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Tips to Help You with House Painting in Concord


Tips to Help You with House Painting in Concord

Exterior house painting in Concord is one of the biggest and most overwhelming home remodeling projects, especially for a DIY homeowner. It can also be the most expensive and time-consuming.

To make it a little easier and less burdensome — and still be able to produce a good end result — consider the following tips:

1. When undertaking such a big home project like an exterior house painting, it’s always better to plan ahead. Choose the time of the year where it is least likely to rain and expect to have low humidity. As you may have known, the paint won’t dry quickly when the day is damp.

2. We know that, as a DIY house painter, you are on a budget and you want to buy the cheapest paints available. However, you may want to keep in mind that quality is more important than the price. You may purchase a cheap paint, but its inferior quality may mean it is most likely to fade real soon or worse, cause some surface problems. Usually, the only fix is to cover it with a new paint again, which spells additional expense.

A better-quality paint provides a better coverage and lasts much longer on the surface, which means you don’t have to go up the ladder and paint again… and again. You will save more money in the long run.

3. Treat one side of the house as a big project for one day, and another side for another day, and so on. Do not force yourself to finish all sides on one day. Let’s face it, you likely won’t be able to accomplish it (unless you have enlisted a bit of help). If your house is especially big, painting one side of it is considered as a big project itself indeed.

4. Paint the hard, less exciting parts first (such as underneath the eaves) and paint the more visible and fun parts last (like the railings or the detailed woodwork). If you paint the fun parts first, you’ll think that your job is finished and later on you won’t feel motivated to paint the harder, more boring parts of the house.

5. Don’t ever skip prepping! Sure, you’re more thrilled to hold the paint brush and start coating the siding right away, but if the surface is dirty, with peeling old paint, cracks, holes or mildew, do you think that the paint will adhere to a surface with such conditions?

Prepping is essential to an exterior painting job — there are no shortcuts to it. Clean and wash the surface then allow it to dry. Washing the siding with a power washer may be a faster way, but washing it by hand allows for a more thorough cleaning. It’s up to you to choose which of the cleaning and washing methods is better.

Scrape off any peeling paint and sand the surface to retain its smoothness. Fill any gaps with a caulk, allow it to dry, and sand the surface. If there’s mildew growing on the siding, get rid of it by applying a bleach-and-water solution and scrubbing it with a stiff-bristled brush. To prevent mildew from thriving again, apply a mildewcide.

6. Use a primer too so that the top coat will stick better to the surface, and make the surface more durable. To save time and effort, you may want to purchase paints with primer in them.

7. While exterior paints with a glossy finish are easier to clean and are more resistant to moisture (such as rain showers), flat exterior paints are easier and quicker to apply because it has a lesser tendency to leave overlapping marks. So if you’re all for a quick painting job, choose a flat exterior paint.

8. Brushing (or rolling) is better than spraying in most cases. Many DIY homeowners make the wrong assumption that paint spraying is the “no-sweat” option compared to brushing and painting.

But in reality, if you plan to choose this method you will need a lot of prep work such as taping every square inch of the surface you don’t want to paint. Plus, you may need to cover the whole front yard — even a few more feet beyond your house — before spraying. Much of the paint you’ll spray won’t go directly to the intended surface — it will just fly and dissipate in the air, so it’s pretty much a waste of paint. You won’t encounter such problems with brushing or rolling.

9. It is better to start painting from top to bottom, rather than the other way around. If you begin painting in the upper part, you will be able to address the paint that has dripped down to the bottom section of your house (by covering it, for instance).

These tips will help in reducing unnecessary extra work and in saving time and effort as well. Contact Custom Painting, Inc. for more smart tips in exterior house painting in Concord and nearby areas or if you would prefer their team does the painting for you.

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