Yes or no? Is painting over hardware, switch plates and vent covers the mark of a lazy painter?

[Anonymous]

I purchased all new switch plates for the house We moved into this summer. We had the entire house painted before actually moving in. They said give us the switch plates. We can swap them out as part of the job. They painted them. They painted beautiful white switch plates with white wall paint. It looks ridiculous. I am livid.

[Anonymous]

Depends on the room color. It looks bad to have bright white switch plates in a room that isn’t white. If the switch plate should blend into the wall and not be a distraction.

[Anonymous]

If they were already painted over, it will cost extra to cut them out and replace them. If they were not painted over, only a really cheap paint job would result in painted grills and covers. Some people cheap out and that's what they get.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Depends on the room color. It looks bad to have bright white switch plates in a room that isn’t white. If the switch plate should blend into the wall and not be a distraction.

I could not disagree with you more.

[Anonymous]

Switch plates, outlet covers, and vent covers should be removed before painting, and put back after the paint dries. (Seriously, this is not hard or time consuming.) You might find it looks better to just replace all the plates and vent covers with new ones if they're looking shabby. It's okay if the plates are white to match the trim, even if the wall color is different. Or maybe you want something fancier. There's a ton of choices. A vent cover can be painted to match the wall, but it should be glossy paint so you don't have a lot of dust sticking to a matte finish.

[Anonymous]

Absolutely, it’s known as the landlord special paint job.

[Anonymous]

^^ Looks more like tenant special paint job!

[Anonymous]

OP, the answer is no - they should not paint over any hardware. That being said, if the hardware was ALREADY painted over and you didn't ask them to remove and strip the painted over hinges/plates (which they would charge more for since that is much more time/labor intensive and the results could be less than ideal) then they will likely paint them.

[Anonymous]

My husband remodeled our entire house himself (he's very handy.

He says that not removing all switch plates, vent covers and tarping the floor before painting is super lazy. The baseboards should be covered over in blue tape before painting starts. Blue tape is your painting pal. A good painting job is 90% masking and 10% painting.

Yes, he quietly notices any bad painting job and knows exactly how it went down/what the painter did not do to cut corners.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My husband remodeled our entire house himself (he's very handy.

He says that not removing all switch plates, vent covers and tarping the floor before painting is super lazy. The baseboards should be covered over in blue tape before painting starts. Blue tape is your painting pal. A good painting job is 90% masking and 10% painting.

Yes, he quietly notices any bad painting job and knows exactly how it went down/what the painter did not do to cut corners.

FWIW. Painter's tape is for amateurs/DIYers. I've never seen a professional painter use masking tape.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Unless they assume you’re going to replace all those things anyway, in which case I guess it’s a decent time saver. But if your new stuff is smaller or shaped different than the old, that’s no good.

If they think I'm going to replaces it all, they should REMOVE IT BEFORE THEY PAINT.

100% lazy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I purchased all new switch plates for the house We moved into this summer. We had the entire house painted before actually moving in. They said give us the switch plates. We can swap them out as part of the job. They painted them. They painted beautiful white switch plates with white wall paint. It looks ridiculous. I am livid.

Regular switch plates are like fifty cents, less in bulk. Don't get mad, just buy new ones.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My husband remodeled our entire house himself (he's very handy.

He says that not removing all switch plates, vent covers and tarping the floor before painting is super lazy. The baseboards should be covered over in blue tape before painting starts. Blue tape is your painting pal. A good painting job is 90% masking and 10% painting.

Yes, he quietly notices any bad painting job and knows exactly how it went down/what the painter did not do to cut corners.

FWIW. Painter's tape is for amateurs/DIYers. I've never seen a professional painter use masking tape.

Her husband doesn't paint professionally. It's a great tool for people who want to DIY. And clearly some of these "professional" painters are pretty terrible, because they don't use tape and then just paint over your entire outlet in a sloppy mess.

[Anonymous]

Yes. The only exception is if you get unfinished wood ones that are designed to be painted. But even those are meant to be painted before you put them on the wall. Even if you are painting the same color, you paint them separately. Having paint covering the seams and possibly gluing the plates to the wall is very lazy.

[Anonymous]

Written in the contract, plates and covers removed, no overspray