How to fix a hole in drywall

A friend and I made a valient and successful effort getting my old couch out to the curb. But in that effort, we scratched up my walls, and in one place, made a 6″ hole in the wall.

So, I had to fix it (it was my couch and is my place, so there). It was an easy fix that due to my procrastination, I spread out over 3 weeks. Why did I take so long? Mainly, delusion. The hole had been made, I didn’t have time to watch spackling dry, and then watch paint dry, and I partially hoped it would fix itself.

But real talk, 😉 it is super easy to fix a hole in drywall. Most houses built within the last 50 or so years have walls that are made of dry wall with studs every 16 or 24 inches. With a patch, some spackling or wallboard joint compound, and matching paint, you too can repair a hole in a wall. A literal hole in the wall, that is. The dive bar around the corner is another story.

There are tons of videos on how to fix a hole in drywall. My favorite is this one from an episode of Ask This Old House:

Fix Drywall–Ask This Old House video

One thing I learned from this repair is that when you apply spackling to a patch, do it in thin coats to make sanding easier. The key here is giving everything time to dry. So maybe 3 weeks wasn’t delusional after all (yeah, right).