The Painting Company Las Vegas Trusts Explains How to Paint Stucco

Most professional Vegas painters would avoid giving advice on do-it-yourself painting, but we’re not one of those companies. We became the painting company Las Vegas trusts by doing a great job on every paint job and offering DIY advice, so you can address the small patch jobs yourself. We help you save money by helping you learn how to do the little things yourself.

Painting Stucco Differs From Painting Siding or Brick

The southwest stucco look complements most home styles and it weathers well in a desert setting. When builders place it, the smooth layers look great and the homebuilder paints it your desired color, whether pink, blue, or desert sand.

Stucco eventually wears away, similar to how brick chips or stone shaves. When your stucco starts looking a bit worse for wear, examine it closely to determine if the paint faded or if you need to have the stucco re-dashed, which means adding a new layer of stucco on top of the existing stucco.

You can probably act as your own residential painter if you only need to paint a small part of the home, such as a patch job or one wall that faded due to a lack of shade on that side of the home. If the home needs a full update but you don’t want to paint it, consider whitewashing it. That also looks great on stucco.

Tools You’ll Need to Paint Stucco

It’s time to hit the home improvement store for a little shopping if you don’t already own gear for painting. Your shopping list includes tools and materials. Here are the tools you’ll need:

• Caulk gun
• Extension ladder
• Paint brushes
• Paint roller cage
• Pressure washer
• Safety glasses
• Thick-napped roller covers.

If you already own some of those items, you’ll have less to buy. Instead of purchasing a pressure washer, we recommend you rent one.

Here are the materials you will need to prepare and paint a stucco home:

• Acrylic exterior caulk
• Block fill primer
• Polyurethane exterior caulk
• 80- or 100-grit sandpaper
• Stucco patch
• Acrylic latex exterior paint, flat finish.

You’ll only need the caulk or fill if your stucco developed small chips or cracks. Use these items to fill them. Let the caulk and filler dry completely and sand it before you paint.

Choose a flat acrylic latex paint because it offers a porous surface that lets the stucco breathe. You can clean it with water, too.

Painting the Stucco

You probably want to start painting right away, but you’ve got a few steps to go through before you dip a paint roller into a paint bin.

Step 1 – Inspect Your Stucco

Inspect the home’s exterior to spot any cracks or chips in the stucco. Once you identify these, you’ll mark them or fill them as you go. If you see quite a few on one wall, you might mark them and come back after inspecting the full home.

Hairline cracks typically don’t require filler or caulk. The paint applied to the stucco settles in them and fixes the problem. Stress cracks, though common, do need filling. You’ll typically spot these around doors and windows.

You’ll need to call a professional if you find large horizontal cracks, a large piece of stucco missing, or oddly discolored stucco. Each of these signals a serious problem, most commonly caused by moisture. A contractor that specializes in stucco can help identify the root of the problem and resolve it.

Step 2 – Pressure Wash the House

You must clean and debris stucco before painting it. Pressure washing offers a quick, effective way of doing this.

Wear safety glasses or goggles while operating the pressure washer. Use the lowest possible setting on the pressure washer to clean the stucco. This usually means the 1,500 to 2,500 pounds per square inch (PSI) setting.

Test a small area in an innocuous space before trying to wash the entire home. Water alone can clean the home due to the PSI of the water, but you can use an eco-friendly, mild detergent. If you don’t want to pressure wash your home, hire a professional pressure washing crew to do it for you.

Step 3 – Prepare Your Stucco

Now, you get to fill all of those small cracks you found. Hopefully, there aren’t many. Use the exterior acrylic caulk on small holes, pits, and cracks. Use stucco patch on larger cracks or dings.

When you notice the paint chipped in spots, lightly sand that area using 80- or 100-grit sandpaper. This sands off the loose paint and prepares the area to receive new color.

Use the polyurethane caulk to surround the door trim and window trim. This offers the highest-quality waterproofing.

Check the roofing gutters on the home. Repair any damaged gutters before painting. If you spot a discolored area where the gutters had broken, have a professional assess the water damage before painting.

If you spotted this in step one and already called them, you can skip having them assess it in step three. If you only noticed the problem when you moved the gutters to make repairs to them, you’ll need to have a professional contractor examine the area.

That discoloration denotes water damage and water may have gotten inside your home’s walls – behind the stucco. When that happens, mold and mildew can grow inside the walls, creating a health hazard for you and your family.

Step 4 – Prime the Stucco

Prime your walls if your stucco has not been painted before. Use the acrylic latex block filler to prime it. This product will soak into the stucco’s pores and help the topcoat adhere better.

Step 5 – Apply the Paint

Apply the paint in the quickest manner possible while also obtaining the needed coverage. Use a brush to cut in and around the doors, windows, and other trim.

Use the thick-napped roller to cover the rest of the wall, rolling the paint on evenly and in straight up and down motions. Start at the top of the wall and work downward in small sections. This lets you keep a wet edge.

If you want to cover the whole home more quickly, use an airless sprayer like a Henderson painter would. This works better on a stucco wall with texturing. On primed stucco, you’ll only need one topcoat. If you did not prime the stucco, it takes two topcoats to appropriately cover the walls.

Contact the Painting Company Las Vegas Trusts

If you think this might create too much work and expense for yourself, call the house painters Las Vegas trusts. Contact Ram Painting LLC, the Las Vegas painter you can trust to schedule your house painting job. While you can probably handle the patch job yourself, we’re happy to handle re-painting your home for you.