What do you do if you need to apply latex paint over an old oil painted surface?

I know there are primers out there for that, but every monkey behind the home depot or lowe's counter gives me a different story about which one to use, and the can or company spec's are not at all helpful either!!What do you do if you need to apply latex paint over an old oil painted surface?
lightly sand the surface and paint it, the stores will tell you to prine first.....the fact of the matter is that you can paint latex over oil, but you cannot paint oil over latex.....painting contractor of 20 yearsWhat do you do if you need to apply latex paint over an old oil painted surface?
I believe you must sand the surface lightly, then use Killz water base primer, if it beats up, then you must use a paint remover or heavy sand the surface. In either case it could be a frustrating process.


good luck!
What I would do is sand down the wall to get any loose paint and some of the oil paint off. Then I would prime it wil KILLZ. Its a grey primer. Let that dry for at least 24-48 hours. Observe the area. If it is even and you dont see any more marks continue with your painting. Other wise give it one more coat of killz and let that dry.. and you should be good to go!
You can prime if you like.


But you will probably do a two coat job, so if the new color is darker just apply th enew paint if the the old color is much darker then prime the area first.
Yep, don't have much to add. You'll either want to sand lightly or use TSP. Be sure you rinse well if you use TSP. Then any acrylic bonding primer will do. Kilz (the blue can: waterbase) will do. I believe Home Depot carries ';Gripper'; , that's good as well. The one thing to be careful about is that these primers are usually pretty thick so just be careful when you use it so you don't get large visible brush strokes.





It's such a simple thing and a shame that Home Depot/Lowes doesn't see fit to train their employees AT ALL seems like... I've painted for over 10 yrs, and always find myself answering questions for people when the paint department people have no idea what they're talking about. I wish they would just say they don't know instead of trying to fake some answer.





One more thing. If you have any questions about whether the primer will work, just call the 800 number on the can and ask if it's a bonding primer. Bonding primers are the waterbase type that will stick to oil.
Wash the walls with Tri Sodium Phosphate....(TSP) let dry and buy a water based primer (Kilz) is good if the color you are painting over is dark (two coats) if the color you are painting is dark tint the primer and you won't have as much work...

ie tab