Painting - First Time Home Owners - Help!

We are buying our first home, it has great potential, but it needs work. We want to do so much, but have so little experience and money... There are a few issues that we need to tackle right away, but want to do it right the first time.

1) This wartime house had an addition built onto it 16 years ago. The construction is very good, but the walls and the ceiling need paint in a bad way. It is a large room, approx. 800sq feet, so alot of work... The ceiling is stucco and has a few cracks from shifting around the skylights (no leaking there), we need to fix that before we can paint. How do we do this and if the ceiling has never been painted, what do we need in order to do the job right and as easy as possible?

2) The bathroom paint is peeling all over. We are getting a larger capacity fan for the room as the previous fan was not large enough and was not working properly. The problem that I see, is that the paint is coming off in strips and it looks like drywall under it - no other paint. If I peel off the paint strips, I'm left with uneven walls. Do I need to remove all the paint and start over? No sign of mildew yet, but I haven't gotten past the outter visual.

I plan to use this forum alot... I'm a hands on chick not afraid of getting my hands dirty, and both of us want to do as much as we can on our own.

Sorry for the long post. Just exasperated... :o

Joneq loves a hands on chick, Always have :cheshire:

It would probably be a good investment,if you don't have 1 already, to get a cheap digital camera.Get a free acct. here (http://photobucket.com/). and post pics. They help a lot.

You will probably get advice on the cracks and peeling paint,but you would get better advice if they had something to look at. I would prefer to see a pic so I could know what I am talking about.

Here is something to consider.

"The most long lasting repairs are made when you bridge the crack with a material that can absorb the periodic movement that most cracks experience. This is achieved by using either a standard drywall paper tape or a fiberglass mesh tape. The crack is coated with a compound that adheres to the plaster and coats the tape at the same time.

In all but the worst cases, cracks repaired with tape remain smooth for a long period of time".


As for the paint you could scrape all the loose stuff off prime with an oil based primer and skim coat[search this forum]. Sand it smooth and prime then paint with an bathroom appropriate paint[zinsser.com]If it has never been primed it may be better to replace it or go over it.

This is just to give you something to think about. More advice to follow I am sure.

My advice to post the pics stemmed from your intent to do a lot of work. Pics included in the title always generates more interest. For me anyway

Welcome to the forums point4m

Since stucco is a masonary product it isn't likely that you have stucco on the ceiling [but anythings possible] More than likely it is some type of koint compound or plaster. As joneq said sometimes pics are helpful - especially when one is unsure of the proper term. Depending on the crack it could be repaired simply by applying caulk or a little mud, or might require removal of the texture with taping and mudding to follow.

If the bath paint is peeling down to bare sheetrock you may be able to skim coat without priming first BUT if the surface is chaulky or glossy you should prime first. If you aren't sure prime to be safe. Skim coating is basically taking joint compound [thinned slightly,mixed well] and applying a thin layer of mud to the wall. When dry a light sanding will remove any imperfections [if not apply more mud] BTW you only need to remove what paint is loose.

LOL ;) and thanks for your posts. I'll be sure to get pictures of the areas so that you can give me a clearer idea of what we need to do. I've been informed by the current owner of the place that the texture was sprayed on. Not sure if that gives any other insite to the issues or ideas on how to fix them more precisely.

How exaclty do I post pictures anyway. Don't see an attach photo option... :confused:

Click on the link I gave you=photobucket.com. Create as free account.

Then take the pictures and store them on your computer.

Open up your new photobucket account and browse to where you stored them on your computer and upload them.

Then when the pictures appear click on the url and copy and paste it[or many] in your reply---I think :cheshire:

Sprayed on texture that resembles stucco is probably a knock down finish. Basically it is thinned down joint compound sprayed with a hopper gun to a splatter finish and then a wide blade is drug across the surface knocking down the splatter.