Interior Painting across Norwood, Massachusetts.

The Census Bureau estimates 1960 as the median year local housing was built, but the spread around that midpoint is wide. Of the town's 13,815 housing units, 24.9% date to 1939 or earlier, 20.5% went up during the 1950s alone, and just 8.0% were built in 2010 or later. Depending on the address, a painter could be facing century-old plaster or drywall hung within the last fifteen years, and the plan for the room depends on which.

The sections below cover what changes with the age of a room: the wall surface, lead, ceilings, woodwork, and the practical side of painting a home that is lived in or rented out.

Plaster walls in pre-1940 rooms

Houses from before the Second World War were generally finished with plaster over wood lath, and unless the walls have been replaced since, that is what sits under the paint. The Norwood Historical Society records that the area once called the Flats, today's South Norwood, filled with rows of triple-deckers built quickly between 1900 and 1920. A triple-decker is built as three stacked apartments, so a single building can mean three separate sets of rooms to plan. Our South Norwood page has more on that neighborhood.

Sound plaster holds paint very well. Trouble shows up as hairline cracks at corners and above doors, bulges, or patches that give when you press them. Fine cracks can be opened slightly, filled with a setting-type compound and spot-primed. A section that has let go of the lath needs to be reattached with plaster washers or adhesive first; a fresh coat over loose plaster only hides it until the next crack appears.

Old trim in these rooms may carry many coats of oil-based gloss. Water-based enamel will not bond to that surface without deglossing and a bonding primer, and skipping that step is a common reason new trim paint peels off in sheets.

Lead dust inside pre-1978 homes

Census tables group construction years by decade, so they cannot isolate 1978, but 71.5% of local housing units were built before 1980. Under the EPA's Renovation, Repair and Painting rule, anyone paid to disturb paint in a home built before 1978 must be certified and use trained workers, and Massachusetts is one of the states that runs its own version of the program.

Indoors, the hazard is dust. Sanding a window stool, scraping a door jamb or cutting out a cracked corner can release fine lead particles that settle on floors and sills, where children and pets pick them up. Lead-safe interior work generally involves:

• Plastic sheeting over floors and doorways to keep dust in the work area
• Misting and hand scraping instead of dry power sanding
• HEPA vacuuming and wet wiping at the end of each day
• A final cleaning check before the room goes back into use

Postwar rooms from the 1950s and 1960s

The 1950s are the largest single decade in the local housing count, with 2,829 units, followed by 1,639 from the 1960s. Walls from that period may be plaster, plaster over gypsum lath, or early gypsum board, and each patches differently, so a quick look behind a switch plate is a cheap way to find out.

Ceilings deserve attention too. Some sprayed textures applied in past decades contained asbestos, so a textured ceiling of unknown age should be tested before anyone scrapes it or rolls a wet coat onto it. A smooth ceiling in an older house may not be perfectly flat, and a dead-flat ceiling paint hides waves and patches far better than eggshell.

If your trim is original stained wood, decide carefully before painting it. White enamel brightens a dark room, but once the grain is covered, getting back to bare wood means stripping every piece.

Rentals, apartments and occupied homes

Renters occupy 46.0% of the town's occupied housing units, and 46.1% of all units sit in buildings with two or more units. For a landlord, the vacancy between tenants is the easiest window to patch nail holes, repaint and reset a unit. Eggshell or satin on walls in halls, kitchens and baths stands up to scrubbing better than flat.

In an occupied house, the work goes room by room so the household keeps a place to sleep and cook. Low-VOC paints cut the smell, and furniture moved to the middle of each room and covered keeps the job moving. Owners of units in an association should also read our condo painting page, since building rules can affect access and work hours.