Unless you can pitch that floor either to a central drain, or to the outside walls and build scuppers into them, forget the tile. I tried this for someone about 6 years ago, and had nothing but trouble with it afterward until they finally completely enclosed it. They said the same thing to me when I said something about pitching the floor-- "Oh, it's covered and we've got the 1/2 walls on 3 sides with the house being the 4th. We've even got trees all the way around, so we shouldn't even get that much blowing rain and snow." So against my better judgement, I did the install. Bad decision. Between melting snow refreezing at night under the tile and popping them, and blowing heavy rain accumulating and getting into the house through the sliders and destroying hardwood right inside the door, that job was one of my worst nightmares in recent history.

I used the bead board from Lowes/HD on my screened-in sun porch. I used it for the knee walls and the ceiling. First I cut all the panels to fit, then (before nailing them on) I put a coat of really good exterior primer/sealer on all sides (even the edges and back side), then 2 coats of good exterior white paint. Then I nailed it up with stainless steel nails. After 2 years it looks good. The key is getting all the edges sealed up so moisture cannot get in and rot the wood.

We are building a screened in porch onto our existing porch. We are using red wood cedar. The porch faces west and we live in Mississippi. I do not know what my options are for finishing the wood. Aesthetically, at first I thought I would either paint or solid color stain the wood white to match the deck railings and the windows and trim on the house. Once the cedar went up I wanted to retain the dark brown color and match it to the brown stained french doors coming off the house into the porch. Issue there is the 10/10 post, the 2/6 boards and the 2/4 boards are all different color cedar. We also plan to have french doors made for the screened porch to mimic the ones on the house. That is another reason I would like to keep the dark wood color. I need to know if there is an option to have the screened porch match the French doors/retaining the dark color of the 2/6’s? And if so, what primer and stain do I use? I also have read I only have about 14 days to start staining the cedar before it loses its absorption properties. If there isn’t an option to stain it to retain the deep brown wood color, do I paint the wood or stain it with a color stain. If so, do I have to sand it and what primer and type of paint would I use. I have spent hours online and calling different stores and seem to get more confused the more I research this. I’m attaching a couple of photos of the screen porch during construction and the French doors going into the house (which need to be refinished soon). Thank you for any advice.

White is a good base and gives you lots of options for fabric.