Painting over knock down texture

[lynnie2183]

We have a new house where all of the walls have knock down texturing. We painted my son's bedroom over the weekend and it took 4 coats and 3 gallons of paint (light blue Olympic) to thoroughly cover these walls. I'd like to paint some of the other rooms, but not if its going to take 4 coats and two days each to do! We did not use a primer since we were just painting over brand new off white paint. We did switch to the biggest fluffiest roller we could find, but it didn't help all that much.

Should we have primed? Should we rent a paint sprayer instead for this kind of heavily textured wall? It was like painting on a sponge.

Thank you!

[pushkins]

Prime...Prime....Prime.

If the paint your covering was sprayed on (very thin layer) or is a flat paint then you need to prime first, cheap paints often used in new builds or cheaper remodels will soak up better paint like a sponge. It's always a good idea to prim first anyway as it usually takes 2 top coats to get a high quality finish.
I like Zinzzer as a primer (water based) available at Lowe's.

[baobei816]

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