Painting quote.. is this reasonable???

[newoldhome]

I have moved into a small house. I had someone come round to do a quote to paint the living room, stairs, landing, one double bedroom and one small box room.

The rooms are small. The living room is fairly small. The whole house is 600sqft

The guy has quoted me £2,000 (not including materials) and said it will take him 12 days to do.
12 days??? I thought it would be 5 days MAX.

I said I didn't anticipate that length of time. So he said if I want he will just do the living room so it's done before Christmas which will take him 4 days and will be £720.

I feel absolutely baffled by this. I'm new to this so just wanted to check if this seems right. I'm in the northwest.

The price wouldn't be OTT for a job that really did take that long, but what you've described doesn't - or at least not with the guy who does mine and approaches it as if it was his own

Use them and I can almost guarantee those 12 days will involve turning up late, knocking off early, "the van breaking down", "the kids being taken to hospital" and much more

Depends where you are but the price isn’t unreasonable imo. Roughly £200 per room would actually be very cheap for where I live.

The time quoted seems long but perhaps he’s building in contingency time in case something comes up, so that your expectations have been managed.

It sound expensive to me OP. I was going to get a quote to paint nearly an entire house that I have been renovating (it’s not a large house) and honestly, I ended up doing it all myself with some help from friends. If you get decent rollers (not the cheap one, but the bigger ones with more coverage) you can actually get it done pretty quickly. I did an entire single bedroom, including ceiling in an hour (just one coat though)

I'm in Liverpool. With papering that would be about £1100. I've had mine done over the last six months (waiting on plaster etc to dry). If you are close to Liverpool, you'll get it cheaper. However, as said, if it needs sanding, base coats, perhaps lining in places, that does put the price up. It shouldn't take twelve days.

Sounds about right to me if he's doing proper prep, ceilings and woodwork too. If you think it's too much why not do it yourself?
I've never paid a decorator, always do it myself because I do it properly with thorough prep and I'm extremely fussy about standards, never seen any work by any decorator that's better than I can do myself. However it takes me a long time. The thing that makes paying someone else to do it worthwhile is the time saved.

Sounds like a lot of days.
I've just gone back to the messages from when we had kitchen, diningroom and utility painted, and 2 floors of hall, handing &stairs stripped of wallpaper and repainted. 6 days work, inc gloss.

I'd get another quote.

I think it's sounds reasonable. In the east midlands we'd say £100 a wall was reasonable about 10 years ago.

Saying that, the cost of just doing it yourself, is a LOT less. Unless you physically can't, why don't you just do it yourself?

We are having a professional decorator in for the first time ever to decorate our lounge 16ftx14ft, we have high ceilings, picture rail etc quote was £950,we supply paint, he supplies any filler, base coat etc (we are South East)
He says it will take 4 days incl drying time.

I agree with this!! It’s only £166 a day. I can’t imagine what you thought it would cost you?

This is good in theory but getting tradesmen to quote these days is a challenge.

DHs best mate is a decorator. We are south England. He charges £250 per day. He does 8 to 9 hrs per day. If you have white that's included in the day rate.

It sounds correct. The prep work alone would probably take a couple of days. All the marks and dents filled, left to dry and sanded off. Taping up. Skirting, ceiling and walls painted on separate days as you can't tape up wet paint. Undercoat, waiting to dry... Clearing the space before painting (unless you have completely empty rooms with no furniture or carpet which also needs protecting).
Painting banisters alone is a day's work from experience.

It sounds about right to me. But painting is pretty easy to do yourself.

Do people ever question accountants or solicitors or other such professions? No they don't.

Like others have said, that's actually a very reasonable day rate.

12 days is too long for the work and size of house involved, I imagine they won't be full days you're paying for and he will have multiple jobs on.

We're paying about that for less size-wise as we're not getting every room done, but it includes materials and they think it will take about 4 days for 2 of them to do.

Get more quotes, but also be very specific about what is included. Are they moving furniture? What state are the walls, ceilings and woodwork currently in? What prep will they be doing?

I would not assume they will do it right unless they tell you exactly what needs doing. Anyone can set up as a painter and slap some paint about - ask for pictures of previous jobs.

no point asking for pics these days, they just get them from professional painter FB groups so you can't reverse search.

True!

It depends on what prep they need to do. Are you just wanting to paint over plastered walls? Or are they having to strip wallpaper or lining paper? Are there cracks? Are they having to change the colour radically- dark to light? Is there fancy coving in the ceiling?

If it is a basic freshen up of paint on plaster - it normally takes me about 6 hours to wash the walls, lightly sand the woodwork and then do 2 coats of emulsion and one primer and gloss/ eggshell on the wood

Sounds about right to dead reasonable if they are prepping [filling and sanding walls and woodwork] properly and giving each room at least two coats of paint.

I would ask for references so you can call and see if people are happy with the finish. I've had two painters who charged the same but the first took shortcuts everywhere and it hasn't lasted.

I paid £3500 to have my whole house painted this year - HSL/sitting room/2 bedrooms/kitchen/bathroom/downstairs loo. That was everything - all prep/materials/labour. And to me it was worth every penny, he did a fantastic job!

If they do all the woodwork etc then it’s reasonable. Daily rate of £150 plus is usual now. The scrubbing of skirting boards and walls etc can take up a lot of time.

We paid just a bit less than £300 for our hallway to be painted upstairs and downstairs. Took 2 days and we supplied all paint. So given that yours is 2 x the time and includes the paint, it seems about right?

Definitely get more quotes.
We were quoted between £1.2k - £5.5k for the same job!

I disagree that the original poster has unrealistic time and cost expectations. No painter doing the job correctly would take five days to prep and paint what is essentially a full house alone.

12 days is nearly 2.5 working weeks after costs, tax and NI that's nearly £100 per day profit for a business.
Thats poor.