How to Repair Light Fixture Ceiling Hole

All the credit for this brilliant method of repairing a hole from a light fixture hole goes to my hubby, Steve. Four years ago, when we moved into our fixer upper, we relocated a lot of lights. This method was so helpful in patching the hole and getting it to blend into the textured ceiling.

The supplies needed:

1- Drywall screws

2- Drill with screw driver

3- Scrap of wood

4- Scrap of drywall (for ours, we kept the dry wall circle cut out for the new light fixture placement)

5- Drywall mud

6- Drywall knifes (small for scooping out the container and large for smoothing out the mud. Our large one was 10″)

7- Paint to match ceiling

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cutting a hole in the ceiling to center the light in the room

You know us crazy girls, 🤪 always wanting everything to be centered and lined up. We requested that the light fixture be moved slightly to the right to be centered on the Bed and Board and Batten wall. Call us crazy, but it was an important element to the design of this master bedroom retreat.

We had this fabulous coastal chandelier to hang and knew if it wasn’t centered, it would throw off the design and look awful! ☹️ Remember happy wife, happy life. 😃

color matching the ceiling paint for the repair

We needed the perfect match of paint. We took our circle of drywall that was removed, to Home Depot and had it color matched in our favorite paint, Behr. The builder did leave a quart of paint for touch ups when Stephanie and Dan built their home, however we quickly learned that it was the wrong white and every touch up was a little off, so frustrating! 🤨

Now with all our supplies in hand we were ready to make the repair.

using a piece of fabric to hold the wood into place while new screws are driven into the board for the ceiling repair

Step 1:

Place a piece of scrap wood up in the hole. It needs to be about 6-7″ longer than the hole. We wrapped a piece of fabric around the board to hold it down while attaching it to the ceiling with screws. When we first attempted this without something to hold it in position, the screw would push the scrap wood away from the drywall.

the board is secured into the ceiling with a screw on each side of the hole

Insert 2 screws through the drywall, holding the board firmly against the ceiling drywall (pull down on the fabric wrapped around the board). Next attach the circle of drywall (previously cut out for the new light fixture). Somehow we inadvertently missed taking a photo of the circle attached to the wood. 🙃 I guess we were too excited to start the drywall mud. We secured the circle of drywall with 2 screws, one on each of the sides of the circle. All 4 screws were installed in a straight line.

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drywall compound to fix the hole in the ceiling

This is the drywall patching mud we used. This particular one comes in a powder form. You just add water and mix until it is the consistency of a brownie batter or thick cake batter. We poured some of the powder in a bucket and added water and mixed until we had the proper consistency. Drywall mud also comes ready to use, no need to add water. Either one will work great.

adding drywall mud to repair the ceiling

Step 2:

Begin by covering the outer edge of the drywall circle and screws with the drywall mud, smooth it out with the larger drywall knife, let dry. Once it is dry, apply more drywall mud over the area in small random blobs. Make sure to go wider than the area that needs to be patched, so it will blend in.

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Using the large drywall knife, smooth out the blobs of mud, matching the texture of the ceiling.

Wait for the drywall mud to completely dry before the next step.

Step 3: Paint the patched area.

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That’s it! You can’t even tell that there was a 4″ hole in the ceiling now! This is really a fairly simple repair and can be done in less than 30 minutes, minus drying time.

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