How much does drywall repair cost?
A drywall repair is priced from four things. How big the damaged area is, what caused it, how hard the existing texture is to match, and whether the room has to be protected or emptied to work in it. A doorknob hole in a hallway and a doorknob hole in a finished basement with a home theatre in it are not the same job, and an honest estimate will say why.
The cause matters more than the hole
Most people call about the hole. The hole is usually the cheapest part.
If the damage came from water, somebody has to find out where the water came from and whether the cavity behind the board is dry. Closing a wall over wet insulation buys you a mould problem in six months and a second repair that costs more than the first one. If the damage came from movement, a cracked seam that keeps reopening, then patching the crack is a temporary fix and the joint needs to be opened and rebuilt.
A repair quote that does not mention the cause is quoting the visible damage only. Ask what happens if the cause is still active.
Texture is the part that surprises people
Matching knockdown, orange peel or skip trowel is skilled work, and on an older wall the existing texture has usually been painted over enough times that it no longer matches itself. Sometimes the honest answer is that a patch will always show slightly in raking light, and the better result is to skim the whole wall or the whole ceiling plane so the surface reads as one thing.
That costs more on the day and less over time, because the alternative is repainting the room twice.
Finish level changes the labour, not the material
Drywall finishing runs from Level 0 to Level 5. Most walls in a house are finished to Level 4, which is fine under flat and eggshell paint in normal light. A wall that takes gloss paint, or sits under a window with light raking across it, needs Level 5, which is a full skim coat over the entire surface.
The board costs the same either way. The labour does not.
Access and protection
Working in an empty room is quicker than working around furniture, and working on the ground floor is quicker than carrying board up two flights. Sanding drywall makes fine dust that travels, so an occupied house needs containment and a finished floor needs covering.
None of that is padding. It is the difference between a repair you can live through and a week of cleaning.
The ranges we publish
Small hole patching generally runs $150 to $400. Mid-size repairs, which covers water damage and larger holes, generally run $400 to $900. A full wall or a full ceiling section generally starts around $1,000 and runs to $3,000 or more.
Those are the same figures on our FAQ and they are ranges rather than prices, because the four things above move a job within them and sometimes past them. A repair that turns out to need the cause fixed first is a different job from the one you called about.
Most repairs can be priced from a clear photo. Send one through the estimate form with a note about what caused it, and you get a written, itemised price before anyone comes out.
The Work Behind This Answer
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