Updated: What the what? Brick pointing

[dr.girlfriend]

Our house was built in 1956, and apparently has only been spot-repointed on the brick walls.  It's not a very big house, and only two and a half walls are really exposed to weather since there's a porch in front and attached addition on one side blocking off the whole lower part of that exterior wall.  I called some people to get estimates for getting the brick repointed.  One guy gave the estimate of $4500, and that knocked me for a loop, because I was expecting it to be $1 - $2k.  The second estimate just came in at $16,500!  Has anyone had this done to let me know what they think a reasonable price would be?  I'm going to get some more estimates for sure.  I know it's hard to tell from a picture but here's the house...it's not very deep, so what you see here is pretty much what needs to be done and then the same amount on the back except the roof is higher so the brick covers more of the second story on that side.

Update:  I emailed the first guy back to clarify and he said his estimate does not involve grinding out the old mortar, just power-washing it.  So, that's not really repointing, just "tuck-pointing" which in some things I've read has been described as "throwing your money away."  But then again, that's by people who do the full re-pointing.  Some areas of the house have obviously been spot-done and it looks like it's holding up fine...is it really worth $12k to grind out the old mortar?  I'm thinking if it's really $16k we're probably never going to do it anyway.

Updated again:  I got another estimate today.  This guy seemed like the most reasonable of the bunch, although maybe it's just because I've downgraded my expectations from repointing whole sections to just spot-pointing trouble-spots.  Where there are deep areas, he'll just mortar, and where it's not deep but still needs to be fixed he'll chisel out the old mortar and repoint.  $1100 to spot-fix the whole house, and he will dye to match the existing mortar (although the part that was done before we bought the house is a gross grey so I don't think I'll be super picky either way).  The more I read the more it seems like where the old mortar is fine you don't want to mess with it anyway, and since I think whole big sections are fine (some areas aren't exposed to weather at all) this seems like the most reasonable solution.  Or maybe I'm just cheap and rationalizing, but whatevs.  :-)

[ssmjlm]

My boss just went through this. She said the quotes were a lot higher than they planned. She ended up getting a rec through a friend of her MIL.

Can you maybe ask on a community FB page?

[pitterwoo]

The first quote seems good to me given the amount of the house that is not brick. I think I remember quotes around here being about 2k per side (ours is a brick 4 square about 1500 sq feet).

I know we were sufficiently scared off that it ended up being another project we are diying. Ours had also never been done and some of it is so bad, our house is quite a bit older than yours though. So, I think the quotes might depend on how much work needs to be done. If you have really bad joints it takes so much more time and material to fill it back up.

[simpsongal]

Yeah, I've heard this can get very pricey. Burying my head in the sand re: our brick.

Just talk to folks and get more quotes. But I'm not sure the first quote is too bad from what I've heard.

ETA: when you're ready to move forward, definitely ask a lot about mortar color.  When we had our porch door installed, the mason needed to repoint some of the brick around the door.  Well, it's a lovely gunmetal gray color when the rest of our mortar is a nice aged limestone-like color

[treedimensional]

I'm taking simpsongirl's approach. When it's time to pay for repointing, I'll probably sell.

[nursecramer]

The higher estimate sounds about right to me. We had our porch foundation done (repointed? IDK, he called it tuck pointing, but he definitely ground out the old mortar and put new in) and I think that was at least $2K. He did some other masonry work, so I don't remember the separate figures, but it was pretty expensive, and that was just for a concrete block foundation. We're LCOL.

[livinthemiatalife]

We paid $1,400 for our little stoop that looked exactly like yours, so it sounds about right .

[soozy87]

We just had a little bit of brick work done. It was replacing probably about 25 sill bricks around our house and repairing one brick that had cracked. We got 2 estimates, one for $725 and another for $900-1200 (quoted from pictures). We ended up going with the more expensive and it ended up being $1200. He said it was a lot of work (took 1.5 days) and he would have given us a higher estimate if he would have seen it in person, but felt like since he requested the picture quote that he should stick with his original quote.

Brick work is expensive.

[hbomdiggity]

Apr 3, 2016 19:55:29 GMT -5 dr.girlfriend said:

Also, what does it mean if someone is licensed but not bonded?  Does that mean they don't have insurance?

Bonds are separate/different from insurance. Insurance covers stuff like workers comp claims, liability (if they burn down your house), etc. Depending on the bond, it can protect against unpaid subcontractors or performance/defective work.  Bonds can be expensive, so the small guys may not be able to afford them or get coverage (you have to put up collateral, like your home).

My state requires a $15k bond for every licensed contractor, but anything more than that is contract driven.

[dr.girlfriend]

Apr 7, 2016 17:48:15 GMT -5 hbomdiggity said:

Apr 3, 2016 19:55:29 GMT -5 dr.girlfriend said:

Also, what does it mean if someone is licensed but not bonded?  Does that mean they don't have insurance?

Bonds are separate/different from insurance. Insurance covers stuff like workers comp claims, liability (if they burn down your house), etc. Depending on the bond, it can protect against unpaid subcontractors or performance/defective work.  Bonds can be expensive, so the small guys may not be able to afford them or get coverage (you have to put up collateral, like your home).

My state requires a $15k bond for every licensed contractor, but anything more than that is contract driven.

Thanks!! That's very helpful.

[downtoearth]

5 years ago we did two sides of a tiny 900 square ft brick house for $2,500.

[dr.girlfriend]

Bumping with an update (in OP) for all those who I sent into a despair spiral with my original post. :-)