Whats that? Paint your home with one coat of paint? This is certainly not the standard, and in general I would not recommend it, however there are certain circumstances where you may cut time and cost by painting your home with one coat of paint without it looking terrible.

In general this will be more difficult for a first time do-it-your self project as you will need to be very thorough in order to pull it off, but if your willing to put the time in you will save a lot of time.

One coat painting usually works best with a sprayer on ceilings using the same color or exterior spraying. The reason is that for someone who is handling the spraying properly you can spray it on decently thick and cover all areas more thoroughly than by rolling one time. Spraying stays consistent where as rolling thins out after a couple strokes with the roller.

In either case you will want to match the color as close to perfect as possible as the color you are painting over. Using a different color will not be effective and you will have to do two coats of paint. You can usually get the paint store to do this but be wary as a low paid clerk may not give it as much attention as needed so you should be there to help match it.

As for spraying you must use even, broad strokes in order to cover properly and not leave thin spots or drips from too much paint. Spraying is not complicated, however if you have never done it before it may be a very messy ordeal so rolling would be better.

The house in the picture was all sprayed using one coat of paint on the owners request to reduce cost. There was no bleed through from the original paint. It looks great but for the exterior it will not last as long as two coats so keep durability in mind.

When rolling make sure you get very close to the ceiling and baseboards to cover the cut line as the cuts usually will show more of the coat under it.

The main trick is to match the color almost exactly the same, other wise this will not work. Any minor repairs and holes(after repair) should be primed using the same paint other wise flashing will occur(strange flat spots you can see through the paint).

Other than that try to apply the paint as thickly as possible without dripping. This can be accomplished by dipping the roller in the paint tray frequently as opposed to waiting for the roller to run dry.

For the brushwork the same applies however for an inexperienced person it will be difficult to apply the paint thick without dripping.

Titanium Painter