What does it cost to remove pebbledash in Southport?
Taking it off, or going over the top of it: what each one costs on a terrace, a semi and a detached house, and how to tell which your walls will take. Typical ranges, not a price for your house.
Two different jobs, two different prices
There are only two ways to deal with pebbledash. You take it off and start again, or you render over the top of it. Which one you are allowed is decided by the wall, not by the budget, and it is the single biggest number on the job.
| Item | Per m² | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Hacking pebbledash off | £15 to £30 | Labour, dust sheets and the waste, which is heavy and fills a skip fast. |
| Making the bare wall good | £8 to £18 | Repointing, filling and a levelling coat once you can see what is underneath. |
| Silicone thin-coat render over the top | £45 to £70 | Basecoat, mesh, primer and a through-colour top coat. |
| Rendering straight over sound pebbledash | £45 to £75 | The same system, with a levelling coat to bury the stone. No strip-out, no waste. |
What a whole house comes to
Including scaffold, taking the dash off, making the wall good and finishing in silicone. If the pebbledash is sound and can be rendered over instead, take roughly £2,000 to £3,500 off a semi.
| Property | Strip off and re-render | Render over the top |
|---|---|---|
| Mid-terrace, front and rear | £5,000 to £8,500 | £3,500 to £6,000 |
| Three-bed semi | £7,500 to £12,500 | £5,000 to £9,000 |
| Detached | £11,000 to £18,000 | £8,000 to £14,000 |
| Bungalow | £6,500 to £11,000 | £4,500 to £8,000 |
What moves the price
Whether the dash is stuck fast
Tap it. Solid all over and it can usually be levelled and rendered over. Hollow in patches, or lifting at the edges, and it has to come off, because nothing you put on top will hold better than what is under it.
What the wall is made of
A lot of pebbledash was put on to hide poor brickwork or a wall that was already damp. Once it is off you can see what you have, and that is why a stripped job is priced with a provisional figure for making good.
Scaffold
£700 to £1,600 for most houses, and more for a gable tight against a boundary or a drop at the back. It is priced by the elevation and by how long it stands.
Waste
Pebbledash is dense. A semi can fill two skips on its own, and that is a real line on the price rather than a rounding.
Solid walls and breathability
On an older solid-wall house, the render has to let the wall dry outwards. Sealing it with the wrong system traps water in the brick and shows up inside a year or two later.
Questions people ask about pebbledash removal costs in Southport
How much does it cost to remove pebbledash from a house?
On its own, hacking it off is usually £15 to £30 per square metre, which is £1,500 to £3,000 on a typical Southport semi before anything goes back on. Almost nobody stops there, so the number that matters is the whole job: £7,500 to £12,500 for a semi stripped back and re-rendered in silicone with scaffold. Those are typical ranges, and the wall decides where in them you land.
Can you render over pebbledash instead?
Yes, when it is sound. A levelling coat buries the stone and the new render goes on that, which saves the strip-out, the waste and several days. It is only worth doing if the existing dash is stuck fast: rendering over something that is already letting go buys a few years and then costs the whole job again.
Will taking the pebbledash off damage the brickwork?
It takes the face off some bricks, and on a soft older brick it takes more. That is normal and it is why making the wall good is a line on the price rather than an afterthought. If the plan is to have bare brick at the end rather than render, say so first, because that changes what can safely come off.
How long does the job take?
A semi is usually one to two weeks on site, plus the scaffold going up and coming down. Stripping is two to three days of that, and the render coats need drying time between them, so cold or wet weather stretches it.
Want the number for your own job?
We come and look at the job, then put a written price in your hand with everything in it. Free, and nothing is owed for the visit.
Or read more about external rendering and silicone rendering.