Painting somehow looks very easy to do, but it is not really as easy as it appears to be. Certainly, any chimpanzee can be trained on how to put a brush into the paint and slap some of it on the wall.

However, a quality paint work needs human intelligence and at least a momentary commitment to detail (two qualities which slumlords seemingly lack entirely).

For your upcoming painting project, make sure to avoid dealing with these 10 amateur mistakes in painting, just in case your work be compared to a slumlord’s or even a chimp’s.

1. Don’t cut corners with the prep work.

Just like middle school, preparation work is a menial labour that has to be completed before you can continue to better things.

The most important thing for the indoor is cleaning all surfaces, sprucing up damage and put a patch on areas, and preparing the area.

The critical prep work for the outdoor is removing peeling and or else loose paint, fixing damaged or rotted wood, as well as clearing all surfaces.

2. Don’t mess with old paint unless you’re sure it’s lead- or asbestos-free.

Aside from curious, if not so reasonable, children eating paint chips, all of the warnings concerning lead paint and asbestos paint can be recognised with paint prep work: scraping or sanding lead or asbestos paint makes the paint friable (airborne), the perfect circumstance for entering into your body.

For safety assurance, if there is any possibility a surface may have been painted before 1990’s (lead house paint was banned in Australia in the early 1990s, and asbestos was banned in 2003), it is advisable for you to have a sample tested first.

For more information on how to perform lead paint testing and deal with it, visit Department of the Environment and Energy of Australian Government at http://www.environment.gov.au/protection/chemicals-management/lead.

Since some paints also contain asbestos, you are recommended to do asbestos testing in Sydney to make sure you will not be exposed to asbestos fibres.

You can visit http://www.australianasbestosnetwork.org.au/asbestos-today/asbestos-at-home/in-your-house/, the website of the website of the Australian asbestos network at for more information.

3. Don’t paint on the top of moisture or active mould.

Stain-blocking (and specifically mould-blocking) primers work well for preventing colour merge with dark mould stains, but they are not designed to fix a live mould problem. And the primers only cover a moisture problem for a temporary.

Because mould and moisture go together, what you need to do first is to stop the moisture (wherever it is coming from), then eliminate the mould (using detergent or diluted bleach), and let it all dry altogether prior to priming and painting.

4. Don’t paint uncovered surfaces without priming initially.

As much as you may dislike it, the primer is definitely your friend. It sticks quite well, it clogs up pores in raw materials, and its price is much cheaper than paint, it is half the price of paint.

It is going to waste your money and probably will result in an unsatisfactory finished product if you use an extra coat of paint rather than a primer.

5. Don’t paint masonry abruptly.

Amid the very small number of building materials that can relatively be called “maintenance-free” is brick, poured concrete, concrete block, and stone. Painting them once modifies that for good.

6. Don’t use tape (in many cases).

Professionals do not use tape for the similar reasons that you shouldn’t: it takes a lot of times and is meticulous in applying, it commonly lets paint permeate underneath its edge, and it can strip the new paint off when it’s removed.

Rather than using tape in the normal places, get rid of anything that’s removable (such as cabinet hardware and outlet covers), and take some time to put in a clean line of paint across the edges of trim work and suchlike.

7. Don’t use low price paint.

Quality paint works better, has much nicer colour and lasts longer compared to an awful paint. And when you think about that you will be seeing the results for the upcoming decade or so, ten or fifteen extra dollars a gallon is a worthy upgrade…except that, of course, you are a slumlord.

8. Don’t use low-cost paintbrushes.

A $3 brush will never be able to work well and has to be disposed of after the first job, right about the time it begins shedding bristles. A $10 brush is knowledgeable about how to manage paint and will come to be a treasured tool for years down the road.

9. Don’t paint window tracks.

Painting the tracks in which the sashes slide is probably the best (and dumbest) method to ruin a window. This is similar to lubricating ball bearings using caulk. For that reason, do not ever let paint overlap from the stop to the sash and conversely.

10. Don’t paint on the top of outlet and switch covers.

Being too idle to get rid of electrical cover plates prior to painting and just taping off the covers leaves a ridge across the edge that normally peels away in a large, unattractive chunk if the cover is taken off later.  Take two minutes to discard the switch plate.

For more info on painting you can check out netwrox.

Buying a house under construction can have undoubted advantages – especially when the price savings is up to 20% – but there are also risks that you should not underestimate.

For example, there’s a high chance when the company got broke, and the buyer loses the sums paid in advance. For this cause, it is essential to know what the buyer’s warranties are and how to protect it.

If you are going to buy a house under construction, it is important to know that in case of bankruptcy of the construction company before the transfer of the transfer contract, only creditors with real estate collateral (such as the bank that has Financed the building by granting a mortgage) can substantiate their reasons.

Others, including buyers, will rarely be able to get back the sums already paid as a deposit or down payment, unless you pay twice the sums already paid.

Legislative guarantees for the buyer

The buyer has a number of safeguards provided by the legislator.

• Warranty obligation – The manufacturer is obliged to pre-guarantee against the sums paid in advance by the buyer up to the transfer of the property. Without warranty, the contract is considered null and void. Thanks to this, the constructor must restrain the purchaser all the sums he has received.

The developer company must provide for waiving the benefit of the principal debtor’s execution: the buyer can contact the bank or the insurance company immediately without first attempting to recover the credit from the builder.

• Ten-year Policy – The manufacturer must deliver a ten-year insurance policy as a guarantee for compensation for material damage resulting from possible property damage or serious construction defects. The policy is effective as of the end of the work.

• Preliminary purchase agreement – Must contain buyer and seller data (personal data, VAT number, etc.), complete identification of the property, full description of the technical characteristics, any urban planning conventions, constraints or mortgages, timing Maximum construction and delivery costs, total price, payment methods, any contractors, details of the request and permission to build and details of the guaranty.

• Preliminary law – In the case of auctioning, the law guarantees the purchaser the right of pre-emption if the home is used as a home.

• Methods of payment – Work progress is followed: 6% of the total cost to the building foundation, 12% on completion of the supporting structures and 13% on the flooring.

Below are a number of tips for those who buy a home directly from the manufacturer:

• Verify the manufacturer’s reliability

• Visit other houses built by the same company

• Make sure that the manufacturer is covered by bank suretyship and insurance as provided by law

• Check that the ground is actually buildable and is owned by the builder

• Request documents and qualifying titles

• Please read carefully the specifications in which the type and quality of the materials and list of installers must be indicated

• Consider real estate measures

Many prospective buyers carefully observe real estate ads, ready to bid on values ​​far below the past. But at the time of the truth, not everyone knows how to carry on a negotiation. We present you with 10 factors to convince the seller to review his claims.

1. Elevator

A home that is upstairs and has no elevator should be cheaper. Even if you are young, the inconveniences are annoying and pretty exhausting.

2. Low plans

A raised ground floor, at this time of poor trading, can be purchased at a great discount. And not everyone looks out onto a busy street.

3. The view

Particularly in large cities, there is only one air-conditioned dwelling, and perhaps they only have a view of an inner courtyard. Compared to those with a better view, this is a boundless limitation.  You can actually leverage this feature at your own will.

4. Location

In the same neighbourhood not all roads are the same, and within the same street, not all condos are the same. A greater distance from public transport or main services, difficulty finding parking, proximity to a very busy artery, are all factors to push for a discount.

5. Energy consumption

An energy consuming home is by no means a joke, and if you do well, the accounts can have a major impact on family budgets. Today, buying a property is nothing to consider without energy certification, so all owners have to present it: as there is, let it be worth it

6. Condition of the property

Restoring a whole house cost a huge amount of money per square meter: make it present

7. Services

Doorman, car park, green spaces, common areas: the presence or absence of these factors is not to be overlooked. Today the offer is higher than the demand and maybe in the building next door, for the same price, there are more services offered to the tenants.

8. Nearby

The quietness of having few neighbours is a double-cut weapon: condominium prices cost more and making a decision sometimes provokes eternal debates in a family or between couples.

9. Space distributions

At equal size, not all houses are the same. The price is a very relative factor when talking about a property space. A 5 by 5 meter apartment, with 4 doors and 2 windows, is less useful than a smaller one but with less dented walls. What about infinite and useless corridors?

10. Size

Right now the bigger the house, the more you have to deal with. Clearly, the discount margin on a studio size apartment is definitely lower, but for those who have money, buying a medium-large size property can turn out to be a real deal.