Home Interior Painting; 5 Benefits of Wallpaper Removal
Wallpaper is a bit of a sticky subject, no pun intended. This decorative feature, once found in most homes (during the early- to mid-20th century), has since lost much of its popular appeal. Despite a relatively recent resurgence in wallpaper use, it’s unlikely that wallpaper will ever dominate home interiors again. Regardless of your feelings toward wallpaper, though, there is a pretty big difference between the coverings of old and modern wall covering options, both in terms of material and design.
If your home is plastered with decades-old wallpaper, it might be time to change things up. You could try painting over the wallpaper or covering it with new wallpaper, but this isn’t the recommended option. Ideally, you should remove your old wallpaper before anything else -- sometimes this is easier said than done. Still, investing in proper wallpaper removal is often worth it for a number of reasons. Let’s discuss five benefits of tearing down your wallpaper.
Benefits of Wallpaper Removal
1. Modernize Your Home Interior
There are many ways to modernize your home, some more intensive than others. You could replace your windows, simplify your decor, open up your spaces, install new light fixtures, and so on. Removing your wallpaper is by far one of the most significant ways to modernize your interior spaces, and it’s not nearly as demanding as, say, renovating your entire kitchen or bathroom. Getting rid of that old wallpaper opens up a world of possibility for your interior aesthetic -- you could paint the now bare walls a single color, create designs via skillful painting, establish a faux finish via various painting techniques, or install new, more modern-looking wallpaper. Whatever you decide to do, your once antiquated interior space will have the opportunity to transform into something fresh and exciting once that wallpaper is out of the picture.
2. Make Room for Fresh Paint
Right now you might be wondering why wallpaper removal is even necessary -- after all, can’t you just paint over the covering with a sufficient number of coats? As mentioned earlier, yes, painting over wallpaper is an option you could pursue. However, most home interior painting professionals advise against it for both aesthetic and practical reasons. For one thing, darker and more elaborate wallpaper can be difficult to conceal with paint, especially if the paint is a lighter shade than the covering. Textured wallpaper can be particularly difficult to paint over and end up with smooth results. That said, most types of wallpaper can be covered up with paint with proper surface preparation, namely priming and spackling. Still, removing the wallpaper, while more time-consuming than painting over it, gives you more leeway when it comes to visually transforming your interior and more peace of mind regarding maintenance and touch-ups.
3. Prevent the Prospect of Peeling
As wallpaper gets older and undergoes more stress, it will inevitably begin to lose some of its adherence, gradually peeling away from the surface. While painting over your old wallpaper can help slow down this process by essentially gluing the material back in place, this is only a temporary fix. Eventually, the underlying wallpaper might push back and loosen up the paint resting on top of it. If this happens, you’ll have two problems on your hands at once -- peeling paint and peeling wallpaper. It goes without saying that resolving both of these issues at once is much more difficult than dealing with one at a time. This is why home painting professionals often recommend removing the wallpaper before painting -- the paint job will look better and last longer when directly applied to the wall. In this way, wallpaper removal can be thought of as a long-term investment in your property.
4. Identify Surface Problems
Wallpaper is, of course, meant to cover your wall -- while this serves to provide an interior space with a unique appearance, it also prevents one from observing the underlying surface itself. As a result, it’s difficult to know when a wall requires attention, aside from obvious signs like water damage that has seeped through the wallpaper. Another benefit of removing wallpaper, then, is that it gives you and your local painters a clear view of the condition of your walls. Upon taking down the wallpaper, you might notice dings, holes, cracks, and other problems that would have otherwise gone unnoticed until they resulted in a larger problem. From there, you can make all necessary repairs prior to coating your walls or installing new wallpaper.
5. Increase Your Home’s Value
The real estate market is nothing if not fickle. Still, there are certain trends and rules that apply broadly in determining a home’s value. Generally speaking, homes that feature painted walls yield a higher demand than those with wallpaper. There are a number of reasons for this reality. First, most modern home buyers aren’t fond of the way wallpaper looks. Additionally, many prospective buyers understand that they’ll be responsible for removing the wallpaper and perhaps hiring interior house painters if they decide to purchase the home as is, and they might not want to undergo that extra headache or expense. Moreover, the presence of wallpaper suggests that the underlying wall might be damaged and/or concealing other issues, as we discussed above. Therefore, if you want to maximize your home’s resale value and attract more buyers, removing your wallpaper is a no-brainer.
Should You Try Removing Wallpaper Yourself?
To sum up, removing your wallpaper modernizes your interior, makes way for a fresh coat of paint, prevents future surface problems, reveals existing wall damage, and boosts a home’s resale value. If the benefits interest you, it’s time to take that wallpaper down. Before you get ahead of yourself, though, note that improperly removing wallpaper can damage your walls and make quite the mess. For these reasons, it’s best to work with local house painters that specialize in wallpaper removal to tackle this delicate task for you.
The experts at Nash Painting are experienced in removing all types of wallpaper and preparing surfaces for fresh coatings. We love transforming our clients’ properties in Nashville, Brentwood, and Franklin, TN. To learn more about us, our services, and our values, call us at 615-829-6858 today!