Plastering and painting - how much ?

bluedrop

Hi all,
How much should it cost to:

1. Strip wall paper (single layer - old) and wood chip on cieling
2. Replaster
3. Paint (neutral colour)

I am in Beckenham -SE London

I have two quotes: One for £7000+ and another for £5100.
I am supplying the paints in both cases.

LEJC

there are various elements to your question and it wouldnt be the same person doing all 3 bits .

Firstly the stripping of the wallpaper on a whole house may be up to a weeks worth of work possibly longer dependant on how easy it is to remove...therefore as a rough guess this part of the quote will probably come in at no less than £625

Its reasonably easy to strip wllpaper yourself...and in honesty if there are areas that youre looking to save money on with your refurbishment then this is one that will be manageable....in fact if my memory serves me right you did start a thread about wallpaper stripping previously and the general concensus was its very achievable to do yourself

The plastering aspect would need to be done after the stripping by a plasterer...very generally you can probably guess at a rough figure by calculating £100 per surface...or probably £400-500 per room to include the ceiling...those figures certainly seem to justify what we paid for plastering/skimming.

In terms of painting again its a man hour calculation...we didnt obtain quotes for this as unfortunatley our budget just would not stretch to it...but having said that because all the walls were smooth the paint has gone on reasonably easy...
Dont underestimate how much paint you will actually use,we have literally used bucket fulls of trade white and magnolia...and you need to factor in drying time between coats...your painting quotes...does that include stripping skirting boards and any other wooden surfaces or just literally the walls?...adding woodwork in the form of skirtings and doors will invarably increase the quote substantially,.

I believe that you could possibly half the price of the quotes youve had if potentially you are prepared to do the stripping and the painting yourself...but realistically your quotes seem a little high but probably not excessively high once you factor in the painting..I would expect the figue for all 3 bits to be somewhere between your two figures if you had tradesmen to do all.

bluedrop

thanks LEJC. You are my lifeline!! I appreciate your inputs in my threads

The thing is, we both work full time. I work on contract basis and so if I take leave, I dont get paid. I get paid £500 a day so it doesnt make sense for me to take a day off to work on site.

My husband has leaves. But he is ZERO at DIY. He is not on MSE coz he never thinks its important to save money. He is the kind who will just walk into a highstreet store and pay the first quote for a bathroom (bathstore). I shopped around and haggled and managed to get £400 off on better brands.

That leaves me with 2 options. Pay someone and get it done. Or do it myself over the weekends. Here comes another trouble. We have to move in on 28th June. My dustmites allergy doesnt help.

So I've decided to bite it and pay to get it done its not MSE, but given my options

The £5100 guy comes with good reviews and I've seen pics of his work. He seems confident and has a lot of business. Jsut that I am looking to pay a reasonable amount and I dont know what is reasonable

LEJC

for something like wallpaper stripping...you probably need to allow something like £125 per day and possibly a day per room...

The plastering as I said previously allow £400 per room

The painting all depends on whats being done...just the walls once they have been plastered probably 1-2 days per room...again work it out on £125 per day labour

whats happening about your skirting boards and doors...are they being stripped down and painted too or just glossed over...that might be something to get clarified in the quote...thats why I aired on the side that the quote should come in somewhere between the 2 youve given

As I said I think quote 1 is reasonable in terms of them doing all the work,but realistcally its not the money saving option...and thats what these boards are about!!!!....your OH may well have zero diy knowledge but so did my 15 year old at the start of our project,and its really easy to strip wallpaper and quite satisfying,he should at least give it a go!!!

I also assume that there is a seperate plasterer and he's not the same person doing the wallpaper stripping and painting...they are 2 seperate trades and in honesty if he's a good plasterer whats he doing stripping wallpaper...and flip side if he's a good painter he shouldnt need to plaster.

bluedrop

The guy who gave me the £5100 quote said wallpaper stripping, plastering and painting will all be done by different people.

LEJC

So hence he's acting as a project manager for you...and you will probably be paying a premium for that.

So whats included in the painting element...obviously walls and they will need a couple of coats....a base coat and probably one or maybe 2 coats to get a good finish

What about skirtings and door/frames and how are they being prepared?

bluedrop

Painting includes base coats and final coat
It also includes sanding and paining skirtings.

Door frames -I am not sure. will need to check with him
Doors - We are changing all of them.

LEJC

bluedrop wrote: »

Door frames -I am not sure. will need to check with him
Doors - We are changing all of them.

Have you chosen your doors yet and do you have standard sized openings...I only ask as its one of the only things we never considered would cost as much as it did.

Our frames were not standard sizes so our budget of £100 per door fully fitted escalated substantially to £2000 for 6 doors as each had to be handmade by a joiner to various sizes as off the peg doors couldnt be cut down as much as we needed.(and that was after I haggled hard)

Dont throw your old doors away until you really do know you can get an affordable replacement

On the plus side though the doors we now have whilst expensive,are very nice!

bluedrop

I have this confirmed. The doors are all standard size.

bluedrop

LEJC, you've now motivated me to try wallpaper stripping this weekend. I am goign to buy a good quality steamer and give it a go.

I could peel some of it straight away. It looks okay. Just worried about the woodchip on the cielings.

sancho

I've never used a steamer and I've stripped a lot of wallpaper. Bucket of warm water and a squidge of fairy, wipe on with a large sponge and leave to soak for a few minutes. Usually it nearly comes off in whole strips.

£7k is a vast amount of money, but then you earn in a day whatiI earn in a week, so it's all relative I suppose