We tackle our top 10 exterior painting tips! Now that we are close to painting season across the US we have secrets that will save you money, keep that house looking great longer after you do the work and our insider secrets that the pro's use to make it look amazing without the extra work. If you are painting outside this summer this is a show for you. Plus if you are going to hire a painter this will help you know what to ask for in the bid and make sure you get all the value out of the work being done.

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[00:00:07] Intro: house. Guess, what

[00:00:09] Intro: now, you have a bee?.

[00:00:21] Caroline Blazovsky: Yeah, no, this is not starting again. This

[00:00:27] Eric Goranson: Oh, this is awesome. And this is making the radio show. I love this. This is awesome. We are now dealing with. You're building probably. And I know you not out of this building, but seems to be that you guys seems to be,

[00:00:41] Eric Goranson: be

[00:00:48] Eric Goranson: and renovating your home.

[00:00:54] Eric Goranson: is around the house. Welcome to around the house. Eric G N Carolina and B. [00:01:00] This is your home improvement source every single week. Thanks for joining us today. Hello Caroline. You were in a ticket outside today.

[00:01:08] Intro: am.

[00:01:14] Eric Goranson: I'm feeling like I'm getting ready for spring, which means painting projects. Spring salmon for outside right spring is

[00:01:25] Eric Goranson: Oh, well, like we were having frost last week, which is not exterior painting. Whether if you know what I mean, we've had weeks of rain.

[00:01:34] Caroline Blazovsky: our area, I think they said the last frost date is like the 17th of May. So I mean, if you're a gardener to painting and gardening kind of go together, that's a

[00:01:53] Eric Goranson: Diving into that exterior painting project. And the first tip that I want to give this not on [00:02:00] the 10, but it's just an overall theme of this is it's all about that prep. Oh, big eight does not cover problems.

[00:02:15] Intro: it out.

[00:02:21] Eric Goranson: What else? You can't just paint it. You got to prep it all first. So take the time. Do the prep that way the paint doesn't fall off the house or, or last year or two. And it looks like somebody just came in and painted it and did a blow and go. And two years later you got to paint the house again. That's a horrible idea.

[00:02:41] Caroline Blazovsky: painter who was amazing and rest God, rest his soul. He passed on, but this man. I had a foundation that was cement Erik. So like every year I'd be scraping the paint and then repainting the cement and there was moisture there and temperature change and all of the things that makes your pain bubble [00:03:00] up.

[00:03:17] Eric Goranson: right. It's one of our numbers farther up the list.

[00:03:45] Eric Goranson: If you've got raw wood, metal, whatever, or dry or whatever you're trying to do by the bright primer for the job. But paint plus primer [00:04:00] is a wonderful marketing tool saying you don't have to buy a primer, but guess what? You still gotta buy.

[00:04:16] Caroline Blazovsky: But if I'm going to drastically change color, or I've got spackling or major things to do, there's no getting

[00:04:40] Eric Goranson: And, you know, you might just need to get the right paint to go with that as well. So make sure you get those things matching together. Now, the next one is one of the things that goes fairly quickly, but it's probably one of the most important things on the prep side of things. And that's all the caulking [00:05:00] around the doors, windows, sighting, wherever that you need to call, use a good quality caulking.

[00:05:07] Caroline Blazovsky: brand you like or type you like,

[00:05:24] Eric Goranson: And it stretches and expands and contracts better than all the other caulkings. So I like, like their big flux caulking for painting projects go around, use it. It really makes a huge difference that you've got something that, you know, really stands out now, beat careful going across some types of siding.

[00:06:10] Eric Goranson: That's a key right there. So do your research on the kind of citing you have to make sure that you're doing yourself a favor and not causing damage done. Yeah, I have to

[00:06:28] Caroline Blazovsky: So I tried to avoid it. I liked the breathability a little bit more.

[00:06:46] Eric Goranson: That caulking because with caulking, because a little bit of a gap in there leaves you space to get the caulking in there. And there's enough material that's now allowed to stretch. So if you have just like a little bit of a [00:07:00] 64th of an inch, just like less than a credit card and you call that if that expands out to a quarter inch, you know, you're going four times, you know, as much out there to.

[00:07:30] Caroline Blazovsky: I'm going to give my two favorite brands.

[00:07:51] Caroline Blazovsky: Right. Cause you can't paint over it. You're going to have a little issue, but they make, uh, they make different ones. But I like both of them are really odor free. So if you have anybody in the [00:08:00] house or, you know, you're susceptible to that kind of thing, you can use these and both products.

[00:08:15] Eric Goranson: If you know what I mean. Yeah. If

[00:08:16] Caroline Blazovsky: outside, definitely. But if you're inside either, either one of these will work great as well. So indoor, outdoor, exterior, or interior,

[00:08:34] Eric Goranson: That'll make a huge difference. It's not like you're doing an inside where you're caulking moldings and stuff where it's not as big a deal outside. It's gotta be able to put up in. With that. So it'll actually move and deal with all the weather that you have. Maybe it's 120 in the summer, and you only are into the fifties in the, in the, in the winter time, or maybe you're in the minus 25 in the winter.

[00:09:14] Caroline Blazovsky: Y before we go on to this, are you a yay or nay on pressure washing your exterior self? Prior to painting.

[00:09:41] Eric Goranson: All right, we come back. We've got so many more painting tips. We'll do that just as soon as around the house returns.

[00:09:59] Eric Goranson: [00:10:00] welcome back to the round, the house show. Caroline and I have been talking exterior painting today and Caroline, this next one is so in your wheelhouse. Always take a look for lead and asbestos. If you have an older house, because both of those can be a problem. The

[00:10:25] Eric Goranson: you know, and I'll be honest.

[00:10:31] Caroline Blazovsky: because you're not disturbing it as long as you keep it painted and it's not breaking apart. Getting into the airflow. You're good. But it's when it starts to degrade, then you've got an issue.

[00:10:57] Eric Goranson: I say. And, uh, it's [00:11:00] not hurting you out there if it's, if it's fully encapsulated with paint and you're not going to find a siting, that's more durable than that. I mean, geesh, you burn the house down and you've got a pile of siding around the outside of the house. It's still there. You're not going to hurt it.

[00:11:38] Eric Goranson: It's the good paint that you bought in the fifties, sixties and seventies, not so much seventies, sixties, we'll say that had the paint, the led in it because the led was the durability option for paying back.

[00:12:06] Caroline Blazovsky: Legitimate. And you see them up there on a ladder scraping away at these homes that are older, that definitively have lead paint. And this becomes a hazard because not only are the workers breathing it in, you start breathing it in. And if you've ever been chipping paint or you. Um, sanding these areas.

[00:12:38] Caroline Blazovsky: You know, if you're going to do this, then you wear a respirator. You do things to make sure that you are safe. You know, you're not exposing yourself to anything on necessarily.

[00:12:55] Eric Goranson: Lady came in, bought the house, needed a paint job on it. [00:13:00] Had a painting company come in. They did not follow the EPA rule. For lead paint. So they scraped it, got all the peeling paint off and the neighbor at about day three of the project called the EPA and they showed up. Not only did the painter get a hundred thousand dollar fine, some of the paint chips hit the ground.

[00:13:53] Eric Goranson: Fine. It was brutal by just not following basic stuff. [00:14:00]

[00:14:17] Eric Goranson: you need to take, so I was talking to handyman, Bob, who, uh, you know, used to be my co-host on this show years ago.

[00:14:48] Eric Goranson: Like if you've got a neighborhood that was maybe lower income back in the day when they're using lead paint and they weren't pushing led paint at the paint store and you didn't see a lot of it, but if you had a higher [00:15:00] income neighborhood, you had guys that were in there that were like, you need to buy this extra special, extra durable paint.

[00:15:25] Eric Goranson: Now you'll look at it and say, okay, it's got 30 years of paint jobs over the top of it. So you're seeing a lot less of it now than you did, maybe even 10 years ago. So

[00:15:37] Eric Goranson: paint, just like it was a luxury to have a specialist flooring.

[00:15:43] Eric Goranson: Interesting. So that's one of the keys. So that's, that's a good on and do a whole show on asbestos and lead, but that's one of those things that you just need to be careful with now, here's the next one.

[00:16:16] Intro: I always

[00:16:20] Caroline Blazovsky: So I usually use like, just the basic, like say Ben Moore makes a primer, right. I'm using that for my wood, but I'm not going over anything really crazy. I'm not going over an oil base. I'm not going over. I'm not using on cement. So when would you need a specialized

[00:16:44] Eric Goranson: That's going to. I like that personally for that, because it's soaks in, it uses paint thinner. You just get a killer bond with that. It's harder to clean up, but for me, I like it because it ends up being a tougher [00:17:00] exterior surface. Now there are, you know, latex, primers it'll do great, but to me, they still haven't got that same durability on the primer side.

[00:17:30] Eric Goranson: It's that thick. And so a dude's really well.

[00:17:48] Caroline Blazovsky: This worked fantastic. Went over everything.

[00:18:13] Eric Goranson: It just was Cedar siding and the, in the moisture got behind it and was pushing it off the wood. So this stuff I went on and you primed the areas for. Where the peeling was and it, this stuff actually built up. So it really filled it in. Now when we come back. Nice. Let's talk a little bit more about this, cause it's an important one.

[00:18:47] Intro: Hey guys, you're listening

[00:18:54] Intro: building it up.

[00:18:59] Eric Goranson: [00:19:00] back to the round, the house show. Now, if you want to get ahold of us, make sure you head over to social media and just look for around the house show. You can find us on Facebook, Instagram. Uh, LinkedIn, Twitter we're around everywhere. You can find us anywhere you look in. If you're a Facebook person, make sure you join our close group, which is around the house nation.

[00:19:29] Intro: Right Carolina. Nice. Is that like that safe?

[00:19:44] Intro: never got

[00:19:46] Eric Goranson: I didn't either, but that's a whole other story, but I think they're getting better now. I think they're getting better now. Well, Hey, we're talking exterior painting today and we talked, you know, Carolyn, you started out the show talking about your, uh, your former painter [00:20:00] rest in peace and the peeling paint that you had at your house.

[00:20:09] Caroline Blazovsky: It does, but it also tells you, cause my painter poppin fetus, that was his name. He was awesome popping fuse, but, um,

[00:20:23] Intro: but he was a great painter, but

[00:20:37] Caroline Blazovsky: So

[00:21:01] Eric Goranson: So I've seen it a P concrete's pretty good. If you it's all in the prep again and having the right primer to do it, we only

[00:21:25] Intro: it works.

[00:21:51] Eric Goranson: And it's releasing what was on there before. And now it's, you know, on the ground, that's a big problem right there that you should start taking a look at and [00:22:00] see where that moisture is coming.

[00:22:09] Caroline Blazovsky: That's getting down between your, your exterior, you know, your building envelope. So it's getting down in your plywood from a roof, leak, a window leak, all that good stuff. When you see water damage, it's not always in the area that the damage is, right. It ends up can come down from the window and end up, you know, down in your paint.

[00:22:50] Eric Goranson: So that's another way to go with that as well. And then you can have other things too. You can have other contaminants that were on there. Maybe somebody didn't do the prep work. Right. But [00:23:00] nonetheless, you really want to get down into a good base coat down there or use some of the, uh, proper coatings that have in primers.

[00:23:16] Caroline Blazovsky: below, um, or sand, I mean, is that a recommendation? I mean, for sanding windows, exterior siding, I mean, obviously not vital, not cement board, but is that ever an option?

[00:23:51] Eric Goranson: But, uh, there are a lot of the painters tricks out there. They will go through with that, with that literally a. Super thick paint [00:24:00] and they'll spray it over that area and it just kind of just fades it in. So you really can't see where those areas, where that paint literally fell off the side of the

[00:24:22] Intro: amount.

[00:24:45] Eric Goranson: I want to see you back rolling it. And the same thing is. On the inside of the house. If you spray your back, roll behind it, so that way you get it to layout correctly, and then it gives you the better adhesion with the surface below it, because you're now pushing [00:25:00] that in an evening out those areas where you've spread.

[00:25:21] Eric Goranson: They're going to blow it on the side of the house, walk away and. You can, it can cut your lifespan on that paint job down by half or more if you're not careful.

[00:25:31] Caroline Blazovsky: what is the, where do you go for exterior paint job? How often do you recommend painting?

[00:25:46] Eric Goranson: I've seen great paint jobs in harsher climates last six.

[00:25:55] Caroline Blazovsky: guess what I have in my office right now.

[00:25:59] Caroline Blazovsky: [00:26:00] yellow jacket?

[00:26:08] Caroline Blazovsky: no, this is not starting again. This is like, may.

[00:26:17] Eric Goranson: This is awesome. We are now dealing with your building probably. And I know you don't own this building. Seems to be that you guys seems to be seems to, for

[00:26:52] Eric Goranson: Caroline. Um, I'm

[00:27:00] Eric Goranson: I don't know. Wow. You're going to our healthy home experts going to the chemicals. Oh my God. That's when she's had enough. Unbelievable. Unbelievable that we're already there. See that now we know we're talking painting season, cause it's also pest season right now.

[00:27:19] Caroline Blazovsky: another thing when you are painting, that is a big concern to watch out for those bushes and under shingles. That's how you get mutilated with yellow jackets.

[00:27:36] Eric Goranson: And if I have, you know, a Hornets yellow jacket wash nest up in there, I am not getting. Bailing off that ladder with Watson Hornets because they're running slow when it's 50 degrees outside. And I would much rather deal with it there than be up there on the ladder when it's 80 and they're much faster than I am.

[00:28:07] Eric Goranson: I'm like, oh, it's in here somewhere. Oh,

[00:28:51] Intro: hi everybody.

[00:28:57] Intro: to around the house with Eric [00:29:00] G and the beautiful Caroline.

[00:29:21] Intro: I don't

[00:29:24] Eric Goranson: giant one. No, that was good. That was good. Well, we got to go through a lighting round cause we have four more in our top 10 to knock out here. Now, Caroline, here's one of my ones that there's a lot of misconceptions out there that I want to deal with, but you know, there's that flow trial that you put in pain to help.

[00:30:02] Caroline Blazovsky: that supposed to do really quick?

[00:30:04] Eric Goranson: used it, so it's been a while since I used it like earliest sprayers, you could thin out the paint to make it easier to spray because they weren't really great at spring older, you know, the newer latex thicker paints, you know how the oil-based paints are a little thinner than, you know, the latex were a little thicker.

[00:30:50] Eric Goranson: Because how you paint is going to be completely different at 60 degrees versus 90. And when you start getting above the mid eighties, it's a really bad idea to be painting paint outside. I [00:31:00] think that's when you get. Painting to you gets too hot. So it dries too quickly. It doesn't get a chance to really soak in it.

[00:31:14] Caroline Blazovsky: I'm learning something cause I never knew. And. The hotter, the better for pain, which is not true. You're saying there's an optimal temperature.

[00:31:23] Eric Goranson: What are those optimal temperatures follow it. And the big one is, is if you're painting in the afternoon and you've got that optimal temperature, but you're going to be in the forties overnight, that paint might not cure. And if you get a Dew in the morning, you can have streaks on darker colors. We're that do has run down the side and the paint didn't cure.

[00:31:46] Caroline Blazovsky: It's so hard. So painting exterior it's weather conditions are, are really hard because you've got to have a couple of dry days like, and really optimal

[00:31:58] Eric Goranson: And that's where we talking about. And [00:32:00] this is kind of two that we've meshed into one discussion, but making sure you have those operational temperature. You're falling off that paint to make sure that you've got it dialed in. And of course, always watch for rain because if you have, uh, if you're up there painting around the gutters and eaves and you got rain coming in two hours, probably want to hold off.

[00:32:40] Eric Goranson: Right. And the

[00:32:45] Eric Goranson: Yep. Yellow and blue. So people go, man, I'm going to take that light dusty blue sighting. And I'm going to pay. Dark gray. So maybe they even say, you know, I'm going to go down and buy like a [00:33:00] Sherwin-Williams I'm going to buy their vinyl siding, paint and paint it dark gray.

[00:33:22] Eric Goranson: Let's see, and to be honest, it's not the paints fault. It's the vinyl sightings fault because they, when they make a light color vinyl siding, they know that that is going to reflect the heat so they don't have to make it. So they want it to be flexible in the winter time. So they build it for that color, in that temperature.

[00:33:44] Intro: to that.

[00:34:03] Eric Goranson: Cause that can be its own issue. So when you take that and thus make it a dark citing and you change colors, now it's getting so much hotter and you're beyond. The flexibility range of that, the

[00:34:25] Eric Goranson: that. And the other thing with vinyl siding is, is, you know, you have those big trims on the outside.

[00:34:36] Caroline Blazovsky: a

[00:34:51] Eric Goranson: Now those overlaps are exposing the old color behind it. So if you paint on a warm day and then you [00:35:00] get into the cold weather, so everything everything's expanded. So you're painting it here. And then when the others labs, you can see it, how they overlap and stuff. So you gotta be careful on that because now you can see shadow lines and gaps.

[00:35:25] Caroline Blazovsky: And now you're going to push all this moisture up under the siding. And then what happens if I wrapped up in plastic? Would you be able to breathe? No. So if moisture gets up under that plastic siding, it loves to form. So if I wrapped up and would, could you breathe? Yes. If I wrapped up in plastic, can you breathe?

[00:35:47] Eric Goranson: either. There's a, there's not a lot of wins there. You're better off to, to change to a sighting, you know, and to be honest, there's a lot of, a lot of great sightings out there. When I was at hardware huddle, I was talking to the guys over there at, [00:36:00] uh, Hardy plank.

[00:36:16] Caroline Blazovsky: though? If you're using a Hardy, you can do a district

[00:36:24] Eric Goranson: So you're going to get decades out of that over a paint, just because it's built into the product, right. You're better off going that way. And then if you get tired of it later on and go, man, I need an update. You can fix that. Yeah. So here's our last one of our top 10 series here. This one's important.

[00:36:47] Caroline Blazovsky: Bad paint. So how do you know if you have

[00:37:05] Eric Goranson: 50 gallon, a day, $50 a gallon premium paint. My buddy just had this happen. He went and bought the $35 a gallon paint. And when I got to put another coat. It didn't cover. So what he did by having that, he now is paying because it does half as much coverage. You're paying $70 a gallon because you have to use twice as much.

[00:38:01] Eric Goranson: And if it doesn't cover you're in trouble, because now you're paying 15, 20 bucks more a gallon for that stuff. When you figure that you have to buy two gallons to do the work of one,

[00:38:22] Caroline Blazovsky: I like a lot of their low VOC

[00:38:37] Eric Goranson: I tell you what, it's a, it's a great paint. Cause it's been paint. It's formulated for our area, which, you know, we've got some, some harsh exterior conditions here. I think that's

[00:38:53] Eric Goranson: Absolutely Carolina. I hear that music in the background. You know what that means? We've got to go. I'm Eric G and I'm Caroline [00:39:00] bean. You've been listening to around the