# Wow painters rates are all over the place



## griz (Nov 26, 2009)

Ninjaframer said:


> I just switched painters- the guy I've been using for 3 years has been sloppy for the last 3-4 jobs, new painter is significantly more $ but perfect work. Since the paint is the last thing to go on and is what makes my trim look like gold or shiz it's worth the $. I guess what I'm sayin is a GOOD painter can charge what he wants.


A GREAT PAINTER is priceless....:thumbsup::thumbup:


Not only do* I* not have to do it, his shiz is flawless.....:thumbup::thumbup::thumbsup:


----------



## steex (Feb 19, 2013)

The only problem with that is the price and workmanship don't always match up.


----------



## The Coastal Craftsman (Jun 29, 2009)

I hate painting with a passion. I hate it a little less when being paid but I want to keep this job looking good. There's to many hacks around this area who paint and even the so called good ones ain't upto much. It's pot luck. If I do it my self I know it's gonna come out perfect and how I want it. I don't want a paint work to mess up the quality of job I have done upto yet. The painter can make or break the job and I'm not risking that on this job.


----------



## Inner10 (Mar 12, 2009)

BCConstruction said:


> I hate painting with a passion. I hate it a little less when being paid but I want to keep this job looking good. There's to many hacks around this area who paint and even the so called good ones ain't upto much. It's pot luck. If I do it my self I know it's gonna come out perfect and how I want it. I don't want a paint work to mess up the quality of job I have done upto yet. The painter can make or break the job and I'm not risking that on this job.


The only way to grow your business is to either train your own staff or network with good subcontractors. If you wanna be a one man band then quit yammering and pick up the brush.


----------



## mhstrick (Jul 20, 2012)

Lol. That was great.


----------



## Driftweed (Nov 7, 2012)

Cmon man you know how to pick a sub! Put them through the vetting process like people do to us. Check their website, references, ask for pics blah blah blah....

Then pick the middle guy in price, lol


----------



## mrcharles (Sep 27, 2011)

SuperiorHIP said:


> Better be careful with trying to stick latex to oil, in my experience it doesn't adhere very well if at all.


I have never had luck with it.... Tried to do it on door slabs and ended up just replacing the slabs.


----------



## mrcharles (Sep 27, 2011)

I have found that I can't make the money I want on interior repaints... I do paint when it is part of a larger scope, but I only take a straight up painting job if it's an exterior.


----------



## ModernStyle (May 7, 2007)

Why would you prime or expect a painter to prime something that is already painted. Unless you are doing a color that requires an undercoat there is no reason to prime. 
Screw charging by the foot. By the time you get paint, get set up paint the room, then clean up, you done killed most of the day. Sqf is fine for new construction because then you aren't hampered with people living there, no furniture or flooring to worry about normally. Get in and get out. 
Too many variables when you put homeowners in the equation. Better to figure how long it will take, then add a little more because you know you never get done when you think you will, and charge them that.


----------



## The Coastal Craftsman (Jun 29, 2009)

Color is going from dark to white so vastly cheaper to use $30 primer to cover the worst than a $60 paint. I wouldnt even be using primer otherwise. Every one of the company's told me i would need primer no matter what the color. I think they wanted to do 2 of primer and 1 final to make some more $ but i told them i wanted 1 primer and 2 final.


----------



## Driftweed (Nov 7, 2012)

Ewww dark to white....

Yup your right. Did you spec it for them so they could give an apples to apples bid?

From what you posted all three bid completely differently.


----------



## The Coastal Craftsman (Jun 29, 2009)

Driftweed said:


> Ewww dark to white....
> 
> Yup your right. Did you spec it for them so they could give an apples to apples bid?
> 
> From what you posted all three bid completely differently.


The job im doing is not a 15x15 room. I kept that simple so that it could be quoted by email. I just used 15x15 as a reference between different companys so i could figure out if it was worth me doing it or subbing it. Thats when i got 3 totally different prices it didnt add up. I checked CL earlier too and there's guys on there doing it even cheaper than the cheap guy lol


----------



## mrcharles (Sep 27, 2011)

BCConstruction said:


> The job im doing is not a 15x15 room. I kept that simple so that it could be quoted by email. I just used 15x15 as a reference between different companys so i could figure out if it was worth me doing it or subbing it. Thats when i got 3 totally different prices it didnt add up. I checked CL earlier too and there's guys on there doing it even cheaper than the cheap guy lol



On the same interior paint job I had a price of $5500, $11,700, and $14,900. 

Ended up getting the middle guy down a little bit as he was my regular painter and I knew he would do a good job.


----------



## Driftweed (Nov 7, 2012)

Just do it. Paintings is easy $$ compared to the other trades. I've learned to love it as long as the timeline is reasonable.

You just may like it...


----------



## The Coastal Craftsman (Jun 29, 2009)

I aint too bad at painting. Its just so boring. done this on me sons room last weekend.


----------



## SDel Prete (Jan 8, 2012)

Indeed boring. Ill never do it unless I really MUST. Nice work btw


----------



## SuperiorHIP (Aug 15, 2010)

Nice work but wow, I would rip my hair out doing all those stripes.


----------



## The Coastal Craftsman (Jun 29, 2009)

SuperiorHIP said:


> Nice work but wow, I would rip my hair out doing all those stripes.


Yeah well that's not the half of it. My wife decided that white was boring and then she wanted strips. I had do double tap every strip instead of just single tap it  so 3x as much work than it would have been if I started with blue instead of white


----------



## carzie (May 21, 2013)

I never price by the sq foot. Every job is different, there are far to many variations to consider.


----------



## KennMacMoragh (Sep 16, 2008)

BCConstruction said:


> It's not like getting 3 different contractors to price a bathroom and they all use different materials. These painter all have to paint the same room with the same paint?


There's lots of different levels of quality to painting. Most the difference is in the prep work, for the exterior of a two story house you can do no prep work or you can spend about a week doing prep. The prices should be reflecting that. I gave a guy a proposal with two options, medium quality for $6,000 or high end for $8,000. He said "Well my neighbor had his house painted for $5,000." Later I saw a sign on a tree that read "will paint two story house for $2,300". I'm not about to start painting over dirt to lower my cost. There are a lot of different levels of quality for an interior paint job too. Maybe check the references to those three painters? Most painters I find are just plain bad.


----------



## wyly (Aug 23, 2011)

per sq ft on new construction if it's a straightforward home that you've done a thousand times before. for me that's $3 per sq ft-floor area and includes materials.

cost plus on renos, occupied homes and monster homes, for me that works out to $70 per hour + materials.


----------



## wyly (Aug 23, 2011)

KennMacMoragh said:


> There's lots of different levels of quality to painting. Most the difference is in the prep work, for the exterior of a two story house you can do no prep work or you can spend about a week doing prep. The prices should be reflecting that. I gave a guy a proposal with two options, medium quality for $6,000 or high end for $8,000. He said "Well my neighbor had his house painted for $5,000." Later I saw a sign on a tree that read "will paint two story house for $2,300". I'm not about to start painting over dirt to lower my cost. There are a lot of different levels of quality for an interior paint job too. Maybe check the references to those three painters? Most painters I find are just plain bad.


yup, everyone thinks they can be a painter but like everything else in life you get what you pay for. If it's really cheap there's a good reason why.

I recall a guy who specialized in painting ceilings his price destroyed mine, he was doing the jobs for less than my material cost! Turns out he was thinning down his material a lot with solvents and left over spray on furniture and floors. He had a long list of lawsuits as well but that didn't seem to hurt his business as people would jump at his incredibly low price.


----------



## SDel Prete (Jan 8, 2012)

wyly said:


> yup, everyone thinks they can be a painter but like everything else in life you get what you pay for. If it's really cheap there's a good reason why.
> 
> I recall a guy who specialized in painting ceilings his price destroyed mine, he was doing the jobs for less than my material cost! Turns out he was thinning down his material a lot with solvents and left over spray on furniture and floors. He had a long list of lawsuits as well but that didn't seem to hurt his business as people would jump at his incredibly low price.


That's because a lot of people are dumb. Lol


----------



## SDel Prete (Jan 8, 2012)

wyly said:


> per sq ft on new construction if it's a straightforward home that you've done a thousand times before. for me that's $3 per sq ft-floor area and includes materials.
> 
> cost plus on renos, occupied homes and monster homes, for me that works out to $70 per hour + materials.


Where you from that you can get $3 sqft on new construction?


----------



## MarkJames (Nov 25, 2012)

BCConstruction said:


> I aint too bad at painting. Its just so boring. done this on me sons room last weekend.


----

Geez. If you're Catholic, consider yourself nominated for sainthood.


----------



## concretemasonry (Dec 1, 2006)

I assume all the prices were given according to your specifications.

Each had a different scope in their proposals, so their usual methods met or exceeded the requirements.

If they meet your requirements they are what you want, just take the low-baller. Some subcontractors like to maintain an image for future work and reputation, so they bid accordingly since they obviously know where their competitors will be on a general scale.

The term for this is "dumping" where subs and suppliers are willing to walk on a job and have plenty of options for the future. As a supplier/manufacturer, we knew everyone's costs and prices and just did not quote on certain types of jobs and even gave the "shoppers" the prices of our competition. - Had 35+% of the market and had a higher list price than others, since we had to raise ours to keep the competition in business and not force them to cut prices just to survive. Same for contractor the does not want cheap competitors trying to survive.


----------



## JHC (Jun 4, 2010)

Something no one has mentioned is 2/3 of these guys probably won't be in business five years from now because they don't know how to price work. 

Given you defined the scope before asking for bids they should be close given all things are equal.


----------



## wyly (Aug 23, 2011)

SDel Prete said:


> Where you from that you can get $3 sqft on new construction?


alberta...not every builder will pay that of coarse some want cheap and that's what they get and it shows in the overall lack of quality in the home. It may seem high but once you add in material, labour, unemployment benefits, pension plan it's not out of line. A Union painter here will make $25-35 per hour, so if your the boss/owner you need to double that to cover expenses and plus profit. 

not that i charge that anymore because I no longer do new housing, I work by myself now, I couldn't handle builders with multiple units on the go at any one time. so now it's $70 per hour plus materials.


----------



## SDel Prete (Jan 8, 2012)

wyly said:


> alberta...not every builder will pay that of coarse some want cheap and that's what they get and it shows in the overall lack of quality in the home. It may seem high but once you add in material, labour, unemployment benefits, pension plan it's not out of line. A Union painter here will make $25-35 per hour, so if your the boss/owner you need to double that to cover expenses and plus profit.
> 
> not that i charge that anymore because I no longer do new housing, I work by myself now, I couldn't handle builders with multiple units on the go at any one time. so now it's $70 per hour plus materials.


Interesting


----------



## Rbnsb5 (May 5, 2013)

I think a lot depends on the job an your crew. I generally don't do by hr or square foot. I just figure up a daily rate for each job. Exterior I charge a little more. I used to do SQFT bids but found that putting the estimates together took a little longer. Get two guys that'll work for X dollars a day, figure out how many days it'll take, add what you want to make, and mark up your materials. Its worked pretty well since i switched to this method. That's how I see it anyway. Every jobs different there's no magic formula.


----------



## SDel Prete (Jan 8, 2012)

Rbnsb5 said:


> Every jobs different there's no magic formula.


Now those are words everyone should remember


----------



## The Coastal Craftsman (Jun 29, 2009)

Rbnsb5 said:


> I think a lot depends on the job an your crew. I generally don't do by hr or square foot. I just figure up a daily rate for each job. Exterior I charge a little more. I used to do SQFT bids but found that putting the estimates together took a little longer. Get two guys that'll work for X dollars a day, figure out how many days it'll take, add what you want to make, and mark up your materials. Its worked pretty well since i switched to this method. That's how I see it anyway. Every jobs different there's no magic formula.


Not many people are willing to do day rate. Thats why you have to figure out a formula to make money. I cant go in a say yeah its gonna be tree fiddy a day and then not know how long the jobs gonna take. I need to be close so that the customer also knows what the costs gonna be. But hey if you can get customers that are willing to pay blind day rates then good for you. I wish i could find more of them. 

The other issue with not having a formula is you cant schedule work. if you don't have a way to figure out how long its gonna take then how do you know when to schedule your next job.


----------



## SDel Prete (Jan 8, 2012)

BCConstruction said:


> Not many people are willing to do day rate. Thats why you have to figure out a formula to make money. I cant go in a say yeah its gonna be tree fiddy a day and then not know how long the jobs gonna take. I need to be close so that the customer also knows what the costs gonna be. But hey if you can get customers that are willing to pay blind day rates then good for you. I wish i could find more of them.
> 
> The other issue with not having a formula is you cant schedule work. if you don't have a way to figure out how long its gonna take then how do you know when to schedule your next job.


He did say he goes by how many days it will take him to do the job.


----------



## Rbnsb5 (May 5, 2013)

BCConstruction said:


> Not many people are willing to do day rate. Thats why you have to figure out a formula to make money. I cant go in a say yeah its gonna be tree fiddy a day and then not know how long the jobs gonna take. I need to be close so that the customer also knows what the costs gonna be. But hey if you can get customers that are willing to pay blind day rates then good for you. I wish i could find more of them.
> 
> The other issue with not having a formula is you cant schedule work. if you don't have a way to figure out how long its gonna take then how do you know when to schedule your next job.


This usually only works for the GCs that I work for. If I think it'll take five days with three guys ill tell him seven. If we finish early he gets a bonus and the customer is happy. When it comes to doing residential repaints and I'm dealing with the customer, there are a lot of variables to factor in, so i usually work up a time plus materials estimate. If they're annoying or needy I tack on a little extra. I know it sounds wrong but I have had a few terrible customers that wasted a ton of my time.


----------



## m1911 (Feb 24, 2009)

My painter has been doing crappy work lately, he has lots of work, so he rushes jobs. It's hard to find one that does good work and gives me a reasonable price. For every one good painter, there are nine chity ones, and the good ones know they can use that to their advantage and ream you.


----------



## Metro M & L (Jun 3, 2009)

m1911 said:


> My painter has been doing crappy work lately, he has lots of work, so he rushes jobs. It's hard to find one that does good work and gives me a reasonable price. For every one good painter, there are nine chity ones, and the good ones know they can use that to their advantage and ream you.


Cry me a river beer budget!


----------



## SDel Prete (Jan 8, 2012)

Metro M & L said:


> Cry me a river beer budget!


Haha. Tell him How you really feel


----------



## Derek1157 (Dec 21, 2012)

I've found that many painters and other contractors simply don't know how to bid. My Dad used to tell me to visualize in 3D. You have to be able to look at something and grasp how long it will take for each step and how much paint. It's very true. I call it my "laser eye". I walk into a room and I can estimate pretty well how long it will take me and what's all involved. I ask questions too. Color change? Sheen? Walls? Ceilings? Trim? It all matters. Is there lots of furniture to be moved? Will the shuffling be ongoing? What kinds of primer do I need? I've also found, and most other contractors agree, that the low paint bids are usually a bad idea. Either they don't know what they're doing or they're skipping steps. There's a fine line with painting. There are a lot of "painters" out there that have no clue what they're doing. Lots of clients who don't know what they're doing either. I hate it when painters try to get rich off of a job. I hate it when clients try to make me poor. I am not a charity. This is my career. In my bid, I need to be able to pay myself, make a profit on top of that wage for my business, plus cover my operating costs. I have to do those 3 things on each job or else it's not worth it to me.

I try my best to give a reasonable total cost for a project. That way the price is set, and everyone knows what they're getting into. Otherwise I go hourly. Sq. ft. bids are worthless to me and time consuming. Day rates are too vague. I like to outline in detail everything I will do. The amount I will do it for. And how long it will take me. Having good language in the contract is smart also. Don't leave things open for misinterpretation. Say things like "weather permitting" and "anything not specified in this contract, will require additional funds" etc etc. Keep yourself safe in the contract in case your bid is off the mark.


----------



## wyly (Aug 23, 2011)

m1911 said:


> My painter has been doing crappy work lately, he has lots of work, so he rushes jobs. It's hard to find one that does good work and gives me a reasonable price. For every one good painter, there are nine chity ones, and the good ones know they can use that to their advantage and ream you.


or you're getting crap painters and crap quality because that's all you want to pay for...

and just maybe the good ones are charging what they're worth.:whistling

I've been in the construction biz for 40 years nothing changes, the cheapest builders build the crappiest quality homes because they'll only pay the lowest dollar...you get what you pay for.


----------



## concretemasonry (Dec 1, 2006)

If you develop a reputation as being too price oriented, good sub-contractors would not even bother to talk to you or just give a courtesy comp bid.

The same goes for suppliers of some materials if they are successful.


----------



## wyly (Aug 23, 2011)

concretemasonry said:


> If you develop a reputation as being too price oriented, good sub-contractors would not even bother to talk to you or just give a courtesy comp bid.
> 
> The same goes for suppliers of some materials if they are successful.


yup, when someone comes to me and tells me they want a really good deal, tells me how tight their budget is, or tells me one of the competing bids is College pro painting I won't even bother giving a price...

I haven't done much painting as I used to since I expanded into renovations as a renovator I choose my sub-contractors carefully, they're professional and honest, I trust them to charge me a fair price for quality work.


----------



## KDPaintingCT (Aug 8, 2013)

That's strange, don't hear of two many painters pricing jobs by sq ft these days..


----------

