Cheap vs. Expensive House Paint

By Zuck Painting

Finding the perfect paint for your home can be a difficult balancing act. First, the colors draw you in, and then the price pushes you right back out. Multiple companies may offer your desired paint color and finish at different price points. So you line up the identical color swatches, and when you find the lowest price, it feels like you have gotten an amazing deal. However, that is rarely the case.

When it comes to house paint, regardless of if it’s for interior or exterior jobs, the cost translates to quality. Of course, we all love a bargain, but cheap paints can actually cost you more time and money in the long run.

Let’s break this dilemma down so you can make a well-educated choice during your next paint purchase.

Why Do Paints Exist At Different Price Points?

Paint may look like a thick liquid, but it’s actually a mixture of solids suspended in a liquid. Don’t worry; you can’t see these solid particles because they are so small. However, they do have an important impact on how paint looks when it is applied. These are the materials that are left behind when paint dries, which makes them crucial to your paint’s final appearance.

House paint consists of a mix of solid pigments, additives, binders, and liquid solvents. Each of these ingredients can vary greatly in their quality and quantity. Expensive paints are priced high because they use the more effective and sometimes more natural versions of these ingredients.

In contrast, cheap paints substitute quality ingredients for ingredients that are less costly. This is often done at the expense of the paint’s quality since synthetic substitutes are rarely as good as the real thing.

What Are The Benefits Of Buying More Expensive Paint?

If you are already spending money on the labor costs of getting your house paint applied, then the cheap container is going to look especially attractive. Especially if you are buying multiple gallons, but it’s a trap!

If you reach for the pricier product, you won’t regret it, here’s why; Expensive paint has better coverage.

Better coverage translates to two things; reduced labor time and more vibrant colors. If you are painting a space on your own, then expensive paint will cover the space in a few or even a single coat. All of the time and energy this saves you will be well worth the added cost. If you have hired a professional painting team, this will take them less time, which can reduce the project’s cost.

The paint will also look very similar, if not identical, to the color swatch you chose it from. The coverage provided by expensive paint enhances the vibrancy and saturation of its color for full coverage on interior and exterior surfaces.

Expensive paint is more durable.

Paint has to deal with a lot of wear and tear. In internal spaces, it is often dinged by furniture or stained, while exterior paint has to cope with the elements and regular home care like power washing. Due to their higher quality ingredients, expensive paints are capable of withstanding these damaging events better and longer than cheap paint.

This means you will need to repaint spaces less frequently with expensive paint, which will save you more time and money in the long run. Expensive paint takes longer to fade.

So much time and consideration goes into choosing a paint color, so it would be a shame for that color to fade and change in a few short months to a year. Expensive paints and their quality ingredients hold their true color for much longer than cheap paints. Again, this will save you time and money on reapplications, but it will also prevent any unwanted color changes.

After all, barns are meant to be red, not pink, and your house is meant to be the color you want, not some washed-out version.

How Can I Be Sure That Expensive Paint Is Worth The Price?

Big name brands like Sherwin Williams and Benjamin Moore, are typically a safe bet. However, most brands make paint at a variety of price points and qualities. You can be most confident with a paint’s quality by doing a test patch in the space that you intend to repaint.

If you still have questions or concerns about finding the perfect paint for your home project, feel free to contact us at Zuck Painting. We are happy to help you create the space you are looking for by helping you choose a paint and providing a team to do the work for you. For a free estimate in the Massachusetts or Rhode Island areas, visit our website or call us at (508) 250-7272.