point. The detail is published: what a quality spray foam install looks like.
3. We stand behind it
We walk the finished work with you, confirm coverage and depth, and give you the real re-entry time rather than a number that makes the schedule look good. If something is not right, we come back. That promise is easier to keep when you have not overbooked yourself.
The fear we built the business around
Most people who call have spent two or three weeks reading already. They are not afraid of insulation, they are afraid of picking the wrong contractor. Three worries come up over and over.
- “What if it is mixed wrong and never stops smelling?” Off-ratio foam is real, and it cannot be aired out, it has to come out. That is a process failure, which is why we are tedious about temperature, ratio, and lift thickness. What removal involves, if you already have a bad batch.
- “How do I know I got what I paid for?” You can check some of it yourself, on any contractor including us. The checklist is public: how to tell if spray foam was installed correctly.
- “What if foam is the wrong answer for my house?” Then we say so. Sometimes a few hundred dollars of air sealing fixes the cold room and blown-in does the rest for a fraction of the price. We would rather lose that job than sell it.
How we work, start to finish
We look at the house
Into the crawl space or attic with a light. Where is the air moving, what is the existing insulation doing, is anything wet.
We specify in writing
Product, thickness, and area, with the reasoning, including where a cheaper approach is the better buy.
We install it properly
Correct substrate temperature, ratio, and depth, in controlled passes, with the space contained and ventilated.
We check it with you
Walk the work, confirm coverage and depth, give you the honest re-entry time, and answer the phone after.
What we will not do
- Sit at your kitchen table with a tablet and a price that expires tonight. No such price exists.
- Give you a firm number over the phone. Anyone who does that is guessing, and the guess is rarely in your favour.
- Promise a specific percentage off your energy bill. Too much depends on the house, the heating system, and how you live in it. You get ranges and the variables behind them.
- Spray foam over wet insulation, rodent contamination, or an active roof leak. Those get dealt with first or we do not start.
Where we work
We are a service-area business, so there is no showroom to visit. We come to the house. Seattle is the priority, and we cover the surrounding Puget Sound cities regularly.
| Area | What we usually end up working on |
|---|---|
| Seattle | Craftsman bungalows and ramblers, damp vented crawl spaces, bare rim joists |
| Bellevue | Split-levels and 1980s to 1990s builds, cold bonus rooms over the garage |
| Renton | Post-war and mid-century homes, attic access nobody designed to be used |
| Kent | 1990s subdivisions, thin attic insulation, leaky can lights |
| Everett | Older stock near the water, crawl space moisture and rodent damage |
| Federal Way | Ramblers and two-story builds, settled or wet batts to remove first |
Elsewhere in Washington, ask. If it is too far to do properly we will say so. Full list on the service areas page.
Questions people ask before they call
Does Paul actually come out, or do you send a salesperson?
Paul comes out. There is no sales team, and the person who inspects your crawl space or attic is the one responsible for what goes into it. That is also why we cannot always be there tomorrow. If your timing is tight, say so when you call and we will tell you whether we can hit it.
What if you look at my house and decide I do not need spray foam?
Then we tell you, and we tell you what would help instead. Sometimes that is air sealing and blown-in rather than foam. Sometimes it is a vapor barrier or a rodent problem that has to be handled before anyone insulates anything. We would rather give the smaller honest answer and be the person you call next time.
How do I check that you are legitimate before I let you under my house?
Ask for our current licensing and insurance details in writing and we will send them before any work starts. Ask every bidder for the same, then ask each one what product they are spraying, at what thickness, and what the re-entry time is. Anyone who gets vague on those three has told you something.
Why should I trust a smaller outfit over a big insulation company?
Size is not the point, continuity is. With a large crew you do not know which installer shows up or how much foam experience he has. Our trade-off is honest: we take fewer jobs, so we may not be free the week you call. In exchange, the same person handles it from inspection to walkthrough.
Where to go next
- All spray foam services
- Closed-Cell Spray Foam
- Crawl Space Insulation
- What it costs in Seattle
- Insulation guides
- Contact us
Paul Kohn, owner
Fifteen years spraying foam in the Puget Sound, most of it in crawl spaces and attics nobody else wanted to get into. Writes the guides on this site. Reach him at (253) 766-5145 or support@seattlesprayfoampros.com.