Garage insulation/sheetrocking - any last thoughts/tips?

[Brian]

Do not texture a garage. It will collect dust, paint overspray, smoke etc and you will NEVER get it clean.

I was wondering about that too. I got the sense reading online that a "smooth" finish might actually cost more than a textured finish though...? On one hand it's a garage, so I'm not too worried about it being perfect, but I don't want to end up being annoyed later seeing seams and having it generally look bad. I've got a ton of junk (still working on decluttering) and cleaning all this out at once is realistically the one and only time I'll do it. Is it realistic to ask them to not do texturing and have it come out with a good decent smooth finish? There's actually currently a cost built in for the texturing, so if it made it cheaper, even better... will ask them what they think next week too.

[Irving]

I was wondering about that too. I got the sense reading online that a "smooth" finish might actually cost more than a textured finish though...? On one hand it's a garage, so I'm not too worried about it being perfect, but I don't want to end up being annoyed later seeing seams and having it generally look bad. I've got a ton of junk (still working on decluttering) and cleaning all this out at once is realistically the one and only time I'll do it. Is it realistic to ask them to not do texturing and have it come out with a good decent smooth finish? There's actually currently a cost built in for the texturing, so if it made it cheaper, even better... will ask them what they think next week too.

Be careful how you ask for a smooth finish. A level five finish is going to be different than just painting with a roller. Painting with a roller will be smooth enough for what you want. Machine texture has hard edges to catch all the dirt like Bert mentioned. There is more drywall mud prepwork involved for a smooth finish than with texture, but I wouldn't think it'd be that much more, especially considering it's for a garage.