Opinions on how long this will take to do please

[HollyBen]

We have had some work done to change our living/dining, separate kitchen into kitchen/dining, separate living room. Both rooms now need decorating. We have had a quote to have this done which was around £1k!!! I am looking for some other quotes, but DH thinks we should do it ourselves. I don't mind painting walls, can cope with ceilings but hate woodwork and there is a lot that needs doing. I am trying to tell DH that this is going to take us a long time to do but he isn't convinced. So....

Kitchen/diner is 20 square meters. Half of this has units so just the fiddly bits above to do (including round 2 windows) There is a large picture window in one wall, a large window in the other, a set of sliding doors and a further door. All the walls and ceiling have been replastered and mist coated. Decorator suggested 2 undercoats and 1 colour. All 3 doors and newly installed skirting will be white eggshell and radiator needs rubbing down and painting. We were going to paper one wall, but probably not if we do it.

Living room is approx 18 sqm. One wall has been replastered and misted. There is a large set of French doors, a rather ornate (to be replaced later) set of double doors to another room, the part glazed sliding doors to the kitchen, another ornate part glazed door to the hall and large radiator.

We have a DD who is 3. We can send her off for best part of a weekend and rest would need to be done in the evenings or by one is us taking her out whilst the other gets on with it. I think we can get the walls and ceiling done over the weekend, but woodwork and radiators fill me with dread. As I generally avoid I have no real idea how long it may take. Any thoughts/experience?

Woodwork isn't as awful as you've probably built it up to be. I even quite like it, and I've been doing quite a lot lately. I've got into using oil based eggshell, which I think is tougher than acrylic and, although it needs white spirit for the clean-up, I find it easier to get a nice finish. Prep is hard work, but you can do that in the evenings leading up to the weekend you plan to paint.

It's not clear how much of your woodwork is new and unfinished. That will need a primer/undercoat. I prefer to use an all-in-one, and they tend to be fairly quick drying. Anything with old paint should be scraped (if it's flakey), sanded to smooth and key, wiped down with white spirit to remove sanding dust, and any patches of bare wood primed. Then a couple of coats of good quality paint should do it.

I would do this job over two weekends: one for woodwork, one for walls and ceilings, with an evening or two prep for each one. But it wouldn't be work-work-work: a lot of each weekend will be drying time, when you can go away and get on with something else. For the woodwork, my timetable would be: scrape/sand/mask weekday evenings; prime/undercoat Friday evening, after daughter in bed; first top coat Saturday morning; second top coat Sunday morning. If you're both working on it, pick a room each, and swap the next day to even out the work. Try to minimise the time you spend working on the same room to preserve marital harmony.

We are in the middle of decorating and all I would say is that it will take as long as you think. Are you both quite DIY savvy? I don't think £1k is bad personally if that includes all the woodwork / ceilings / walls. Those are big rooms. The difficulty is (in my view) particularly if you are painting ceilings is removing furniture out of the room / covering everything up / protecting carpets and / or flooring. Good luck!

Your quote sounds quite reasonable to me - we paid about £800 for our living room to be decorated (painted) and £1k for our hall stairs and landing (including 7 doors). We're pretty inexperienced decorators and the one room we did do ourselves probably took us about 10-12 hours in total - it was the box room!

Why 2 undercoats and one coat colour? I thought 1 undercoat and 2 colour.

Usually because its cheaper to do 2 coats of undercoat than 2 coats of colour, especially if you're using expensive paint (but you obviously have to apply colour liberally and well). No expert though!

Thanks for the replies. We are far from diy experts. I have done a fair bit of painting but usually avoid woodwork.We painted the toy room last year. DH did one colour and I did another. The wall he did looked awful. He blamed the paint. I gave it a second coat and it looked fine. I did another wall in the same colour which looked fine with one coat.

I offered last night to sell some shares I have through work to fund the decorator. That way it is done quickly with minimal mess and a nice finish. He said he would do it all and it'll take a week hhhmmmm

Yes 2 coats of flat and one top coat works well. I sometimes do 2 of both as very hard wearing then. Second oil based egg shell. Very tough. Water based is too soft IME.