Dread Decorating the Outside of Your House? Hire Someone to Do it for You

By Heather Curtis

WASHINGTON – With Thanksgiving over, the Christmas season is now officially underway, and that means it’s time for people to decorate their houses.

If you dread untangling strings of Christmas lights and climbing on ladders to put them on your house, there are people who will happily do that for you for if you’re willing to shell out an average of 1000 dollars.

Companies work with you to come up with a design and then put up all the lights and decorations, which they supply. Then in January, they come and take it all down.

“I thought it was crazy in the past, when we bought into this franchise. Who is gonna hire us to hang up lights? Then we’re like, ‘whoa!’ said Chris Kungis with Stewart Lawn and Landscaping and Christmas Decor in Annapolis.

This year, they’re so busy, he and his staff are working today, even though they planned to have off, to make sure they finish in time.

Many companies start in October, since people often want their decorations up by Thanksgiving.

Ron Layman with the King of Christmas loves returning to people’s houses year after year to decorate.

“When you turn those lights on for the first time, everything just changes,” Layman said adding people look so much happier when they see their houses aglow.

Last week he decorated a 65-foot outdoor tree in Silver Spring.

“People are driving around, hollering Merry Christmas,” Layman said.

It takes an average of a few hours to decorate a house. The King of Christmas works on more than 200 houses a year and spends the off-season planning displays and making decorations.

In the past, Stewart Lawn and Landscaping and Christmas Decor was hired to light up the governor’s mansion Annapolis, but Kungis said budget cuts have stopped that tradition in the last two years.