There are times when you should listen to the experts…
…And there are times when you should just gleefully jump in with both feet to a project with no idea of the end results.
Deciding what to do about our laundry room floor was definitely the latter. I showed you guys the before and after photos of our $157 laundry room makeover last week:
And I mentioned that the vinyl floors in the “before” photo appeared unclean in person. I may have understated. (Eww.)
(I probably should’ve cropped that photo a little, but I couldn’t bear to cut off the tiny baby foot in the bottom left corner. I’m just not the kind of person who likes to cut off baby feet, sue me.)
We had a goal to redo the flooring for about a dollar a square foot, and we laid out five ways to update vinyl sheet flooring on a budget. The craziest idea – but also the most oddly tempting – was to paint them. The paint experts we spoke to thought we might be mildly insane. One guy tried so hard to talk us out of painting our floors that we ended up agreeing we wouldn’t do it just so he could get some sleep that night.
But since we’re basically hard-core DIY rebels who run with all the wrong crowds and break the rules, we did it anyway.
*Gets on motorcycle and rides away.*
*Does not even use turn signal.*
Materials Needed
- Regular latex primer like you’d use on the wall.
- Enough porch and floor paint to cover your floor. (We bought a gallon of teal and a gallon of white because you can’t buy it any smaller amounts, and we had LOTS left over in our 50 sq ft room.)
- Painter’s tape (for stripes)
- TriSodium Phosphate (This is a heavy duty cleaner you can find at a home improvement store or order it right here. We paid about $7 at our home improvement store, so the current amazon price as of this posting is actually cheaper than that.)
- Paint rollers and brushes
- Orbital sander and sandpaper. (This is the sander we use.)
- Caulk, if your vinyl has holes. (This is the exact kind we use.)
Step One: Clean
Clear out the room and clean the floors with soap and water, then scrub them with trisodium phosphate.
Having the room cleared was probably the hardest part for us. We lived with the washing machine and dryer taking up our whole hallway for about a week.
It was super duper fun times squeezing through there, and also lugging our dirty cloth diapers to the laundromat.
Step Two: Sand
Using a fine-ish sandpaper (maybe 180 or 220-grit – we just used what we had), sand the floors to remove the shiny finish.
If you’re already like: “Power tools? Ya lost me.” – don’t freak out; this is easy. Just put some sandpaper on that guy – it velcros right to the front – turn it on, and rub it all over the floors until they’re not shiny. Sanders are the least-scary of all power tools.
If you have anything stuck to the floors – we had some paint spots from when we sloppily painted the walls – sand or scrape those off too.
Step Three: Repair
(You get to skip this step if your vinyl has no holes in it.)
If you have any tiny holes in your floor in discreet locations, you can try to patch the holes. This patch job is not perfect, but the hole we had in our floor was actually underneath where the washing machine sits, so we weren’t concerned with perfection.
Even after we patched hole, you would definitely notice an imperfection in the floor if it was in a more obvious location. Still, if your floors are vinyl and you can’t change them for budget reasons, painted holey floors look better than unpainted ones!
So here’s how we repaired it. First, we used a utility knife to cut around the hole where it was swollen and awkwardly protruding at us.
Then we filled the hole with all-purpose caulk and smoothed it out the best we could. Caulk works best because it expands and contracts like the floors do.
After the caulk dries, smooth it out so it’s even with the rest of the floors. Wipe away any excess with a damp cloth. And that’s it!
Step Three: Prime the floors
Already this is sounding easy, don’t you think? It’s really not so hard! We used standard latex wall primer that we had sitting in the garage.
Just roll on the primer and let it dry. We might’ve done two coats because we had no idea if it would work at all anyway, and we were being extra careful.
Step Four: Paint!
Before you do this, PLEASE make sure you bought “porch & floor” paint! That stuff is made to be rained on, walked on, and spit on by tattoo-wearing DIY rebels.
This step was actually about a hundred times more fun than painting a wall, because you just pour the paint right on the floor and roll it around.
Step Five: Fancy ‘em up as you desire.
Obviously, we painted our floors with horizontal stripes which we taped off with painter’s tape.
But I think a stenciled floor would look SUPER cool. I actually considered doing that for mine, but decided that sweet peacock stencil I’d chosen was too directional. Something like this or this would be awesome. (And I’m giving away a stencil right now – go enter here!)
One thing to consider when you’re choosing your stencil design: if your vinyl floor has any kind of texture, that’ll still show up after it’s painted. You can see in the pictures above that our floors have a grid pattern that’s indented into the flooring. We chose our stripe size to be four little grid squares wide, so the stripes work with the grid texture. It might not be a big deal for you, just something to consider.
But how do these floors hold up against wear and tear?
I’m SO glad you asked. We’ve had our floors painted for about five months, and so far we have seen nary a scratch. They still look perfect. The porch and floor paint is made for, well porches. And also floors. So it can handle your pretty little feet.
That said, we don’t drive bulldozers through our laundry room, or hold all-night raves there or anything, but I can tell ya that I’ve been pleasantly surprised by how clean and perfect they’ve stayed all these months and I have no reason to think they won’t stay that way for a long, long time.
Step Six: Enjoy
What do you think? Would you ever paint your floor? Have you ever defied the experts and won?
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Hi, I'm Kelly. Glad you're here! This little blog is where I chronicle our efforts to fix up our beaten-down home on a tiny budget. We're not there yet, but here's a peek at the view along the way...
I just did this two weeks ago except I guess I took the lazy way out because I skipped a few steps. I didn’t sand or repair holes but my vinyl flooring was not glossy. I painted two coats of the porch & floor paint w/out primer. So far, it’s holding up.
love it, love it, love it! And I’m impressed that you managed to squeeze around the washer and dryer in the hallway. When I first saw them, I was picturing you all having to climb over them every time!
Absolutely beautiful! It is such a huge statement in that room. Love it
)
It actually makes sense to me that paint would stick to vinyl better than it would to wood. I’ve painted wood floors in the past and the paint chips and peels almost right away. This looks fantastic, cost very little and is holding up well. I’ll call that a gigantic success story. Good job you 2!
We are eventually going to re-do our master bath, but before we rip up the old floors I am dying to try this out first!
I really love this- thanks so much for the tutorial. Now to get up the courage to try it!
We have hideous vinyl in our laundry room and I absolutely pinned this tutorial for when we have the guts to re-do ours!!
What I want to know is WHY you don’t have a shop for me to buy my own killer laundry room light?!
Love this idea- I’d totally give it a go but only because I’m a bad ass DIYer too. ; )
See, it worked out that you didn’t post about this room for 5 months so that you could have some ammo behind the potential durability concern! You tattoo-sporting people are brave for trying this. It looks great!
Yep, that was COMPLETELY intentional and well thought-out.
Such a great decision…it’s inexpensive and looks fab! We painted our porch floor becuase it was in a major hurt before. So far, it’s held up okay, but time will tell. {And yes, we used porch and floor paint.
}
But Andy has such nice legs I can’t help it.
It looks sooooo good, and it’s totally worth painting before buying new flooring! And since it’s holding up, that just makes it so much sweeter! More money in the bank!
Haha!! I was totally checking out Andy’s legs, then scrolled down and saw your caption. Busted! I’m thinking about painting a design over my bedroom parquet floor, so this is encouraging. I listen to the experts, then do my own thing anyway. I’ve never primed/sealed a textured ceiling (I know… ugh) first… just jumped in and painted.
We have these same type of floors everywhere in this house! They’re coming up eventually but I’ve been wondering about maybe doing a little quick fix with some paint just like this.
Your post was so fun, I just may have to do it!
Wow! Would you recommend putting a clear coat of something over the top for some gloss/extra protection, or do you think that would compromise the porch paint? I can’t get over how great your laundry room looks, btw!
We’ve actually heard that you should add polyurethane on top, but we thought it might compromise the porch paint. We weren’t sure, and we really needed to use our washing machine again, so we skipped it. It might add a nice gloss, but I don’t know how well it would hold up to traffic.
HOLY MOLY! It looks AMAZING!!!!!!! The whole laundry room is perfection!
You should travel around the world making it your personal mission to cover all the ugly laminate! Love how it turned out – your whole laundry is amazing – bet they can’t tear you away from the washer now!
Kelly
I love how the floor turned out. I’m a sucker for anything striped. I have no vinyl in my house but I’m totally passing the info onto little brother!!
What a great idea! I would have never thought of that. Pinned it to my board “Laundry Room” because that room is in my “site” for a major overhaul. I love the walls and cabinets also. I have my cat box in the laundry room and any rug I put in there would just be scattered with litter but I’m wondering now if I just paint a rug on using your technique??? Thanks for the inspiration!
Jaye
Hey Girl… do these stripes make my legs look hot?
Bliss
Loooove this!
I’m torn between painting my laundry room and tiling it
I stenciled my bathroom floor. http://the-kelly-house.blogspot.com/2013/01/bathroom-reveal.html I used the porch and floor paint and covered it with two coats of poly.
Wow that is super fabulous! I *KNOW* that must’ve taken you hours and hours. Is it holding up well? I was wondering about whether using poly is better for worse. Thanks so much for sharing!
So far, so good, but I haven’t had it on there long. I’m painting my laundry room floor next.
You keep saying “we.” As in “we sanded. We patched. We painted.” So are those your hairy legs? Is that your five o’clock shadow? Ha ha. Every one of you did a fantastic job!
Yes, those ARE my legs. Thanks for making me feel insecure.
Just kidding.
I need to make Andy take pictures of me doing things, except that would mean pictures of me in all my best painting clothes… maybe that’s why it looks like Andy does everything. Or maybe it’s just that he does. 
I know you work your fanny off cause I read every post. If you look at pics in our album, you’d think the kids were being raised by a single dad. And a photographer. (-:
I would TOTALLY give this a shot! They look 5000% better (even SHARP!) and I love that it’s so affordable. Home run, Kelly! Don’t know how you lived w/o washer dryer for a week???? I’d have been committed.
xo Heidi
Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!
I’ve been thinking about painting the vinyl floor in our powder room for 7 years but everyone (my husband & my father) told me I would ruin the floor. The floor is so ugly anything would be an improvement.
I can’t wait to try this
I never would have thought to paint the floors, but they turned out amazing! Great job!!
Thank you for this…I have been thinking about doing something similar, but didn’t know if I could…you are the best!
Anybody that is going to do this, make sure you wear a mask or a ventilator.
Some of that old linoleum flooring contains asbestos, if you are going to sand
it and kick up an asbestos dust storm, it would not be good.
If you can just paint it without sanding it, that would be safer.
Great tip. Our house was built in the 90s so we aren’t usually thinking about that. Thanks!
Pretty darn cool! I love the way they turned out. If I had some vinyl flooring, I’d definitely give it a shot.
Amazing! WOW! What a transformation! Love them!
Wow! That is an amazing transformation! I love the stripes with the stenciled walls! It looks awesome! Pinning!
Very impressive. Great tutorial and inspiration.
I didn’t know you could paint vinyl floors- I may have to try this in my laundry room! The rest of the room looks fabulous as well!
Love love love love love! I told my husband that you did this, and he said, “that’s crazy talk.” I said that everyone said that, but you did it anyway, and it has held up really well. He’s down with the idea now! I’m not really sure if we have anywhere to do it, though. Hmmm….
How do you clean them without damaging the paint? Love this idea, but I would like to do it in a bathroom and I have to wonder if the moisture would cause the paint to peel or bubble and, of course, the floor would need cleaned regularly.
We just clean them with mild soap and water. Some people have said they sealed the floors with some kind of floor sealant, and that might not be a bad idea. We didn’t try it because we really needed to use our washing machine!
So happy I stopped in from SSS…the room looks wonderful and I have been contemplating painting our old vinyl floors in our downstairs kitchen! Can’t wait to show my husband!
Thanks!!!
I’m so glad you linked this post to Kelly’s linky party. I have a vinyl floor in my bath that I need to update. (When time/money/energy allows). I love how your painted floor turned out. I also like the prior post showing other solutions. I am definitely inspired.
Wow! I mean… wow! I am so pinning this. Everything looks better with a fresh coat of paint. Even that ugly vinyl flooring. We want to buy a house soon. So if we end up getting vinyl flooring we can’t replace right away, I’ll know what to do!
LOVE THIS!!! Your laundry room is adorable and I love that floor. I didn’t know you could paint vinyl. I am featuring this at somedaycrafts.blogspot.com.
Just a note — priming is good if you have color to cover. The BEST primer ever is Glidden’s Gripper. NO SANDING primer! It is amazing! And I would say yes, add poly to the top. If you have little ones and little bit starts to peel up, I could see said little one pulling on it and yanking up an entire stripe.
Awesome job! The room is lovely. Thanks for the inspiration. I’ve got a few rooms before the laundry room, but I will use this when I get there.
Kelly- This is my first time stopping by and your laundry room is stunning! I love how much imact the floors and stencil have! Great job!
xo
Good tutorial! We did this 2 years ago on top of old vinyl in a basement bathroom. We didn’t to the TSP and sanding, just primer and porch and floor paint. You do see the vinyl “pattern” through the final paint layer, but it doesn’t look weird. I also found that I needed several layers of the porch and floor paint to get a good result. Finally, it was very important to give the paint time to harden — not just dry. It took up to a week for ours because it didn’t have great ventilation.
Well, it’s super cute, that’s for sure! The only thing I would have considered doing differently is the primer… I’d use either BIN (not the latex based variety, but the ammonia based one, that stuff really sticks… or there’s a newer primer out there that is latex based but supposed to be every bit as good, I’m not sure how to spell it, but it’s pronounced Sticks… it may be spelled Styx??) Anyway, thanks for the great tute, and cute room!!! Little Bit
Could we use acetone and skip the sanding step? Hmmmm . . .
Good question! I think any kind of deglosser would work. As long as you get rid of the glossy finish so the paint can stick, you should be okay!
What a fantastic project! I’ll be linking to it on our Flooring pinboard. Check it out at pinterest.com/homedepot.
That tape really works well for the stripes! Pinning. So glad you didn’t cut out the baby feet:)http://www.sewsweetvintage.com/2013/01/his-and-her-pillows.html
Your laundry room looks amazing! I never would have thought to paint the floor! Love it!! I have a new Pinterest Power party and would love to have you share this and any other projects or recipes you have!
http://www.thetaylor-house.com/2013/01/31/pinterest-power-party-4.html
Thanks!
Chrissy
Great idea! I want to try this in our laundry room! Thanks for the great step-by-step guide.
Thank you so much for sharing!!! I’m in the stages of buying my first house and as a newly single mom on a strict budget I was wondering if there was anything I could do to make the kitchen floors look better without breaking the bank, I’ll definetly be giving this a try!
Thanks for the great tutorial and for stopping by my blog.
Maybe someday I will be brave and give this a try.
I work for Sherwin Williams and we sell Porch and Floor enamel in quarts (in any color). It’s obviously too late for you but maybe other readers will find this helpful. Also, I would recommend adhesion primer. It’s made especially for surfaces that paint might have trouble adhering to. Great work!!
This looks great! We have yucko linoleum in our laundry room that doesn’t even line up with the walls. I can’t wait to get rid of it! Great job.
You are such a inspiration! ☺
As I have done most of my own interior painting for years now, hope you don’t mind me suggesting that if one uses a good ‘Primer’ there is no need to sand the flooring surface. A favourite product of mine is Zinssers Bullseye 1-2-3 (water-based) Primer. In comparison to other Primers though a bit pricey, it is perfect to use on slick or glossy surfaces! I have used it to great success on laminate, ceramic tile, metal and over oil-based paint for both interior and exterior projects. Though its primary use is to cover up water-marks and stains just follow the application instructions on the can and ensure that the paint is cured (not dry) prior to the top coat of porch paint. -Brenda-
Footnote: I am NOT affiliated with Zinssers in any way.
Thank you so much for this tip! I think we were just SUPER nervous that it wouldn’t work, so we wanted to go through every step. I have heard great things about Zinssers!
a couple of questions…(this looks awesome!)
do you have any 4 legged kids walking on it???
what are you mopping with? have you used any of the cleaners with wax?? mop n glo type?
a couple of questions…(this looks awesome!)
do you have any 4 legged kids walking on it???
what are you mopping with? have you used any of the cleaners with wax?? mop n glo type?
one other thing.. is the blue stripe also in the porch paint???
We have one pup but she doesn’t ever venture in there so I can’t attest to the scratchability. We’ve just used water and mild soap to clean so far and it’s worked well. Since it’s just a laundry room and not a kitchen or bathroom or something, we haven’t had any crazy messes we’ve had to scrub or anything. And yes, the blue is also porch paint. Good luck!
Can you please tell me about the light? It is unique and fun. I would love to add that. I love the whole room. Shows that stencils don’t have to take us to ’76 country motif!
Hi Jan, We did a full post about the light which you can check out here: http://www.viewalongtheway.com/2013/01/diy-dodecahedron-pendant-light-and-an-announcement/
How did you get the W/D back in w/out sliding them on the newly painted floor? Just a question because that is what I would have to do to get my W/D back in. These are terrific, I would love to do this in my kitchen, but don’t think I could live w/out a kitchen for very long. I wonder if I did it in stages????
Just curious what your thoughts are.
I think I would put a protective coating on as well.
Thought I would never be able to rid myself of our ugle dated 70′s flooring in the kitchen. This is definately do-able for our pocketbook….THANK YOU!
Holy mother of Batman! This is blowing my mind right now! Found you from the YHL forum and all I can say is WOW! Our laundry room looks a lot like your before picture. I think you have inspired me to get moving on getting a new look in there!
OMG!! This is so AWESOME!! I just got done painting our kitchen cabinets…now I cannot wait to paint the FLOOR! Thank you for the fantastic tutorial
IVE THOUGHT ABOUT DOING THIS IN MY KITCHEN CUZ MY HUBBY SPLIT A GLUE THAT LOOKS PURPLE WHEN WE FIRST BOUGHT OUR HOUSE 6 YRS. AGO IVE TRYED COVERING WITH RUGS AND ITS NOT WORKING LOL.
MY QUESTION IS IF I DO PAINT MY LAMINATE FLOORING HOW DO I CLEAN IT? AS IN CAN I MOP OR WHAT??? LOL
THANKS,
ONEBRAVEMOMOF2
We just use a mop and dish soap. Good luck!
oh my gosh! We are SO going to try this!! We just purchased our 1st home & have so many things to change, but don’t have a great deal to spend…so glad I found this post! Thank you!