I hate popcorn ceilings

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I live in an old house with popcorn ceilings and the popcorn is starting to fall from the ceiling creating a nasty mess on things. I wish I didn't have popcorn ceilings.

Do you rent or own the house?

Um, how old is the house?

I ask because this could be a health concern.

Seriously.

Removing popcorn ceilings and making them flat & smooth as glass is one of the parts of my job from time to time. I've done several. It can be fairly lucrative, too.. I have one to finish up over the next week and then another one to start - but these are newer-ish homes.

If the house is pre-1985 in Canada, drywall mud (what textured ceilings are made out of) contained Asbestos FOR SURE. It was still used for a few years afterwards, too, so we just assume that anything 1990 or prior is containing & take appropriate precautions. In a perfect world that means NOT scraping it off & simply priming it with an oil based primer, the coating over it with fast set to really seal it in, rough sanding the high spots, then skim coating it with drywall mud, finish sanding it smooth, priming & painting. However, if it must come off we'll wear respirators and tyvec suits, seal off the room/building, spray it with water ~1m^2 at a time so it scrapes off in clumps that fall vs. creating airborne fibres that could be breathed in.

Wherever you live, you want to find out of drywall mud contained asbestos at the time your home was constructed. Chances are pretty good that it DID. The lowest cost way of mitigating risk of breathing in asbestos fibres from it would be to paint it with a couple of coats of high quality oil based primer to really seal it all in so that it cannot fall off your ceiling, releasing fibres when it does.

The more exposure to asbestos the worse it is for you.. and you cannot ever get the stuff out of your lungs. It's got microscopic barbs on it like fish hooks. You breathe it in and it stays there. Decades later, for those who were exposed to the stuff for a career, it can develop into asbestosis and/or contribute to a variety of lethal lung cancers. Most of the people who die from this stuff spent decades working with the material BEFORE it was common knowledge how dangerous it is. You're not gonna die. But living in a home where that is happening isn't exactly ideal. Tons of people live in older homes with asbestos containing popcorn ceilings.. but if they're doing that (dropping bits of it) I HIGHLY recommend sealing your ceilings with a couple coats of good oil based primer, even if you never put a proper coat of white ceiling paint over top, as it'll be FAR healthier if you do.

Or don't, chances are you won't ever develop lung cancer and die from it, but, knowing what I know about the stuff it's not a risk I would take when $100 worth of primer & paint supplies could completely mitigate that risk - especially if there are young lungs in the home. Just saying.