How Much Does It Cost To Plaster Walls?
Cost to Plaster Walls
| job | Description | labour |
| 1 | Let’s assume 30% of the plaster is off the walls in various areas around the room. To do a patching job will take 2 men 1 day | £325 |
| 2 | You get a better finish than above if he plasters the whole wall after effecting any repair. He doesn’t have to spend time trying to get his repair flush with the surrounding surfaces, he just does the whole lot. It takes about the same amount of time as well! So he repairs first, probably with “bonding”, then applies PVA adhesive and “skims” the whole wall, that’s one wall of our pretend room. Same cost as above. | £325 |
| 3 | As above but 2 walls fully plastered. 2 men 1.5 days | £450 |
| 4 | As above but the whole room….2 men 2 days. | £600 |
| 5 | The jobs above were priced with him leaving the radiator and electrical sockets in place and plastering around them because you were too cheap to do the job properly. To remove and replace them on completion, will require a plumber and an electrical each to make two visits so add…. | £200 |
Information Sheet on Plastering Walls
Firstly we’ll create a scenario that requires you to be phoning for a plasterer. You have removed “all” the wallpaper from your normal sized bedroom (with two windows, one chimney breast and the door) and great patches of plaster have come off as well.
All the prices above include all material costs, the time it takes to buy the plaster, cover the carpets etc, get the materials and tools up to the room and clean up properly when he’s finished, (don’t actually expect clean, just “not all that dirty”).
Plastering
The older your house, the greater is the likelihood that the plaster needs attention. You usually discover this when you eventually decide to remove all the wallpaper from a wall to start wallpapering again from scratch and layers of plaster come away from the wall with the paper.
Had you investigated prior to removal by knocking the walls gently with a small hammer or your knuckles, you would have been rewarded with a hollow sound quite different from the solid surface you expected. In fact if you live in an old house and do this now in all your rooms, you will encounter this but I don’t advise it, as it will only upset you!
When plaster sounds hollow, it’s said to have blown. This happens over time because the house has been eventually subjected to central heating and the plaster has become incredibly dry. The initial surface preparation all that time ago, didn’t allow for houses being warm!
Preparation is key
When applied to exposed brickwork, plaster is applied in two coats.
If applied to plasterboard it goes on in one coat.
It is likely that, before the first (float) coat is applied, the brickwork may be pasted with a dilute solution of PVA which creates a barrier and helps the first coat to stick.
The first coat will be either bonding or browning plaster. Which of these is the most suitable will depend on the composition of the surface to be covered.
Both of these are slightly aerated and relatively light (I’m no Louis Pasteur but I do believe they both contain vermiculite) They are both applied to a thickness of approximately 15mm (0.5 inch). This “float” coats job is to take up any discrepancies in the wall and present a flat surface for the second “finish” or “set” coat.
Whenever coats of plaster are applied one over the other, it is essential to seriously rough up or scratch the surface of the initial coat. This will provide a mechanical key to aid the inherent chemical bonding agent that the following coat of plaster naturally possesses. If this scratching is insufficient, the two coats will eventually separate.
Finish or set coat
Finishing plaster used to be made with lime and horsehair and stuff and the chaps did all sort of unmentionable things into it to make it sticky! Modern plaster contains a mineral called gypsum. It is manufactured as a powder which is then mixed with tap water to form a workable paste which can then be applied to a surface to make it smooth and flat. It dries out over time and can then be painted or papered.
“Finish” is much denser than bonding or browning and will be spread to a thickness of about 3mm (1/8 inch) thick. A good plasterer can leave a wall totally flat, smooth and with a glass like finish. Applying finish plaster is called skimming.
So, you think you’ve removed all the wallpaper in your bedroom and now you’re faced with a room with dirty great patches of plaster missing?
Questions to ask the plasterer during his Quotation Visit
Can you start plastering on the wall as I have left it?
No! It is likely that you will be asked to get all the hundreds of little bits of paper that are still stuck to the remaining sound plaster. There is no way he will try and plaster with them still there as they will roll up under his trowel and cause little lines in all his work.
He may also want you to take off the blown plaster. Then he will be able to see what the job actually entails.
He may offer to do the preparation work himself (or more likely find someone who will!), but this will cost you more, especially if you have to pay a skilled tradesman to do unskilled work.
You will also be expected to clear the room of every scrap of furniture. This is in both your interests!
Can you give me two quotes please, one to patch, one to plaster the whole room?
Where will you be mixing the plaster (knocking up in builder’s parlance)?
Where will you be getting the water from?
(Not your bath hopefully!)
Will you be completely covering the route from that spot to the room in question and cleaning up on completion?
Plastering is the filthiest job in building! Given carte blanch, his labourer will take his water from your bath taps, “knock up” on the landing with not a dust sheet in sight!
Do not allow this, be firm from the start!
Will you be using PVA adhesive on the newly exposed brickwork and float plaster prior to plastering?
This will reduce the inherent suction effect of the exposed surface and slow down the new plaster’s drying time (the time it takes to go off). This will allow him more time to perfect his art and more importantly, will seriously help stick the new stuff to the wall.
Will you be leaving the new patched areas completely flush with the surrounding areas?
This is essential. After all this hassle and when you have eventually wallpapered, you don’t want to be reminded of him every time you put the light on and see all those strange shadows on what should be a flat wall!
How will you be making any external right angles (e.g. into a window reveal)?
If he is making a complete corner up from scratch, he will use angle bead, so no problem. If he’s repairing, it’s not that simple. The art of freehand corner making has mostly disappeared.
Will you attempt to “feather” the new plaster in, adjacent to tops of skirting boards?
If he’s not careful and with certain thin board tops, he will end up covering a small area of the board. This will soon crack off and look nasty but not before your check has cleared! Feathering is simply reducing the plaster thickness to nothing at the last minute so to speak.
If he is quoting for the whole room, does he intend to knock off every bit of plaster and start again or will he simply fill in all the holes, apply PVA to all of the old surfaces and plaster over the whole lot?
The latter is perfectly acceptable if all the blown plaster has been removed.
OK, he came back the second time, you had been a good boy and done the preparation properly this time, so he can now see what’s actually required.
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