How Do You Prepare Your Home for Exterior Painting?

Painting the outside of your house can give it the fresh, modern facelift that it needs. However, you can’t just jump right in to the project. First, you have to prepare the surface of your home, or else you could end up with cracking, dripping, and a generally unpleasant-looking paint job. Read on to learn what you should do before putting a paintbrush to the exterior of your house to achieve the best-looking, longest-lasting results.

Pet Patrol for the Backyard

If you have a dog that will be affected by your exterior painting project, be sure to consider them! Your painting team will be moving around your house with supplies in tow that you won’t want your pup to get ahold of. They’ll also be preparing the surface, which could cause falling debris. The last thing you would want them to do is accidentally eat something that they’re not supposed to or knock a can of paint over onto your lawn. Keep their presence in mind, and prepare to take them out on a leash, or be sure to build them a safe, temporary enclosure outside until the project is done.

Ground & Landscape Covering

You don’t want dust, debris, and paint littering your landscaping and the shrubbery that surrounds your home. Placing a lightweight canvas tarp over your flower beds and potted plants will keep them from accidentally becoming damaged over the course of the project.

Sanding & Scraping Away Flaking Surfaces

By far, the most laborious part of preparing for exterior painting will be sanding and scraping the outside of the home to get rid of any flaking or cracking existing paint that will ruin the appearance of your new coat. This is an incredibly important part of the process that could either make the results look amazing, or completely ruin all of the effort and time that you’ve invested into it. You can use a hand sander to do this or a power sander, but it’s important to keep in mind that the power sander will create a lot of dust, and if you don’t know how to properly use it, it could leave a divot on your home.

Mapping the Weather

The last thing you would want to happen in the middle of your project is for a massive thunder storm to hit or an overnight freeze to happen. This could ruin the surface repairs you made on your home in preparation to paint and completely alter the texture of your paint, causing it to crack, drip, and not properly adhere to your home. Find out how long the project will take and check the forecast to make sure that you won’t run into any wild weather that could ruin everything.

There are so many preparation factors to consider before starting your exterior painting project, which is why it’s a great idea to have the help and input of a professional who knows what they’re doing. That way, you won’t accidentally end up with a droopy, terrible-looking mess on your hands!

About Platinum Painting of Keller

At Platinum Painting of Keller, we value taking our time to do each job properly and achieve long-lasting, amazing results. That’s why we offer a satisfaction guarantee for each one of our projects. Our team of residential painting experts knows exactly what we’re doing, and we make sure to keep each homeowner in-the-loop throughout the entire exterior painting process. For questions or to schedule a free in-home estimate, visit our website or call 817-422-0985.