What it costs · Exterior
What an exterior repaint costs in Auckland
Two houses with the same wall area can be a straightforward recoat and a full remediation. The difference is what the walls are made of and what condition they are in — and that difference is larger than anything else on the quote.
95% vs 2%
Estimated weathertightness failure rate for monolithic or stucco cladding against weatherboard, on New Zealand homes built 1992–2005. This is why the same area does not cost the same money — and why the first question about your exterior is what it is clad in, not how big it is.
The first question
Cladding is not a modifier. It is a different job.
When New Zealand costed its weathertightness failures, the split by cladding type was the whole story rather than a detail. It is also the best available proxy for how much investigation an exterior needs before anyone opens a tin.
What each exterior actually involves
Weatherboard. The most labour-linear exterior there is: every board is an edge, and edges are cut in by hand. Wash, scrape and sand back failing coating, repair or replace rotten boards and scotia, spot-prime every bare patch, then two top coats. The swing between a sound weatherboard house and a badly failed one is the biggest single variable on this page.
Brick and block. Fewer edges and less linear detail, so faster per square metre than weatherboard — but painting brick is a one-way decision. Once coated it needs recoating forever, and trapped moisture in a previously unpainted wall is a real risk. Be sure before you start.
Fibre cement. Sheet or plank. Straightforward to coat, but the joints, stopping and fixings are where preparation time goes, and sanding older sheet raises a genuine dust hazard that has to be controlled properly.
Monolithic, stucco and plaster. The one that needs investigation first. Moisture readings, then crack and joint repair, then a flexible membrane system applied to the manufacturer’s build thickness. If the investigation finds water in the wall, painting is the wrong trade — that becomes a repair, and the repair may be restricted building work requiring a Licensed Building Practitioner. The recladding decision sits here.
National cladding shares are useful background and nothing more: New Zealand has no per-suburb cladding dataset, because the Census records neither cladding material nor dwelling age. The system each cladding type needs.
BRANZ Study Report SR142, House Condition Survey 2005 · 2005
The model
The labour component, and how condition moves it
The same house, sound and failed, is the clearest thing this model can show. The rates are published; the crew and days are our judgement, printed so you can argue with them.
| Exterior archetype | Crew × days (judgement) | Hours | At median $29.81/hr | Across the pay band |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single-storey weatherboard, sound paint Wash, sand, spot-prime, two coats. | 2 × 8 d | 128 | $3,816 | $3,077 – $5,784 |
| Single-storey weatherboard, failed paint Scrape back, fill, timber repairs, full prime, two coats. | 2 × 14 d | 224 | $6,677 | $5,385 – $10,123 |
| Two-storey weatherboard, scaffolded Same system, height access, slower movement. | 3 × 12 d | 288 | $8,585 | $6,924 – $13,015 |
| Single-storey brick or block Less linear detail than weatherboard, fewer edges to cut. | 2 × 6 d | 96 | $2,862 | $2,308 – $4,338 |
| Two-storey monolithic or plaster Moisture check, crack and joint repair, membrane system. | 3 × 16 d | 384 | $11,447 | $9,231 – $17,353 |
The first two rows are the same house. Sound paint against failed paint is six extra working days of scraping, filling, timber repair and priming — $2,862 of additional labour at median pay, on an identical wall area. No per-square-metre rate can represent that, which is the point.
Paintwork Auckland labour model; hourly rates from Tertiary Education Commission — Tahatū Career Navigator · retrieved 2026-07-30
The pay you see here is your pay before tax. When an employer pays you, Inland Revenue (IR) collects a percentage of that income. Learn more about income tax on the IR website — Inland Revenue. Pay data: Tertiary Education Commission — Tahatū Career Navigator, licensed CC BY 4.0.
The cost driver nobody quotes for out loud
Access is hired by the week, so a slow job costs twice
Scaffolding is not a rounding error on a two-storey Auckland repaint. It is erected, inspected, hired and dismantled, and the hire runs whether anyone is painting or not.
We do not publish a scaffold price, because we have no source for one — hire rates are quoted per job by the scaffolding company, vary with height, footprint, ground conditions and how long the standing time is, and no free dataset collects them. What we can tell you is the structure of the cost, which is what actually catches people out:
- Erect and dismantle is usually a fixed charge, independent of how long you keep it.
- Standing time is charged per week. This is the part that grows.
- Weather delay does not pause it. A fortnight of Auckland winter rain can add weeks of hire to a job that has not progressed a metre.
- Height triggers requirements. Edge protection and working-at-height rules apply regardless of how confident anyone is on a ladder.
So the question to put to every exterior quote is not just is scaffold included, but how many weeks of standing time is allowed, and who pays for the weeks after that. Two quotes that answer differently are not the same quote.
This is also where the Auckland calendar turns into money. Our thirty-year climate model counts 17.1 usable exterior painting days in an average March and 1.9 in an average July. A scaffolded job started in July is buying standing time it cannot use. The month-by-month model.
| Month | Paintable days | Three-day dry runs |
|---|---|---|
| January | 16.9 | 10.2 |
| February | 15.4 | 9.8 |
| March | 17.1 | 10.5 |
| April | 13.1 | 6.3 |
| May | 8.6 | 3.4 |
| June | 4.1 | 0.6 |
| July | 1.9 | 0.3 |
| August | 1.9 | 0.3 |
| September | 3.4 | 0.5 |
| October | 8.8 | 2.7 |
| November | 12.3 | 6 |
| December | 14.1 | 7.6 |
A calendar day is paintable when min temp >= 10 C AND max temp <= 30 C AND mean RH < 85% AND precipitation < 1 mm AND the FOLLOWING day also has precipitation < 1 mm (so the recoat is not lost). Contains modified Copernicus Climate Change Service information (ERA5).
Open-Meteo Historical Weather API (ECMWF ERA5 / ERA5-Land reanalysis) · 30-year model, 1991–2020
What to do
Four things to establish before you accept an exterior quote
- What the cladding is, in writing. If a quote does not name it, the quote has not considered it. On plaster, ask what moisture readings were taken and where.
- The preparation specification. Wash only, or scrape and sand to sound? Spot-prime or full prime? Which timber repairs are included, and what happens to the price if more rot appears once the paint comes off — a stated hourly rate for extras is far better than silence.
- Product and coats. The product name and the number of coats, so the datasheet can be read. This is also the honest answer to “how long will it last”.
- Access, in weeks. Is scaffold included, how many weeks of standing time, and who pays beyond that.
Those four answers make two quotes comparable. Without them you are comparing a number to a number. The method behind all of this · the roof is priced differently again.
Questions people actually ask
Why does my neighbour’s repaint cost less when our houses are the same size?
Almost always cladding, condition or access. A weatherboard bungalow with sound paint and clear ladder access is a straightforward wash-and-recoat. A plaster-clad two-storey with hairline cracking needs a moisture check, crack repair, a membrane system and scaffolding to reach any of it. Identical floor areas, genuinely different jobs.
Does the quote include scaffolding, and how many weeks?
Ask both halves of that question. Erect-and-dismantle is usually fixed; standing time is charged by the week and does not pause for rain. Get the number of weeks allowed for written into the quote, along with who carries the cost of weeks beyond it. On a winter start in Auckland, that clause is worth more than a small difference in the painting rate.
My plaster house has hairline cracks. Is that a paint job?
Possibly, and possibly not — and the order matters. Monolithic and stucco cladding accounted for an estimated 95% of New Zealand’s weathertightness failures against 2% for weatherboard, on 1992–2005 construction. That is not a prediction about your house, but it is why the sequence on plaster is investigate, repair, then coat. Painting over a crack that is admitting water buys you appearance and nothing else. What each cladding system needs.
How long should an exterior repaint last in Auckland?
We will not put a number on it here, because the honest answer depends on the product, the number of coats, the substrate, the aspect and how thoroughly the surface was prepared — and no New Zealand dataset tracks it. What we can tell you is what shortens it: painting over failing paint, painting outside the manufacturer’s temperature and humidity limits, and skipping the primer on bare timber. Ask for the product datasheet and the number of coats in writing, then hold the specification, not a verbal promise.
Can you paint the exterior in winter?
Some days, yes. Our thirty-year Auckland model finds only 1.9 days in an average July that meet every application limit at once — air temperature, humidity, dew-point margin and a dry following day for the recoat. The full model and its thresholds.
Is it cheaper to paint just the worst wall?
Cheaper on the day, usually more expensive over ten years. Set-up, access and mobilisation are much the same for one elevation as for four, so you pay those costs twice. It also leaves you with a visible batch difference and two maintenance clocks running at different times. The exception is genuine triage: a north or west elevation that is failing while the rest is sound is a legitimate patch-and-hold while you budget for the whole house.
Next
Send the exterior, not your details
Cladding, storeys, roughly how much of the paint is failing, and your suburb. That is enough for an honest read on whether the job and the budget are in the same room.