LESLIE: We’ve got Thomas from Texas on the line who’s got a question about paint. What can we do for you today?
THOMAS: Well, thanks for taking the call. I painted this house – well, it was built almost 10 years ago. And I painted the interior. And I had paint left over, so I kept it. And every once in a while, I have to do touch-ups. And what I’ve found is – even though the paint is originally a flat paint, when I go to do the touch-up, the touch-up is shinier than the old flat paint. Because it’s even gotten flatter. Is there some way to flatten this paint that I have left over so it’ll blend in?
TOM: It sounds like the original paint has faded and now it’s not quite matching the touch-up paint. Is that accurate?
THOMAS: That’s pretty accurate. When you stand off, you can see the difference in the – my touch-up. It’ll be – it’ll look shinier. Now, that may be just because the original paint has aged. I’m not sure.
TOM: So, one thing that you could try is you could take a chip from the wall paint now. If you can possibly get a chip of the faded paint, bring that to a paint store, like a Sherwin-Williams, and have them scan that paint. And they can very, very accurately match that exact color and provide the right finish for the paint – whether it’s flat or eggshell, whatever finish is necessary – so that you get both the finish that matches and the color that matches. It might be that that will give you a better match than the original paint that you held onto.
But in terms of trying to sort of flatten those spots – I don’t know, Leslie, I’m just wondering if something like a Scotch pad or something like that might help take a little bit of the shine off it or a Magic Eraser. But it’s really going to have to be a trial kind of thing – trial and error.
LESLIE: Yeah, you’re going to have to try some stuff. A Magic Eraser might do the trick but it also tends to dull things a little bit by color, not just by sheen. So you try it on an area where you might not notice so much. But that could be the trick. I feel like that does a lot.
THOMAS: I’ll give that a try. I certainly appreciate it.
TOM: Alright. Good luck with that project. Thanks so much for calling us at 888-MONEY-PIT.
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