I have a double wide mobile home, built new in 1989, as a piece of rental property. My husband and I lived in it while we built our house, then bought a lot in town and moved the mobile onto it for rental. Since my husband was killed last March, and I am a stay -at home -Mom, the income from it is important to me. It came with that ugly sheet rock covered in wall paper, with thin strips of molding over the seams, with no matching of the print--those of you that have manufactured homes know what I mean. I pulled off the molding, and mudded the seams, scrubbed it all down with TSP, and painted it in a semi-gloss white latex. It actually turned out great! But the lady who has rented it for the last several years, apparently fried a lot of food, and never washed the walls. She moved out last month, and that's when I found out she has had a boyfriend who smoked. (My own fault, I never specified non-smokers). Anyway, the kitchen walls have dried "beads" of grease, colored brown from the cigarette smoke, from above the sink, over the stove, and around 3/4's of the kitchen,and are REALLY bad between the range and range hood-which she apparently never used--the fan, I mean. So far, I have tried TSP with water, bleach water, cleanser, etc. Then I got tough--I tried straight TSP powder on a sponge, and dishwasher detergent on a sponge, straight powder, no dilution. The latex paint on the wall has gotten thin enough to be able to see the wall paper pattern through it, but the beads and runs of smoke-stained grease are still there! So here's my thought, and I would like to get everyone's response....I was thinking about sanding it all down, but since I'm already down to the wallpaper in some spots, that doesn't sound like too good an idea. You all have talked about using Kilz paint...which I should have mentioned, I did use on the smoke stained ceilings...I just used the rollers with the poles attached, and it didn't even take that long. But you guys have talked about a new 'latex' kilz...would that work? Can it seal kitchen grease? And if so, can I just paint over it with regular latex semi-gloss paint? And what about the "texture" of the grease beads? Should I just paint it and texture be damned? And, should I put another coat of regular old semi gloss paint over the Kilz? This whole thing is taking up my time from the farm, but I can't afford to not have the place rented out, so this has to be my top priority right now. The bathroom walls were painted the same way, but without the grease, they cleaned up with a quick swipe of bleach water, as did the familyroom, living room, and bedrooms, they have that mobile-home linen-look wallpaper. I should mention that my renter was a really sweet gal, and she, too, had tried to clean up the kitchen walls, and forfeited her whole damage deposit, which, with some money the escrow account has earned in interest, will pay for new carpeting, so I will be able to get rid of the awful cigarette smell, and I have already written the new lease about non-smokers. I hope you guys can give me advice about the new Latex Kilz, and what it can and can't do. Thanking you in advance. God Bless. K.T.

-- K.T.Simon (KTS@hotmail.com), October 15, 2001

Answers

K.T. I had to repaint some kitchen cabinets once that had the grease built up from the previous owners. I used spic-n-span to wash down the cabinets. It works pretty good at getting the grease off. There is a liquid and a powder. I used the powder, so that if I had a particularly stubborn spot I could put a little bit of the powder right on my sponge and give it a little elbow grease. For the stains that just won't come off the Kilz will work great. I love the stuff. But you might use a good kitchen/bath paint that will be washable for in the future. It will make clean up of the kitchen a whole lot easier. Good luck to you. Kim :-D

-- Kim in Indiana (kwcountrygirl@aol.com), October 15, 2001.

Ugh.... Sounds like that filthy old trailer I lived in way back when I was in college. If all this grease sticks to wall so effectively, imagine what a heavy grease diet does to one's innards. Can try liquid dishwashing detergent, some are suppose to be real effective on grease. Next strongest detergent is laundry detergent. I even washed caked on grease off old engine oil pan once with this. Wear gloves, laundry detergent is STRONG but should dissolve any kitchen grease.(Use liberally in hot water and apply with kitchen scrubber, steel wool, or stiff cleaning brush.) Alternatively can try GoJoe or some other type mechanics hand cleaner. I use the cheapest AutoZone orange scented kind when working on cars. Be kinda expensive for washing walls though. Last resort try rag dipped in mineral spirits or kerosene. Do only small areas at a time to lessen any fire hazard and have windows open. Dont use gasoline. Its extremely flammable and really dangerous.

Cheaper than Kiltz is regular old aluminum oil based enamel paint. I've used it to seal water stains on ceilings. Covers real well and doesnt show through when covered with good latex wall paint. Being oil based, the aluminum enamal might even help dissolve grease on walls. I wouldnt count on it and would try to clean walls first though.

-- Hermit John (Hermit@hilltop_homestead.zzn.com), October 15, 2001.

We just went through this in the house we bought.

It's pretty smelly but I've never found anything that works better yet than plain old hot water, NON-CHLORINE detergent with a healthy shot of ammonia in it. Wear latex gloves and have good ventilation. If hot water, soap and ammonia won't get that grease off it won't come off.

The new Latx Kilz doesn't say anything on the label about covering grease stains as I just carefully read the labels on both types, latex and oil based. I went with the oil based and it covered my grease saturated bare particle board beautifully. Two coats of Kilz and two coats of Permawhite bathroom paint and the ugly areas look quite nice now. We had scrubbed the wood until it was starting to disintegrate but of course there was no way to get all the grease out, just the loose stuff on top.

You probably alread know it but that oil based Kilz simply MUST be used with LOTS of ventilation. The primary solvent in it seems to be naptha and it will do a number on your head if you don't have lots of airflow. Sure works well though.

={(Oak)-

-- Live Oak (oneliveoak@yahoo.com), October 15, 2001.

Another option might be to just forget the whole thing and paper over with that heavy wallpaper made for things like that. It is a heavy textured paper (in several textured designs). You hang it just like regular wallpaper but it covers up a multitude of sin. You then just paint it, and it looks just like a regular textured wall. It will stick to anything and cover ANYTHING! It is not too expensive (not much more than buying a bunch of cleaning products and kilz) and you can get it at K-Mart, Lowes, Home Depot and the like. At least it would quickly solve the problem and be worth the investment. It truly does look wonderful when done and would add value for re- renting!

-- Karen (db0421@yahoo.com), October 15, 2001.

This is so weird, I am looking at my kitchen right now.Dh and I have spent the last 3 days redoing it. I had pannelling up and it was dark. Originally we were going to remove the panelling, drywall and then paint. Then I descovered paintable, textured wallpaper. It cost about $10.00 a roll.There is no matching so no waste. The directions say it will cover panneling and even concrete blocks. It does say that you dont have to paint it but the seems were visible so we put a coat of semi-gloss paint on it. You cannot tell there is panelling underneath. It also covered a hole that was in the 1 wall. Very easy to work with. I really think you should consider this if you can hang wallpaper. If the walls are allready scrubbed down and the underlaying paper is still that attached it should hang without a problem. It even says you can use this for a ceiling. Totally invested for my kitchen was $40.00 for the wallpaper and $20.00 for paint. It looks brand new. Good luck

-- tracy (murfette@stargate.net), October 15, 2001.

I find that high gloss paint works much better than flat paint to wash. I once had a painter turn down my job because I insisted on useing high gloss paint everywhere, all rooms, ceilings. Because I'd much rather wash stains than repaint.

I respectfully disagree with putting more wallpaper. Someone else is not going to take the care with it that you would. Some renter's kid (or my own, for that matter) will find a loose spot and start to rip.

IF you think it was hard cleaning up the painted wall---think what cleaning up the wallpapered wall will be like. YUK! I like the look of wallpaper but not the TOTAL waste when a small part is ruined.

I know you are in tight finances right now--did you know that you can get paint free at some recycling centers? It doesn't even matter if two cans are the same color--mix!

Renting is always dicey business--Let's hope wiping grease off the wall is the least of your problems.

Im pulling for ya,Ann

-- Ann Markson (tngreenacres@hotmail.com), October 15, 2001.

If you liked them painted the first time you will like them painted again, but you don't want the little dots to show up right? Well I had a room with uneven walls and every time you tryed somthing it still looked uneven. Riped wall board and lots of bad patches someone did. Well I did not want to go to all the trouble of putting up new walls so I found a med tan paint I liked and then got two more lighter tans in the same color scale. Go to a paint store and the sales man will help you. Wal Mart paint sales people won't know what your talking about so get someone who knows what that means. Its really simple you just don't want your colors to clash. Anyway I take the darkest paint you got and paint the walls. Then spong on the other two one at a time. Then the last step take the darkest one and just spong toches of it here or there. So you can't tell where one ends and the other begins. It hides everything!! IT now looks like I have very even wall and its beautiful. Everyone who has gone in that room since I have painted it says it looks like it has swade leather on the walls. I over sponge so the lines are a little fuzzy.

-- Teresa (c3ranch@socket.net), October 15, 2001.

K.T.--You can also put up wallpaper liner and paint over it. We have done it and it worked great. We got a lot of it at Big Lots on clearance. It usually doesn't cost too much at other stores though.I have never had any problem with any of it coming loose.

-- vicki in NW OH (thga76@aol.com), October 15, 2001.

The only thing I want to add is to reinforce the ventilation thing. If you have not used kilz before and do not ventilate well you can get quite high. We experinced this years ago and thought we had ventilated well, boy when we figured out why everything was so funny it was kind of scarry. Lynn

-- Lynn (johnnypfc@yahoo.com), October 15, 2001.

Try regular household ammonia in water. The stronger you can stand the faster it will remove the grease and smoke. Followed by kilz, not the latex variety. I did this in many houses I painted. It usually works quite well, and doesn't cost a fortune.

Hope this is helpful.

Talk to you later.

-- Bob in WI (bjwick@hotmail.com), October 15, 2001.