Your house exterior is the first thing that is noticed by the visitors and passersby. Literally, a nicely painted house exterior makes a big statement and creates the first impression. Since siding materials, exterior walls, and colors take the maximum attention, it can be very easy to forget about the exterior trims.
Nevertheless, exterior trim is also very important since it helps to give your house exterior a compact look and typically provides an eye-catching contrast with the siding color. Painting your exterior trims is vital since you need to know the proper techniques.
Before you even use the paintbrush on your exterior trim, you must properly prepare the surface of your trims. If the trims have previously been painted, all previous paints should be scrapped off from the surfaces. For a house that comes with several trims, you may want to use a power tool like a painter shaver instead of just using the hand scrapping method. Once the scrapping job is completed, you need to use sandpaper to sand the trim to create a smooth and even surface to be painted.
If you find any holes, cracks, and other damages on the exterior trim surface, you need to readily fix the same. You can use a wood-epoxy putty to fill the holes and chips. Since the exterior of your house is going to be exposed to the outside element, you need to clean the trim before applying paint on it. In order to get an effective exterior cleaning, you can mix a cup of bleach and other cleaning substances and spray the mixture over your trim. You can even use a hard brush and scrub the area to get rid of any dirt.
All bare wood areas of your exterior trim should be properly primed before painting. You can start applying paintable water coating on the trims. This would help preserve the wood and prevent the trim from contracting or shrinking when they are exposed to moisture. Once you are done with this, you can apply a traditional exterior primer. When applying the primer, you can use an oil-based formula since it has the ability to penetrate the more effectively than the latex based primer.
For more assistance in regards to paint your exterior trim, you can contact the available Painting Contractors in Andover MA.