After years of harsh wear-and-tear on the exterior of your Kansas City home, you may be considering an update with a fresh coat of paint. Painting the exterior of your home involves more steps than a typical interior job in order to get a high-quality result that will last for years.
1. Pressure-Wash Your Walls
A clean slate for your home’s exterior paint job is absolutely essential to a high-quality final product. Pressure wash your home with a detergent that’s specifically for exterior siding. Make sure you select a nozzle that will carefully distribute the detergent while spraying so that it is not overly concentrated.
2. Repair Dings and Scrapes
Damaged and rotted areas in the siding of your home must be attended to first, and in some instances, they require the help of a carpenter or another professional builder. Fill in gaps between the trim and your house, including doorways and windows. Use a caulk gun and caulk that’s explicitly intended for exterior use, which will ensure longevity during harsh weather conditions.
3. Remove Loose Paint
Any loose or chipped paint will become quite obvious once painted over. So, you have to prepare the exterior properly. Remove chipped or loose paint before an exterior paint job, and sand over any harsh edges to ensure a smooth coating.
4. Prime Stains
Over the years, your home likely incurred some stains, perhaps some splotches from trim paint or splashes from a fence-staining project a few years back. Even wood knots can be treated like stains to make sure that your final paint job doesn’t show any shadows or blemishes. To prepare your home for paint, use a paintbrush to prime these spots with stain-blocking primer.
5. Protect Everything
Remember that anything you don’t want to be painted must be covered securely with plastic sheeting and painter’s tape. That includes doors, knobs, windows, shutters, lights, and any other fixtures on your home. You’ll also want to protect exterior outlet boxes, utility heads, and hose racks.
6. Prime Surfaces
To ensure the longevity of your paint job, you need to include a layer of high-quality primer in your preparations. Take extra care to prime wood surfaces and areas where you have completed repairs on your home.
For best results, we also recommend staying aware of the weather before, during, and after your exterior paint project. You don’t want extreme conditions to put a damper on your day.
If the idea of going through all these steps by yourself to refresh the exterior of your Kansas City home seems too daunting, Schloegel Design Remodel is just a call away! Call us today at (816) 448-8157 or reach out online to discuss your upcoming home makeover with our professional paint services team.
Need more painting tips? Be sure to check out our Complete Homeowner’s Guide to Painting Your Home in Kansas City.