External paintwork/render

[plimsolls]

We have a brick house with paintwork and render (I think that is the term?) in a similar fashion to the stock house image attached to this post. Our house has more paintwork/render than the one pictured as there are a few more windows and a basement frontage thing to be done too but its the same kind of thing as pictured.

Ours is peeling, cracking, dirty, and looks generally terrible. It needs, I think, a jet wash, a restore of the render and a re-paint.

I have been completely obsessed keen on getting it sorted before our baby arrives but regardless I think we definitely need to get it done before another winter.

We were quoted about £4,000 for it from a contact of OHs which I thought was pretty steep but I have no experience of this type of work. Builder contact said it will need full scaffolding and will take about two weeks to do the whole job. However, he now won't be starting or completing the work before the baby's due date despite agreeing the job months ago. So, I'm wondering if there is a different way and if I should be looking for someone else.

I was wondering if any of you have got experience of having this kind of job done and:

How much it cost you (especially if you're in London)
How long it took
If you needed full scaffolding or just a tower or something else?
If you have any alternative suggestions at all as to how I can get this job sorted? I can't bear the idea of waiting until spring which is what OH has just suggested.

Thank you. I think I am disproportionately stressed about this probably as a distraction from impending baby but I'm desperate to get it sorted!

[wowfudge]

There's a tiny amount of render in the photo at the base if the wall - what's it like on your house? Jet washing is a bad idea as it can damage the brick and especially the mortar joints.

Get another quote for comparison purposes, but scaffolding hire is not cheap and you want a good job doing that will last, not a bodge that needs re-doing in the future.

[plimsolls]

Thanks wow. There's a lot more on our house as we've got a kind of lower ground floor bit which is fully rendered around the window.

Thanks for the advice about the jet wash. I can cross that off the list then!

I'll ask for another quote from elsewhere but it sounds like you think it's definitely a scaffolding job then.

I think I'll just work on my patience as it'll be better in the long run....

[curlywillow]

We have just had our whole rendered house painted. Its 4500 square feet. About four times the size of that house in the photo plus its detached and so it has sides. It also has two rendered chimneys. We paid £4000 for it to be done with two coats and we had a colour change so it had to be done properly. This included painting the soffit and fascia and the external doors plus balcony railings. It took about a week with two on them on it.

To be fair our decorators didn't use full scaffolding just portable towers and rollers on poles.

[plimsolls]

Thank you curlywillow, really helpful.

(Your house sounds amazing by the way!).

[wowfudge]

I don't know if you need full scaffolding, but I do know that the cost of hiring scaffolding can be high.