What is the Best Interior Paint to Use in Your Home?
Finding the Right Interior Paint for Your Home
Adding a coat of paint to your walls is probably the quickest and most affordable way of increasing the value of your home. With the right interior paint, you can address multiple design flaws and transform any room into an attractive, cozy space.
Previously, interior painting was a tedious task. First, you needed to prime the walls, let the primer dry for at least a day, and then apply the first coat. Once the initial coat dries, the painter had to return to add another. Despite the enormous efforts, the results wouldn’t be satisfactory in most cases.
Modern interior paint solves this issue and makes your work a lot easier by mixing the paint and primer for one-time application. So, whether you need to paint walls, ceilings, cabinets, or furnishings, the current interior paints allow you to achieve fitting and long-lasting aesthetic results without much hassle.
Even so, the sheer number of interior paint options can make your selection of a suitable coat pretty challenging. With our vast experience in interior painting, we’ve searched the market and identified high-quality paint every homeowner should consider.
Choosing the wrong paint for your interiors can ruin every aspect of your home improvement project. That’s why it’s crucial to consult a seasoned interior painting service provider before embarking on this exercise of elevating your home appeal.
What to Consider When Purchasing Paint
To find the paint that best suits your project, weigh these elements and avoid the pitfalls many property owners often encounter:
1. Suitability for the Surface
Typically, interior paints fall into two categories: oil-based and water-based. The oil-based paints are wear and mildew resistant, making them suitable for trim, bathroom and kitchen cabinets, or other furnishings you contact more frequently.
Consider acrylic or latex water-based paints for walls and rarely used furnishings that give your interiors a solid finish. While water-based interior paints are more popular due to their ease of application, the oil-based coats last longer, even in the face of scratches and other common use-cases.
A new class of interior paint, water-based alkyd, offers the qualities of oil paints with reduced emission of harmful fumes compared to conventional alkyd paints. When selecting an interior paint, opt for the variety that will best hold up to the surface you want to give a face-lift.
2. Volatile Organic Compounds (VOCs) Content
A vast proportion of water and oil-based paints contain VOCs but in varying quantities. These chemicals usually evaporate from the fresh coat into the surroundings and might continue for several months. Since the VOCs are toxic and associated with headaches, liver, and kidney disease, choose low or zero VOC paints for your interiors.
Synthetic (alkyd) oil-based paints usually contain higher VOCs than their organic (linseed oil) counterparts, which corresponds to their strong odor. To avoid inhaling harmful fumes after painting your living room, go for paints with “Low VOC” or “Zero-VOC” labels.
3. Paint and Primer
The traditional technique of painting entails applying a primer followed by different coats of paints. You can reduce the workload without spoiling your paint finish by considering a self-priming interior paint that contains the paint and primer in a single can.
4. Dry Time
The time a paint takes to dry primarily depends on the base. Solvent or oil-based paints usually require more hours to dry compared to water-based paint.
Choosing paints with shorter dry and cure times helps to reduce exposure to the harmful fumes usually present in the elements. Water-based paints will dry to touch in an hour but require 30 days to cure as opposed to solvent-based paints that might take up to 16 hours to dry.
5. Paint Finish
Paint finishes vary from high-gloss to non-reflective, and paper-like texture. With every rise in the sheen spectrum, the cost rises. While you might pay as high as an extra $5 per gallon, gloss paints will make your surfaces, such as trims and molding, more vibrant and easier to clean than flat finish paints.
Semi-gloss paint finishes work well in high-traffic places, including kitchens and bathrooms, as they are relatively reflective. The paint finishes you select depends on the area you want to refresh and your preference.
Top Picks for Interior Paints
Benjamin Moore Regal Select Interior
Regal Select is the interior paint of choice for many professional painters with considerable experience in the field. This high-end water-based acrylic paint combines durability, cleanability, and coverage, which is a rare feature.
The Regal Select is available as a “paint and primer” combo, making it easy to apply. Even an average DIYer can use this paint on interior walls and furnishings without leaving any brush strokes due to its premium thickness. Typically, the paint dries within one hour and cures within 14 days with minimal release of harmful fumes as it’s zero-VOC.
The stain-release technology used in the formulation of Benjamin Moore Regal grants the paint its cleanability. You only need a cloth to wipe off the dust and have a vibrant wall again. Plus, the coat is also fade and mildew resistant.
Sherwin-Williams Cashmere
If you were to consider ease of application only, Sherwin-Williams Cashmere comes first. The buttery smooth paint levels out evenly with any brush. So, you don’t need to worry about blemishes such as brush strokes even after the paint cures.
Like Regal Select, the Sherwin- Williams Cashmere comes as a paint and primer solution that covers exceptionally well. Colors and marks underneath will be invisible after applying a single coat of this paint, making it popular among painters. The ultra-fine finish gives this paint a robust look from all angles.
The paint is usually available in five sheens, but you can get a custom hue too.
BEHR Premium Plus Ultra
The water-based acrylic BEHR Premium paint is the best fit for any homeowner looking for zero-VOC paint. Individuals with allergies, smell sensitivity, and other respiratory ailments can live comfortably in spaces painted with BEHR Premium Plus Ultra as it dries within an hour and emits negligible harmful fumes.
Besides the VOC advantage, many customers prefer the paints owing to their superb coverage on different surfaces, including cabinetry and walls. Like other modern interior paints, it contains built-in primers that allow you to apply it even on sanded walls. After four weeks of application, the paint should have cured.
Interior Painting in St. Pete, Florida
Whether you want to elevate the market value of your property or impart a cozier feel in the living room, painting is somewhat the cheapest way to transform your home. The low cost doesn’t nullify the need for expertise.
If you want to embark on painting your home, look out for experienced professional painters like the team from Tampa Bay Painting Company. As leading painters in St Pete, our painting experts will handle every project skillfully to meet the unique customer needs. We take great pride in ensuring you got nothing to worry about—from the selection of the most suitable interior paints to cost estimation.
For all your interior and exterior painting services in St Petersburg needs, contact Tampa Bay Painting Co. today at 727-800-5988.
