Cost of painting

I live in the south east. I have a very good decorator who has worked for me for 20 years and has 30 years experience. His preparation is immaculate and attention to detail impressive.

I am in the process of having my house re-decorated from top to bottom. It’s a big house with large rooms but the condition of the walls is usually pretty good after the old paper is removed with not too much remedial work necessary.

He charges £200 labour per day plus materials.

Most rooms take four days so cost per week has been £800 plus materials.

The stairs and large landing took almost two weeks and were done in two stages. First week the prep, old paper stripped, painting (a lot of it), then second week the papering which took four days. That cost £1,900 plus materials excluding the wallpaper which I paid for separately.

If you are just having repainting it very much depends on how much preparation is required and how well you want it done.

My chap gives walls and ceilings two coats and any woodwork painted from scratch, an undercoat and sometimes two top coats.

He has just finished my kitchen's utility room and rear lobby which had five doors and their frames to paint as well as walls, ceilings and cupboards plus a fair bit of making good. That took four and a half days so just under £1,000 including paint.

My decorator charges £200 a day plus materials. She has painted my entire house now (in stages), and some rooms have taken longer (so cost more) because of the prep required. Filling in cracks, taking off old wallpaper etc is time consuming, as is lining walls before painting. Where we were happy with paint onto plaster (mainly upstairs) it took far less time than where we’d had wallpaper (never again!) in reception rooms, so the charge varied. We talked all of this through before she started each job, and in theory the lines walls will just need painting over in future.

That doesn’t help, OP, but the cost will depend on things like the state of your walls (not always obvious if they are papered). Be sure to get paint the decorator knows is scrubbable, too. I chose one lot (Valspar, I think) that was supposed to be scrubbable, but ended up needing to get it done again because a wipe with a damp cloth left a mark. Now we go for brands the decorator has used in her own home and knows will clean well.

£8000 seems a lot for 2 beds a sitting room and kitchen(?) though. Even with top of the range paint I’d expect it to come in at less than that, unless there are lots of repairs needed.

Wow that seems a lot to me. We have a similar size house and have had the decorator here three times over the last six months, all done now in white paint, no sash windows though, I expect they would be time consuming, ours was £1,200. We’re in the north of England.

That sounds reasonable, but I would ask for detailed estimates and see what each decorator will do for that.

It might be that you would decide not to have the Rolls Royce repaint but a more family saloon size one. For example, one decorator might say he would strip all the paint off every window and start from scratch, while another would rub down the current paintwork and repaint. Both uite acceptable methods, but would be differently priced.