Top 5 house painting pitfalls to avoid

Are you in the mood for change? Giving the rooms in your house a fresh lick of paint is one way to breathe new life into your home, adding vitality and providing a new way to envisage the space.

Whether you want to add a splash of red, a drop of blue or coat the walls in a neutral shade, there are a few pitfalls many people fall into when attempting some DIY painting.

Failing to clean the walls

Dust and dirt can build up on the walls, making it important to avoid skimping on the pre-paint clean. While this build up might not be as significant as it is on the outside of your walls, that does not give you any reason to skip this vital step.

Any hair, dust or dirt that you miss could end up being caught in the paint if the walls are not cleaned, leaving unsightly ripple marks. 

Make sure you thoroughly scrub down each and every wall, but leave plenty of time for them to dry out before getting that paintbrush or roller out.

Being impatient

Much of the success of your job will depend on your levels of patience. It can take some time before your walls have been adequately prepped and made ready for paint.

Before slapping on the primer, make sure you fix all the imperfections in your wall. You can use a specially formatted patching compound to perform this duty and once you are convinced it is entirely dry, you should sand it down.

Failing to complete all these jobs, however time consuming they are, could result in a job you are not proud of.

Skipping the primer

Unless you coat the walls in a good layer of primer, the paint might not stick. The other downside of skipping this step is that the paint may not end up being the same shade you were promised. 

Mixing your paint types

If you are repainting the walls of an older home, it is important to ensure you are not going to be painting over an oil-based coating with a latex-based paint, as this could peel.

You can use a special primer to prevent this from occurring, but in order to do so you must find out what kind of paint currently adorns your walls.

Not protecting floors, doors and furniture

When you are painting your home you will learn just how far small droplets of paint can spread. Cover your floors with a protective material, remove all furniture and the doors if you can.

If you cannot remove doors, try to cover them as best as possible, particularly the doorknob as paint from your hands could give this a polka-dot makeover.