Which Should I do First - Paint the Walls or Redo the Floors
I’m moving to a new apartment soon. The walls need a fresh coat of paint and the floors need to be sanded and refinished. Which process should I do first?
I’m moving to a new apartment soon. The walls need a fresh coat of paint and the floors need to be sanded and refinished. Which process should I do first?
I vote for walls first. I have renovated six apartments, and I always paint then refinish floors. You will regret it otherwise.
The pros always recommend to me to do it the other way around.
But in my experience this is the way to go.
Another vote for floors first. I ran a painting co. for years and we occasionally did floors. Regardless of the vacuums on the sanders fine dust covers more than anyone expects. Do all of the wall/ceiling prep fully first. This means spackling, plastering, outlet and fixture issues. Do not prime or final coat. Then finish the floors entirely trying not to get too much poly on the wood baseboards. Then cover the floors well and then paint. Your only issue then will be meeting of the wall or baseboards at the floor. This is not difficult to paint and if you hit the poly coats you can easily wipe it clean for a nice line. Now you are clean on walls, ceilings and floors and you’ve avoided (or painted over) a lot of dust. Good luck!
4:48- No, I am not drunk. Sanding floors produces a fine dust that lands on any possible surface.
Another vote for floors first, especially if you’re using a flat finish on the walls. (My woodfinishing books recommend doing repairs first, wood refinishing second, painting last.) And if you do happen to spill some paint on the floors, those are easy to clean as long as they’re finished correctly.
Agree with 2:09 – floors first. If you paint first, the dust from floor sanding will get on the walls. Wash down walls and Put down brown paper as described. It’s easier to get small paint drips off floors than getting sanding dust off newly painted walls.
2:09pm,
You don’t know what you’re talking about and you’re flat out wrong.
99.9% of sanding dust is vacuumed up by professional floor guys. A bit of dust on the floor moldings is a worst case scenario unless you hire total nut heads.
I’ve supervised dozens of renovations and never had to “wash the walls.”
Are you drunk or something?
Floors first–the dust from the sanding is so fine that you will have to wash the walls before painting…..Just roll out brown constriction paper and plastic tarps to protect the finished floors while you paint
paint the walls first
If there’s any scuffs on the floor moldings after the floors are done, you can easily retouch them.
doing it the other way around means putting your newly refinished floors at risk — don’t do it! You can’t easily “retouch” wood floors the way you can with paint on walls and moldings.