Pricing Small Jobs

DeanV

I need to give a price for one room which includes a bar (dark, spray stain and glaze finish) and painted trim and base. How do you guys price jobs like this since it requires so many extra steps and sitting around and waiting or running around while paint drys?

For instance, for the bar area (paneled with no openings) I will need to bag the prefinished cabinets, then spray stain, 2 coats lacquer sealer, glaze, then two coats lacquer topcoat. I figure this will require 2 trips on two different days. Then return and mask off bar, prime trim, wait for it to dry, top coat. Next day return for final sand and top coat on painted trim.

This job looks like it will spread out over four short days (maybe the first day can be a full day followed by 3 shorter days). Do you just figure straight up the number of man hours or how do you adjust the price for the hassle. What about annoyance of having to set up and clean out 2 different sprayers for one room (HVLP pressure pot with agitator for spray stain, separate pot for lacquer, and the airless for the painted trim?

Danahy

I would tell them to pick other rooms for you to do inbetween coats, because you're charging for them anyway. Bill for 4 full days, unless you can setup and tear down a new job somewhere else between coats....? Down time between coats should never be the painters responsibility... if it were, we'd all go broke.

Richard

how many days will it take
X what you make per day
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the cost of your labor

I dont add "hassle costs"... it's all gotta get done--I charge enough to feel ok with a bit of hassle

PS...Always bid a small job with a total, not hourly
bid for a full day, everyday--and enjoy a bit of profit in the end

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Rich

ProWallGuy

Yessir!

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Wallpaper Hanger St. Louis
Digital Murals Installation

slickshift

If it's appropriate, I'll divide a job into half days
If it's two or three hours, that's a half day
(I can still get some time in somewhere else)

Anything over four, it's a full day
(it's unlikely I'll break down, clean-up, and go to another job, set up, etc., and work for an hour or two somewhere else that day)

If it's not realistic to get some work in somewhere else the rest of the day, that's a full day

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