To ask how you go about painting the interior of your house?

[Pinesinthedunes]

I have no idea - how often do normal people do this? Do you get people in? DIY?

It depends whether you value time over money.
I used to do it all but now I pay a decorator. They can do in a day what would take me weeks.

We usually redo 1 room per year as then its never a big job.

You don't need to mist coat new plaster BTW. You can buy paint that is intended for the purpose and acts as a seal and base coat. I've just used it on my new plaster. It's quite thick and covers well.

why every 12 months??!

I thought I'd did mine fairly frequently at 3/4/5 years, but annually? That's just nuts

We have one stretch of wall in our kitchen (side return extension) which we end up doing about annually - its super narrow and where our sink, dishwasher, fridge, coffee machine, kettle, washing machine and bins live, as well as our downstairs loo, so its super high-traffic and gets grimy very fast despite my best efforts. Our front hall also needs similar retouching (scruffs from shoes and from the tyres of the buggy, we're in a terrace so anything that needs to enter or leave the house or garden comes through this narrow stretch). Both just need a single coat of the same colour paint and involve no furniture removal - it's an afternoon's work.

The rest of the house is definitely not getting done annually! The only room we paid to have done was our living room because it has a lot of fiddly features and we were going for quite a bold colour. Everything else we did ourselves. I will say, in our house you can definitely see the difference where a pro did the work!

We paid decorators to do our whole flat about six months after we bought it -walls, ceilings, wood work - basically every thing. So now it is easy to keep on top of. That was 7 years ago and I have redone the kitchen ceiling and the whole living room but everywhere else is just occasional touch ups. I may repeat the whole place with decorators again in a few yers.

If you go for white or a variant thereof, it’s going to need doing a lot more often. I am quite maximal in my taste so I like colour. My house doesn’t need painting that often. My mums is all white and she doesn’t smoke, obviously no young kids, although she does have a dog. But hers looks grubby within a few months. Realistically she probably would need it done annually to keep it looking fresh.You’d be surprised how much grime can come in from outside, pollution and suchlike, depending on where you live obviously.

Because they're all white and get grubby.

Because they're all white and get grubby.

Frog tape is massively better than other masking tapes to stop wonky cutting in.

They do a delicate one for freshly painted surfaces but I would still try and do the ceiling a few days before the rest of the room if possible, as we found some paint came off when it had only been drying for 8 or so hours before we masked it.

Have never painted a room in my whole life. Fuck that, would rather just live with shabby walls.

Mine are all white too but jeez what are you doing in your house that all those rooms are 'grubby' after just 12 months?

That’s funny I’d rather be busy painting for a day or two than live with shabby walls. It really gets to me to live in a home in need of some tlc. Different strokes!

We do the one-wall-at-a-time thing, moving just enough furniture at once. Paint these days dries in no time.

We've lived here 10 years and only painted each room once but none of it is white!

We do it ourselves, though we did get someone in to do the ridiculously high bathroom.

Been here 25 years and no room has been done more than twice - bedrooms only once and hall only once as it's such a big job (high ceilings, lots of doors).

I’ve always paid a firm to do it, the finish and cutting in is better - however this year I have considered doing it myself and I just want to touch it up and clean up the paintwork.

My big tip is to use a long reach or telescopic roller. Saves loads of time, and gives long strokes of even coverage as opposed to an ordinary roller when you tend to end up with more patchiness.

Dogs 😁

Me too 😂

I do it all myself including electrics and basic plumbing. I love DIY and painting and decorating. My dad taught me to do it all. Its a great money saver too.

I learned the correct way to paint through YouTube videos.

I paint our rooms but it takes ages, is very tiring etc etc. I do a good job though.

easier if the house has enough rooms though! When we lived in a tiny flat then we had it painted by a pro before we moved in and never did it again! We just couldn’t as there was no space to move anything to.

So it depends on circs

I've a silly question... Can I paint straight over wallpaper, and does the texture / finish of the wallpaper matter, eg if it has shinier parts in the pattern?

I presume I have to strip it, and sand whatever is behind the wallpaper before painting...

I never did it, it's my husband's job. Normally every 2-3 years.

We are obviously in the slob decorating group.
15 years in old house. Some rooms done twice, others only once.
I pay a decorator for hall/landing/stairs.
Rest we do ourselves.
New house:not been in a year yet. Bedrooms redone as not the right age for our kids. Rest will get done over the next year or so.