Decorating Quote

Aliktren

We had a quote today for the decorating for our house and wanted to run it by you guys and see if anyone has any comments

We have a 4 bedroom chalet bungalow, with a dining room, it's all emulsion at the moment, no wallpaper, so the job, effectively, is re-emulsion the walls , and then paint the new doors and skirting boards we had fitted recently, included in the quote was also to paint to exterior soffits on the 1st floor

The bungalow is a modest size, the quote we had was for £3500, the last quote we had was £4000 excluding the exterior work. We are in Dorset, would anyone know if this sounds reasonable ?

Idiophreak

I don't know anything about these things, but it sounds to me like a couple of cans of paint and a couple of days labour. Doesn't sound a lot for £3.5k

misgrace

Hi there, I am a P&D and I feel this price is quite high, could you give me a bit more info?

Are you supplying the materials?, are the painting of the ceilings included in this price?
Is there much prep involved, IE rough door frames, rough walls etc.

I know you said the doors are new, are they bare wood, or have they been pre-primed when you purchased them?

Did they give you a break down, or a time scale, and how many would be on the job?

misgrace

Idiophreak wrote:

I don't know anything about these things, but it sounds to me like a couple of cans of paint and a couple of days labour. Doesn't sound a lot for £3.5k

Actually to be fair it would be more than a couple days work, specially if there is new doors and skirtings involved for a four bedroom chalet bungalow.

If the doors are new wood and have knots in them, then they have to be knotted and primed, before you even start on your 3 coats of undercoat, let alone your top coats, thats if you want a pukka job done, also there is both sides of the doors, same applies to the skirtings.

You cant rush new wood, or just tosh it over, it has to be done properly, admittidly the emulsion on the walls, if the walls are in good nick and you can crack on, then that side shouldnt be that difficult.
Bearing in mind, if the place is occupied, you have to sheet up everything, move things etc, clean up as you go along, all this takes time.

I have just quoted for a two bed house, including HSL, kitchen, front room bathroom, and its all white ceilings and white walls, frames, skirtings, old doors, but the place is occupied, so I have to do one room at at time.
The masking up takes times also, and moving things from one end to the other.

My quote is no where near what the OP was quoted, but without seeing the job it is difficult to put a price on it.

Aliktren

The doors and skirting are new but already white prepainted.

The vast majority of the house is in good order, there are a small number of places where some making good is required (a bit of the ceiling on one room needs a small amount of artex finish to match the rest of the ceiling), and we need to get all of the skirting "corked" (is that right??) to seal the gaps. There are three MDF cupboard doors that need priming and two coats, otherwise it really should be just a simple paint job, we are having most of the house painted white (which it already is), two of the rooms were painted recently (<6 months) so they just need a fresh coat to touch them up.

The quote, as far as I know (details passed on by the missus) did not include materials.

The quote was for walls, ceilings and woodwork in all rooms

I am not sure if they've left us a breakdown of time, I will be checking that to get an idea of the day rate, since the quote seems a little on the high side to me.

misgrace

Hi there aliktren, by the work you described I would say it defiantely does not warrant the amount they charged you, as specially you have to buy the materials.
When I price a job I include, white emulsion, filler,decorators filler( what you need for the gaps in the skirtings)U/C and gloss or satinwood, as lond as its in white, and I only charge for what I use, but the colour the client buys.

Pity I live too far away,( greater london) as I would have given you a good honest quote, as your job is is right up my street.

When you get a chance, ask them how long they think they will take, and how many will be on the job.

If its a firm, dont forget they have overheads etc, but if its a one man band or a one woman band like me,:D then we havent the overheads a firm would have,yes we have liability insurance, pay tax, petrol the same as anyone else,but we have to buy our tools etc but we dont have to pay for rental of a building or decorating firm, or the electricity and gas to run it.
Therefore a one man band should work out cheaper.

Personally I would get as many quotes as you can,and the work you have described its definately far too much money.

Let me know how you get on.:D

Aliktren

Well, after waiting ages in indecision we decided to pay the guy £750 quid to to the upstairs external fascias and the new internal woodwork and do the rest ourselves :eek: