There are texture paint available for the homeowner that can be purchased through paint stores and home centers. The product is usually white and could be tinted to a light color. There are also products available by Bondex that can be added to create texture in paint. You can also consider Venetian Plaster, which is a faux finish product that can add texture to a wall. It requires a base coat color and then use the Venetian Plaster over the base coat.

Hi there, I'm pretty new to this forum, but I'll take a stab at your question. What kind of a texture do you want on your walls? Spanish style, plaster-look, little bumps, knock-down? I have manually skip-troweled some of the walls in my home, and created a plaster-like finish on the others. I use topper joint compound: it's cheap and easy to work with. The only tools you need are two trowels, one long (I use 12") and one short (I like the four inch wide ones) and finally a rectangular plastic tray with a metal edge for the joint compound. You load a small amount of the joint compound on the knife and smear it on the wall. It takes a bit of practice to get the effect you like, but what's nice about the stuff is you can actually practice on the wall if you like, just scrape it back off while it's still wet if you don't like it. A wet sponge will take off any left behind. If you want a "knock down" or bumpy texture you can buy spray cans of the stuff which have directions on how to do it. I don't know how you would use a paint to make texture. Paint's expensive, too. Good luck on your project. And good for you, taking it on yourselves. Renee

What spackle compound are you using? It needs to dry thoroughly prior to sanding and priming. Be sure it's sanded flush with the wall. When finished sanding, there shouldn't be any spackle on the wall, just what is filling the damaged area. Try priming it with a 4" roller cover instead of a brush.

There is such a thing as textured, paintable wallpaper - it is meant to be painted, but if this is not that - if it is simply textured, then you need to remove it, wash the glue off the walls, prime and paint. Otherwise, the paint will make it very hard to remove later or cause it to bubble up and start to fall down.