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" Whenever I clean a mark off my walls, I leave a weird shiny patch in the paint that&amp;#039;s really visible. What am I doing wrong? CARL MINCHEW (Director of Product Development, Benjamin Moore): What you&amp;#039;ve done is what we call burnishing. You&amp;#039;ve stripped off and smoothed out some of the original paint&amp;#039;s texture. You rubbed too hard, and before that, you may have left the stain on too long. The trick to keeping painted walls clean is to react quickly to stains \u2014 time is of the essence. Then how should I clean them? Start with clear water on a rag or a nonabrasive sponge or paper towel, and rub the stain gently. If that doesn&amp;#039;t work, dip the rag or sponge into water mixed with a little dishwashing liquid, the milder the better. If the stain persists, the next step would be to apply a few drops of soap directly onto the wet sponge or cloth you&amp;#039;re using. For more stubborn cases, you could apply a little soap right onto the stain. If you finally need to resort to a stronger product like Fantastik or Formula 409, realize they have pretty strong solvents in them that can soften the paint surface, especially if they&amp;#039;re left on for a while. Make sure that whatever you do to get rid of the stain, you rinse the wall afterward with plain water. Do different kinds of stains require different treatments? There are basically two kinds of stains: oil- and waterborne. Frequently just a wet cloth takes off the waterborne ones \u2014 wine, Jell-O, ketchup, mustard, even smashed mosquitoes. For oily stains \u2014 cooking grease, crayon, shoe polish, lipstick \u2014 you may need to escalate to the mild dishwashing soap method. How do you deal with permanent markers? What makes them &amp;quot;permanent&amp;quot; is pretty much the same chemical engineering that makes paint permanent. So try dishwashing liquid, then work your way up to more aggressive treatments like Comet on a sponge, or on a sponge with an abrasive side. Get off as much marker as you can, but at some point you may well cause so much abrasion that you&amp;#039;ll need to repaint. Before you do, use stain-blocking primer over whatever&amp;#039;s left of the marker. What about scratches or dents from chairs, strollers, or picture frames? You can prevent some of that damage by putting clear- or light-colored rubber bumpers on the backs of your chairs. Or you could install a protective chair-rail strip. Also consider hanging picture frames from two hooks instead of just one, so they don&amp;#039;t shift around as much. For scars you already have on walls, you can do touch-ups with paint from the leftover cans. Be sure to smooth out any abrasion beforehand, and keep your patches as small as possible. Don&amp;#039;t get tempted to apply a big swatch \u2014 it will show. For little patches, stipple and dab on the paint. That will even out the gloss and sheen and minimize the difference in texture between new and old paint. Do you recommend that I vacuum my walls once in a while, the way I do to maintain upholstery? Only if you have serious cobweb problems, or dust left over from construction. Make sure you use the brush attachment on your vacuum, not anything metal that would scuff the walls. Is there a kind of paint or finish that&amp;#039;s easier to clean, and most resistant to damage? The more gloss or sheen in the product, the more latex polymer there is. A smoother surface resists stains and water-drip marks, because it gives dirt fewer places to congregate. So generally, we recommend a flat finish for living rooms, dining rooms, bedrooms, hallways. A satin or pearl finish works, too, though some may think the finish a bit bright for bedroom walls. Semigloss and gloss we recommend mainly for kitchens, baths, trim, and doors. What&amp;#039;s the most common painting mistake people make? They don&amp;#039;t prepare the surface sufficiently, in their rush to start painting. You have to clean your walls thoroughly. There are usually handprints around the light switches, cobwebs in the corners, soap build-up and lotion spots in the bathrooms, greasy smoke residue in the kitchen. Paint will stick to that kind of dirt, but the dirt won&amp;#039;t stick to the walls, so you&amp;#039;ll quickly get paint failure in those spots. And one more mistake people make: They underestimate the value of good tools. Use the type of traditional bristle brush or moderate-nap roller that&amp;#039;s recommended on your paint cans, ask your retailer for advice, and don&amp;#039;t be stingy, or else you&amp;#039;ll end up with tools that shed fibers into your paint. Carl Minchew is the director of product development at BenjaminMoore.com. New, Time Saving Painting Products       "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.housebeautiful.com/lifestyle/cleaning-tips/advice/a104/maintenance-painted-walls-0308/>