Painting Basement Walls

We just had the draintile replaced in our bassement. So, while we are waiing the 30days for the new floor sections to cure, and while it is fairly cleaned out, we wanted to repaint the basement walls. The house was built in the early 50's, and the previous owners have painted the walls at least once. The paint is in good condition (no peeling or efflouresence), but we don't know what kind it is. We are leary of scraping incase it's lead based. My question is: Since it's already painted and a UGL type of paint won't penetrate, can we just use any latex based wall paint?

Hi gkinner, welcome to the forum

You may want to inquire about the local building codes in your area about painting over lead-based paints first because they may require you to remove that paint first before repainting

You can test if it is latex or oil by wiping with de-natured alcohol. If the alcohol cleans it, is an oil based paint. If it removes the paint then it is latex. Using a bonding primer will work regardless and then cover with a latex paint.

Your local paint dealer is a great resource and will have knowledge of common local practices - and might be able to give you some more tips as to what was used to paint your basement.