concrete skirting boards

thegoodlifewannabe

this is my first post so feeling a bit nervous!
what it is i am wanting to redecorate my front room, i put up paintable wallpaper so we could just paint it. the thing is we live in an old council house and the skirting boards are made out of concrete and the paint chips off them very easily and they look horrible i wondered if anybody knew anything that i could put on them or cover them with so they would look smooth and stop them chipping so easily. at the momemt they have under coat on and then gloss paint . now i know the sensible thing to do would be to knock them off replaster and start again but havent really got much money to spend on it any ideas would be greatly appreciated

soz about spelling
thegoodlifewannabe

McKneff

Concrete paint is widely available.
(nowt wrong with your spelling, mate, no need to be soz)

thegoodlifewannabe

oh my god i never thought of that my question sounds a bit daft now thanks mckneff

McKneff

no worries, i have had the honour of being the first to thank you.

MY OH (who was a decorator for many years) says are you sure they are concrete (lots of council houses had these red tiles around the room which acted as skirting boards) he says it would be better if you could strip off all the old stuff first. If you stirp it off with paint remover it has to be completely fre of paint remover by a good washing before yu start again with concrete paint.

thegoodlifewannabe

no there not tiles but under the paint it is brown we had similar stuff on the stairs under the wallpaper and it was like thick brown treacle when we started to remove it so on the skirting we just sanded and painted it my house sounds like a right dive dosent it its not it is quite nice its just the way the council have done things over the years leaves alot to be desired but i was decorating the house whilst in labour with my first child it was a bit of a rush job so some things we had to make do with thanks for your help i really dont know wether to take them off and do it properly cause we dont know if we might be moving house soon but if the housing market doesnt pick up we wont be going anywhere and if it was me who was going to live here for years to come id rather save a bit more and start from scratch
oh i dont know what to do:think: