How Often Should You Paint the Interior of Your House?

Nearly all homeowners try to gauge whether their homes need new wall paint, especially in rooms that frequently have visitors. While the general rule is that a house interior should be painted every 3-5 years, it varies by household. Discover how often you should paint the interior of your house with the following room-by-room breakdown.

Living Rooms and Dining Rooms

Living and dining rooms are high-traffic areas where friends and family gather. As a result, the living room and dining room walls often take the brunt of fingerprints, impacts, spills, and splashes. Professional painters recommend homeowners paint these rooms every 5-7 years to keep the walls looking fresh.

Families that rarely use their living rooms and dining rooms can wait an extra two years before they paint. However, a change in aesthetic preferences or the emergence of new trends may cause homeowners to paint their home’s interior more frequently. If you feel unsure whether you should paint your living and dining room, consult a painting professional for more clarity.

Kitchens and Laundry Rooms

If you wonder how often you should paint your house interior, there is a good chance you have been looking at the walls of your kitchen or laundry room. Grease splatters, food stains, and other forms of wear and tear can wreak havoc on the appearance of kitchen walls. For this reason, professional painters recommend you give your kitchen a new paint job every 3-4 years.

The laundry room experiences more heat and humidity than all other rooms. The constant washing and drying of clothes create a balmy atmosphere that can shorten the paint’s lifespan. While it may not see the most traffic out of any room in the house, the laundry room is still where hard work gets done. Dirty garments and metal clothing buttons can damage the walls. When giving your laundry room a fresh look every 3-4 years, use water-based paints.

Bedrooms

How often should you paint bedrooms? Most experts agree that you should paint adult bedrooms every 10 years. Most adults use their bedrooms for sleeping or watching their favorite movies and TV shows. Bedroom walls rarely get stained or scuffed due to high traffic. Occasional, minor dusting usually keeps them in decent shape.

Children’s bedrooms require new paint jobs much more often than adult bedrooms: every 2-3 years. Young kids can do a significant amount of damage to bedroom walls in a short amount of time. Dirt, food, fingerprints, and doodles can leave lasting marks on the walls that require significant prep work before repainting.

Bathrooms

A new paint job for the bathroom always makes the space seem more sanitary. Bathroom walls always have to contend with increased heat and humidity, which can cause issues for old paint. Look for bubbles, flakes, and chips in the paint. Those are signs that it may be time to paint the bathroom. In general, homeowners should paint their bathrooms every 3-4 years.

Hallways, Mudrooms, Baseboards, and Trim

How often should you paint your house interior’s miscellaneous spaces and trim? Hallways and mudrooms are often forgotten when discussing a home interior paint job. Yet, both spaces see a lot of foot traffic, taking significant damage from dirty hands and heavy winter clothing. It’s a great idea to paint hallways and mudrooms every 2-3 years.

An even better idea involves painting a home’s baseboards and trim every 2-4 years. Everything looks better when baseboards and crown molding have fresh coats of paint. Door and window trim should look fresh and clean because guests will be walking through the doors and looking out the windows. Dirty trim in a house interior becomes noticeable in a hurry.

FAQ

How often do ceilings need to be painted?

Ceilings need to be painted every 10 to 15 years, with occasional touch-ups between paint jobs. Since professional painters remove or cover all of the furniture when applying ceiling paint, homeowners might as well have their walls painted at the same time. More than other rooms in the house, the living room, dining room, and kitchen walls need to be repainted alongside their ceilings.

How often do most people paint the inside of their house?

Most people paint the inside of their house every five to 15 years on average, depending on foot traffic, climate, paint quality, and other factors. The primary motivation for painting usually involves a desire to change colors rather than too much wear and tear. However, variations in lifestyle and differences in family size can cause homeowners to repaint more or less frequently than average.

How long does interior paint last on the wall?

Interior paint lasts on the wall for 5-10 years, and perhaps even longer if properly maintained. While several factors will determine how often you should paint the interior of your house, prompt cleaning after accidents and regular dusting of the walls will keep the paint looking its best for as long as possible.

Conclusion

Of course, hiring the right painting company and using the right paint go a long way toward extending the life of your paint job. Our expert home interior painters draw upon decades of combined experience to oversee smooth, fast, drip-free projects that our customers enjoy for years. Call Groovy Hues at (844) 430-2698 to schedule a consultation and free estimate.