Painting an internal concrete floor

[peekay]

Hi

 

I'm looking for a bit of advice about painting internal concrete floors. 

 

We moved in to our self build 12 months ago. It is habitable but still not quite finished, and as always, money is tight.

 

The ground floor is about 140m². 90mm drymix screed over UFH.

 

The plasterers made a bit of a mess of the screed with splashes of plaster. Most of it has been scraped off but there are still lots of pink stains. When decorating, we didn't bother protecting the floor, as we expected to be able to hide the splashes under flooring.

 

When we first moved in, we realised that we wouldn't be able to afford flooring for a few more months, so sealed some areas of the paint and plaster splattered floor with this

https://floorseal.co.uk/product/concrete-floor-sealer/

 

some with this

https://www.toolstation.com/bostik-concrete-sealer

 

And some we never actually got round to sealing.

 

It is all looking a bit grotty now, but for financial reasons, and practical reasons it will probably still be a few more years until we put a proper floor finish down.

 

We don't know what that floor finish will be yet. Currently siding on a mix of cork, and marmoleum. But we may use LVT, or microcement.

 

We want to paint the concrete floors for the short to medium term, but are worried that doing so might limit the effectiveness of any adhesives or other materials that might be needed in the future once we have decided what final floor finish we will apply.

 

There seems to be a lot of different varieties of floor paint, that require different preparation but reading through the tech details, I can't figure out whether I can just apply directly over my sealed floors and unsealed areas, and what impact the paint may have on future floor finishes. Light domestic traffic, I don't think we need epoxy.

 

This is what I'm thinking of using, in a jazzy colour 

 

https://www.crowndecoratingcentres.co.uk/paints/interior/floor-coatings-and-protection/crown-trade-fast-drying-concrete-floor-paint

 

It is possible I may be overthinking it, and should just get on with painting whatever I want on there.

 

Any thoughts or advice?

 

Thanks

[Nickfromwales]

Do not paint the floor! You’ll have to scrub it all back off to stick anything down.

 

Buy some student carpet and make runners to go in the middle of thoroughfares and to sort bedrooms do same wall to wall.

 

You’ll spend a few hundred on decent paint, so use that on 2nd hand carpet or very cheap carpet (foam backed).

 

Painting is a very bad idea afaic, and will just keep wearing away if water based. If oil based or 2-pack, it’s there forever and will cost many more hundreds to get rid of.

 

If laying Lino or other bonded flooring you may be able to stick it to a good quality paint product, but then you’ll need to clean / decontaminate / seal / prep / prime / apply the paint so it is not going to lift or degrade before relying on it long term under your eventual new floors. 
 

All this is time and cost, so just buy some cheap crap carpet or Lino is my advice. 

[saveasteading]

1 hour ago, Nickfromwales said:

You’ll spend a few hundred on decent paint, 

If you buy the cheapest garage floor paint it doesn't stick well or last long.

Grey or red probably. So if in 2 years it comes off easily, great. If it doesn't come off then stick to it.

Meantime, keep some for touching up the worn areas.

 

[SteamyTea]

We recently painted the bare concrete floor in our restaurant.

The job was pretty easy, and seems to last well (same paint in the high traffic exhibition area).

If I remember I shall find out the make of paint on Wednesday when I am next in.

[gaz_moose]

Industrial Paint Supplier & Manufacturer UK - Trusted Nationally | BC Paints

 

Black country paints, 2 part floor paint was what was recommended to me when i did my garage floor. It withstands trolly jacks etc..

 

Id buy some cheap carpet or lino by the roll and do the whole house in the same stuff. With lino I've stuck it down with just spray glue around the edges of the concrete floor the double sided tape over the glue once its gone off. Id be more inclined to use lino as i wouldn't have to mess around with gripper rods and stretchers. 

[SteamyTea]

This is the good stuff we used, cheap to.

 

[peekay]

Thanks everyone. 

 

We've looked in to cheap vinyl/lino, but as we have a large area to do, (140m², of which ~100m² is mostly a single continuous but oddly shaped space), we will need 4 joins with 4m wide rolls which as an amateur will be difficult to do tidily. Plus the cheapest I can find is about £9/m², so we are looking at at least £1000 for something temporary that we have a good chance of cocking up. 

 

Thanks for the recommendation of paints. That Teamac stuff looks like a good price and the reviews look good. 

 

On 24/11/2025 at 09:39, Nickfromwales said:

Do not paint the floor! You’ll have to scrub it all back off to stick anything down.

 

Buy some student carpet and make runners to go in the middle of thoroughfares and to sort bedrooms do same wall to wall.

 

You’ll spend a few hundred on decent paint, so use that on 2nd hand carpet or very cheap carpet (foam backed).

 

Painting is a very bad idea afaic, and will just keep wearing away if water based. If oil based or 2-pack, it’s there forever and will cost many more hundreds to get rid of.

 

If laying Lino or other bonded flooring you may be able to stick it to a good quality paint product, but then you’ll need to clean / decontaminate / seal / prep / prime / apply the paint so it is not going to lift or degrade before relying on it long term under your eventual new floors. 
 

All this is time and cost, so just buy some cheap crap carpet or Lino is my advice. 

 

 

If the paint is adhered well enough to the concrete not to flake or peel, would it really need removing before using an adhesive to affix whatever flooring we finally settle on?

 

We've actually already used cheap recycled office style carpet tiles in the bedrooms upstairs. That worked out at about £1.50/m². We did consider doing that in the ground floor hallway/kitchen/diner/sitting area, but would prefer a hard floor.

[saveasteading]

8 minutes ago, peekay said:

cheap recycled office style carpet tiles in the bedrooms upstairs

That's a good option, and easy to stick down. There seems to be quite a big market for these tiles but do check the wear... some are like new while others can be worn through.

But paint everywhere and rugs locally seems the pragmatic way.