Commercial & body corporate painting costs, Cape Town
What really goes into the cost of a commercial repaint.
Complexes, offices, retail and warehouses. We do not publish rates; every building is surveyed and priced on its own. If you are comparing three tenders that all say the same total, this page tells you where the difference is hiding.
Commercial repaint tenders are almost never comparable. One is measured off a plan, one off a walk-around, one off a guess. One includes access, one adds it later. One says two coats and applies one and a bit. The totals look close enough for a trustee meeting to pick the cheapest, and the difference shows up three winters later on the elevation nobody looks at.
So here is what a proper commercial scope includes, and why each part matters.
What goes into the price
What a proper job includes, line by line.
Complex or sectional title exterior repaint
Every elevation measured and scheduled, condition photographed, cracks opened and sealed, primer, two full coats of Plascon, phased block by block with resident notices.
Office and retail interior repaint
Worked after hours or in sections so the business keeps trading, furniture moved and protected, low odour systems, two full coats.
Warehouse and industrial walls
Height access included in the rate rather than added later, dust and racking managed, coatings chosen for wash down and knocks rather than for a showroom.
Structural steel, roof sheeting and cladding
Rust treated back to sound steel, correct primer for galvanised or rusted substrate, then a full coating build. Galvanised and rusted metal are not the same job and are not priced as one.
Commercial waterproofing, flat roofs and parapets
Rubber Sealant Liquid Rubber, all details reinforced, three coats to specified thickness. Quoted as its own line, never buried in a paint rate.
Non-asbestos fibre-cement sheeting on outbuildings and sheds
Sheets coated in place: cleaned, primed, every bolt and lap reinforced. Asbestos-cement roofs are outside our scope and go to a registered asbestos contractor.
Line marking, signage cut-ins, doors and steelwork items
Priced on what is actually there. Averaging these into a wall rate is how a tender ends up cheaper on paper than it is on site.
We do not publish rates. Every property is different. We give you one fixed price for the whole job after we have looked at it properly and written down what we found.
Why the cheap quote is cheap
The savings all come out of the same place.
The area was never measured
A commercial rate means nothing without a measured area schedule per block and per elevation. Without one there is no way to check the tender, and no way to argue when the variation order arrives.
Access is priced later
Scaffold, boom lifts and rope access on a three storey block or a warehouse wall are a real cost. Left out of the tender, they come back as a variation once you are committed.
Waterproofing is smuggled into the paint rate
On most older Northern Suburbs schemes the real problem is water, not colour. A tender that does not itemise waterproofing has either ignored it or intends to paint over it.
Nobody wrote down the specification
Product, primer, number of coats, target thickness, colours. If those five things are not in writing, a guarantee has nothing to attach to and neither do you.
What we check before we price
So your fixed price stays honest.
- Structural work, balcony slab repairs, roof sheet replacement and electrical work, which belong to the right trade
- Asbestos removal, cutting or disposal, which is licensed work for a registered contractor
- Plaster repairs beyond patching, quoted once opened up
- Access to private balconies, courtyards and units where residents cannot be reached, quoted as a return visit
FAQ
Frequently asked questions
Get your own number
Guidance only goes so far. Let us look at the property.
We come out, get onto the roof and the walls, photograph what we find, and send you one fixed price for the whole job.