A couple years ago, you made a wise decision and added a brick pavers patio to your backyard. You’ve since spent hours and hours enjoying your brick pavers patio – barbeques in the afternoon, dinner parties at night or just relaxing in an ideal setting.

You remember considering a wood or concrete patio but your neighbor here in Algonquin talked you into brick pavers instead. You remember him telling you about all the work required with his wooden deck and how concrete patios tend to crack. You remember him saying, “Tearing out that wood deck and replacing it with brick pavers was the best decision I could have made.”

What you’ve discovered is that, by comparison, your brick pavers patio is low maintenance with a high level of durability. You’ll enjoy that brick pavers patio for years to come. Even if you decide to sell your home and move out of Algonquin, that brick pavers patio will add to the value of your home and serve as a great selling point.

Still, to keep your brick pavers patio in tip-top shape, it does need some maintenance. You can do some of this yourself but you’re really better off calling in a professional. With a professional maintaining your brick pavers patio, it will last even longer and look even better.

What can a professional do for the brick pavers patio in your Algonquin backyard? Here are a few of the considerations:

• Just as concrete patios crack, bricks in a brick pavers patio can also crack. The earth moves under your feet and that can bust a brick on rare occasion. While that’s a major problem with a concrete patio, with brick pavers, you only need to replace the offending brick. Pulling one broken brick paver out and replacing it is a job for someone with experience.
• You’ll want to keep your brick pavers patio clean. This starts with pulling out any weeds that sneak between the bricks and sweeping off any debris. If the brick pavers were installed correctly in the first place, you shouldn’t see too much of this. You’ll want to wash the brick pavers, particularly if there are any stains. Once again, a professional will have a better idea how to deal with the most offensive dirt and stains.
• The best way to deal with stains is in advance. An ounce of brick pavers stain prevention starts with sealing the brick pavers. It’s a spray on application and will fight off stains, protect the brick pavers from the harmful rays of the sun, as well as from ice and snow in the freeze-thaw cycle. It will also help to keep weeds from popping up between bricks.
• The best maintenance for a brick pavers patio is proper installation. If you’ve already added a brick pavers patio to your Algonquin home, hopefully, it was done right. If not, a professional can help put things in order. For instance, if the edging isn’t done right, the bricks can start to slowly pull apart making room for weeds to push them further in the summer. In the winter, the snow and ice will move in and force the brick pavers further apart.

The lesson learned with this last point is to make sure you have a qualified landscape professional design and install your brick pavers patio in the first place. You’ll still want to do some basic maintenance but it will be a smaller job and easier done.