Interior Painting Cost Calculator
Repainting the inside of a 2,000 square foot house runs about $6,865 in Atlanta for walls and ceilings — $6,096 to $7,635 — using 36.5 gallons across 6,836 square feet of surface. That surface is the number that matters: your floor area is 2,000 square feet and your walls are 4,836. A price per square foot means two completely different things depending on which one the person quoting had in mind, and most of them never say.
Estimate the cost for your home
Estimated cost of painting the interior
$6,870
typical · range $6,100 to $7,640 · 4,836 sq ft of wall from 2,000 of floor · 36.5 gallons · 2 coats · 96.6 trade hours
Labour priced at national wages. Enter a ZIP code to price it for your area. 33% of this figure comes from modelled material prices — each line shows its own uncertainty.
Priced from bls.gov Aug 2026how every line is sourced
The one input that changes the answer for you.
Ceilings are flat white and go on fast, but everything below has to be covered and the painter works looking up all day. Worth doing at the same time as the walls rather than later, because the masking is done once instead of twice.
The usual state of a lived-in house: holes, scuffs, hairline cracks at corners, gaps where trim meets wall. More than twice the preparation hours of a sound wall, and the difference between a wall that looks new and one that looks painted.
Two coats, no primer. Two rather than one is not upselling: a single coat over an existing colour looks fine while it is wet and patchy once it dries, particularly on a wall that gets side light.
Where most of the value is. Better coverage means fewer coats, which across a whole house can pay for the difference in labour alone, and a washable finish is the difference between wiping a mark off and repainting a wall.
What the two other choices are worth
| Walls only | $4,981 |
|---|---|
| Walls and ceilings | $6,870 |
| Walls, ceilings, trim and doors | $8,610 |
| Builder grade paint | $5,958 |
|---|---|
| Mid range paint | $6,870 |
| Premium paint | $8,275 |
Going from builder grade to premium is $2,318 on this job, while adding trim and doors is $1,740. Paint grade moves the total far less than people expect, because most of what you are buying is hours — which is also the argument for spending the difference: better paint that covers in two coats instead of three saves a coat of labour, and labour costs more than the tin.
1 / 5
The figure above is already calculated. Each step just makes it more yours, and you can stop at any of them.
Nobody paints square feet of floor
| Surface | Square feet | Cost per sq ft |
|---|---|---|
| Floor — what people quote by | 2,000 | $3.44 |
| Wall and ceiling — what gets painted | 6,836 | $1.00 |
Your walls come to 2.42 square feet for every one of floor once the openings are taken out, and that is before the ceilings. So the same job is $3.44 a square foot or $1.00, depending only on which surface the person quoting means — and most of them do not say. ⚠️ That is the single biggest reason two painting quotes look impossible to compare. The conversion is derived rather than asserted: an average room of 150 square feet is about 12 feet 3 inches square, its perimeter is four times that, and each room paints its own faces. Openings for 10 doors and 12 windows are then taken out.
The one number you can check afterwards
This job takes about 36.5 gallons — 6,836 square feet at 2 coats, and a gallon covers 350 to 400 square feet per coat on smooth sealed walls. That figure is printed on the tin, not estimated by us. Everything else on a painting quote is hours, and hours are a matter of opinion until the work is done. The tins are not: count the empties at the end and you know whether the surface was what everybody assumed and whether it got the coats it was sold.
Where two quotes actually differ
| Condition of the walls | Trade hours | Cost |
|---|---|---|
| Sound — a few nail holes | 70.6 | $5,626 |
| Normal — filling, sanding and caulking | 96.6 | $6,870 |
| Poor — peeling, patches, previous bad work | 144.4 | $9,156 |
Same house, same paint, same number of coats: $3,530 between sound walls and poor ones. ⚠️ Preparation is not the part of the job you can see afterwards, which is exactly why it is the part a cheap quote removes. Two quotes for the same rooms that differ by thousands are usually not disagreeing about paint: one of them has looked at the walls and the other has assumed. Ask both what they intend to fill, sand and caulk, and get the answer in writing before comparing the totals.
| Line item | Qty | Cost | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| Paint — mid rangeroller surface × coats ÷ 375, when this grade is chosen | 36.5gallon | $1,533–$2,482 | estimated±24% |
| Masking, filler, caulk, abrasives and covers1 per job | 1each | $120–$380 | estimated±52% |
| Preparation: filling, sanding, caulking and maskingroller surface × hours per sq ft for its condition × lead factor | 47.9hour | $2,209–$2,373 | sourced |
| Cutting in and rollingroller surface × 0.0033 hours × coats × lead factor | 45.1hour | $2,080–$2,234 | sourced |
| Moving and protecting furniture0.0018 hours per square foot of floor, when the house is furnished | 3.6hour | $158–$170 | sourced |
| Total | $6,100–$7,640 | ±11% |
Where these numbers come from
- Nobody paints square feet of floor
- Every cost page for interior painting is indexed by the floor area of the house, which is the one surface the painter never touches. The conversion is not hard, but it has to be stated: take an average room of 150 square feet, treat it as square, and its perimeter is four times its side. Each room is painted on its own faces, so a wall between two bedrooms counts once from each side — which is correct, because both sides get painted. That gives 2.42 square feet of wall for every square foot of floor at an eight-foot ceiling, after taking out the openings for doors and windows. So this job is $3.43 a square foot or $1.00, and both numbers describe exactly the same work. ⚠️ It is the main reason two quotes are impossible to line up: they are frequently using different denominators, and neither has said so. The assumption is published here so you can redo it with the real room sizes of your own house.
- The one line you can check after the work is done
- A painting quote is almost entirely hours, and hours are an opinion until the job is finished. Gallons are not. Paint covers 350 to 400 square feet per gallon per coat on smooth sealed surfaces, and that figure is printed on the tin by the manufacturer rather than estimated by us. This house takes about 36.5 gallons for 2 coats. Count the empty tins at the end: if there are far fewer than the surface called for, either the second coat was thin or it was not a second coat. That is the only independent check a homeowner has on this trade, it costs nothing, and it is worth more than any amount of reading about brands. It also cuts the other way — a crew that used the gallons has done the work, whatever the walls look like under bad lighting on the day.
- Preparation is the job, and it is what a cheap quote deletes
- On these walls, filling, sanding, caulking and masking is 47.9 hours against 45.1 to cut in and roll the paint. Same rooms, same paint, same coats: $5,618 on sound walls and $9,159 on poor ones, a gap of $3,540. ⚠️ Preparation is invisible once the paint is on, which is exactly why it is the line that disappears from a competitive quote. When two prices for the same rooms differ by thousands they are rarely disagreeing about paint — one has looked at the walls and the other has assumed. Ask each what they intend to fill, sand and caulk, in writing, before you compare the totals. By contrast the grade of paint moves the total surprisingly little: $5,953 on builder grade against $8,271 on premium.
- Before 1978 this is regulated work
- The federal lead programme exempts only what it calls minor repair and maintenance —
Minor repair and maintenance activities are activities … that disrupt 6 square feet or less of painted surface per room for interior activities or 20 square feet or less of painted surface for exterior activities
— so a repaint passes the threshold on the first wall. The same rule closes the obvious loophole:Jobs, other than emergency renovations, performed in the same room within the same 30 days must be considered the same job for the purpose of determining whether the job is a minor repair and maintenance activity
. In practice, in a pre-1978 house any real painting job means a certified firm, containment, dust-extracting tools and cleaning verification, and on this model it takes the same work from $6,865 to $8,825. The rule is at 40 CFR 745 subpart E, Residential Property Renovation and the programme is explained at EPA, Lead Renovation, Repair and Painting Program, both retrieved 2026-08-23; why it exists is at CDC, Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention. Working above six feet brings in 29 CFR 1926 Subpart M, Fall Protection (govinfo.gov), which matters more on our exterior page than here. Wages from BLS OEWS, May 2025, for painters and construction labourers, retrieved 2026-08-20, with benefit load from BLS ECEC. - Material prices
- Modelled estimates, not sourced prices. No public, machine-readable source of US residential material prices exists, and we would rather say so than pretend otherwise. Each line carries its own uncertainty band. How we estimate them.
Contractor overhead and profit applied at 33–43% over direct cost. Data last reviewed 2026-08-23.
What this figure does not include
- Repairing damaged plaster or drywall
- Filling nail holes and hairline cracks is preparation and is priced here. A hole, a failed joint or a water-stained ceiling is a repair, and it comes before painting rather than as part of it.
- Wallpaper removal
- Unpredictable by nature: some comes off in sheets and some takes the paper face of the drywall with it. Nobody can price it honestly without testing a corner first.
- Lead testing or abatement
- The containment and lead-safe practices priced here are what a certified firm does while renovating. Testing for lead, and abatement — permanently removing it — are different services with their own pricing.
- Cabinets
- Painting kitchen cabinets is a different job with different products, usually sprayed and often taken away to a shop. It is not a trim line item.
- Textured or popcorn ceilings
- They drink paint, and if they went up before the eighties they can contain asbestos, which means testing rather than scraping. Neither is modelled here.
- Furniture that needs two people or a specialist
- The furniture line assumes ordinary household contents. A piano, a large aquarium or a wall-mounted television are their own conversation.
Questions people actually ask
How much should it cost to paint the interior of a 2000 square foot house?
About $6,865 in Atlanta for walls and ceilings in normal condition, two coats of mid-range paint, the house furnished — a range of $6,096 to $7,635. Walls only is $4,972; adding trim and doors takes it to $8,609. The single largest swing is not the paint: sound walls come to $5,618 and poor ones $9,159, a difference of $3,540 on identical rooms. And note that 2,000 square feet of floor is 4,836 square feet of wall plus 2,000 of ceiling, which is what anybody is actually pricing.
How do you calculate interior painting cost?
In three steps, and the first one is the one most quotes skip. Convert floor area to wall area: an average room of 150 square feet is about 12 feet 3 inches square, its perimeter is four times that, and every room is painted on its own faces — which comes to 2.42 square feet of wall for each one of floor at an eight-foot ceiling, before openings. Second, convert surface to gallons: 350 to 400 square feet per gallon per coat, printed on the tin. Your house needs about 36.5. Third, price the hours — preparation, cutting in and rolling, trim — and add the paint. Everything except the gallons is a judgement, which is why the gallons are worth checking.
How much do interior painters usually charge?
On this model a painter's billed hour in Atlanta is $46 to $50, built from a published BLS median wage of $24 an hour nationally, an area multiplier of 1.003, the federal benefit load, and a declared contractor markup. The whole chain is on our method page. But the useful comparison is per square foot, and it is where people talk past each other: this job is $3.43 per square foot of floor or $1.00 per square foot of what actually gets painted. Both are true, they differ by a factor of about 2.42, and most quotes never say which one they mean.
What is the average cost to paint the inside of a 1500 square foot home?
About $5,191 in Atlanta on the same assumptions — walls and ceilings, normal condition, two coats, furnished — which is 5,101 square feet of surface and 27.3 gallons. Notice it is not three quarters of the 2,000 square foot figure: 76% of it, because setting up, masking and moving furniture do not shrink with the house. Two things move it more than size does. An empty house is $6,719 instead of $6,865. And if it was built before 1978, lead-safe work takes it to $8,825.
Taken from Google’s “people also ask” results for this search on 2026-08-23, not invented.
Other cost calculators
The first of these are the jobs closest to this one — the ones that turn up in the same quote, or instead of it.
- Exterior painting cost
Prices the same house on five wall materials, because texture decides the gallons and the substrate decides the preparation hours.
- Drywall installation cost
A 1,500 square foot house takes about 6,000 square feet of board — four times its floor area. This works out the sheets, the hours and what the finish level really costs.
- Whole house generator cost
Publishes how many cubic feet of gas an hour each size demands beside its price, which is what decides whether your supply can feed it.
- The full interior painting cost dataset
Every unit price, every quantity rule and the reasoning behind each estimate, as a plain table.
- How we calculate
The formula, the sources, and an honest account of which parts of the model are weak.