CalculatorFree tool
Repointing cost per m², built up properly
Start from the benchmark — published wages, a real gang, the costs on top of wages most people forget — then move anything you disagree with. The whole sum stays on the page.
The working
- 1 × tradesperson at £16.40
- £16.40
- Gang wage, per hour
- £16.40
- + 35% on top of wages
- £22.14
- × 8 hours on the tools
- £177.12 a day
- Rake out and repointjoints raked to depth, repointed and brushed£177.12 ÷ 8 m² × 1.20 = £26.57/m²
Benchmark
£26.57/m² labour
CIJC rates · tradesperson £16.40/hr · gang of 1 · 35% on top · overheads and profit 20%
Materials, scaffold and supervision are not included in this rate.
What’s in this?
- Employer's National Insurance — 15% above £5,000 a year
- Holiday pay — 12.07%
- Pension, auto-enrolment minimum — 3%
- CITB levy — 0.35% of payroll
- Sick pay, training and employer's liability insurance — the remainder
- At 0% this is a CIS subcontractor's labour price — National Insurance, holiday and pension are then theirs to carry, not the job's.
The location range is authored, not measured — our tender data says what was bought where, not what labour costs there.
Price a whole job with this ratePut in the job size and your lump sums — scaffold, plant, skip — and get the job total.
The minimum starts at a day of the gang, priced — £212.54 — because travel, unloading and setting up make a day the honest floor. Type your own, or 0 for none.
Put a job size in and the total appears here.
Raking out is the work; pointing is the finish
Most of a repointing day goes on getting the old mortar out, not putting new mortar in. Joints are raked back to a depth of at least twice their width so the new mortar has something to hold on to, and on a hard cement-pointed wall that is slow, dusty work. The pointing itself, once the wall is prepared and brushed out, is comparatively quick.
That is why 8 m² a day is a fair benchmark and why it moves so much. A soft, lime-pointed wall rakes out easily; a wall pointed in hard cement forty years ago can be a third of that.
The mortar has to suit the wall — and you know your wall
The mortar must be softer than the masonry around it, so that any movement or salt damage happens in the joint rather than the face of the brick or stone. In practice that means older, softer buildings are generally pointed in lime, and modern masonry in a cement-based mix.
Which one your job needs is a decision for whoever has surveyed the building — and if it is a listed or historic property, for the conservation officer as well. What this calculator can do is price the labour once you have decided, and let you set an output that reflects the real work. Lime work is generally slower, needs protecting while it cures, and has a shorter working season.
What moves the output, in both directions
- What is already in the joint. Hard cement is the slowest thing to remove. Soft, perished lime falls out.
- Joint width and unit size. A square metre of brickwork has far more linear joint than a square metre of large stone blocks, so the same area is a very different amount of pointing.
- Full repoint or patch. Chasing out failed sections across an elevation is slower per square metre than working a whole wall systematically, because you spend the day moving.
- Access and weather. Scaffold is a lump sum, not part of the rate. Frost stops the job, and new pointing needs protecting from rain and sun while it cures.
Price it from your survey, not from an average
Repointing has one of the widest genuine ranges of any trade on this site, because two walls of identical area can be entirely different jobs. Nobody can price it sensibly from a photograph, and no published average is worth much against a wall you have actually looked at.
So use the benchmark as a starting point and move the output to what you know the wall will run at. Everything else in the chain — the gang, the wage, the costs on top, your overheads — stays exactly as it is, which is what makes the number defensible when somebody asks how you got to it.
Questions people ask
How much repointing can be done in a day?
Around 8 m² a day is a reasonable benchmark for raking out and repointing, but the genuine range is wide. Old, soft lime mortar rakes out quickly; hard cement pointing can cut the figure to a third of that. The condition of the existing joints matters more than the area.
How deep should joints be raked out before repointing?
To at least twice the width of the joint, so the new mortar has enough depth to key into and is not simply a skin on the face. Raking out is the slow part of a repointing job — the pointing itself is comparatively quick once the wall is prepared and brushed out.
Should you repoint with lime or cement mortar?
The mortar should be softer than the masonry around it, so movement and salt damage occur in the joint rather than the face of the brick or stone. Older and softer buildings are generally pointed in lime, modern masonry in cement-based mixes. On a listed or historic building the specification is a matter for the surveyor and conservation officer.
Why do repointing quotes vary so much?
Because two walls of the same area can be completely different jobs. What is already in the joint, the joint width, the size of the masonry units, whether it is a full repoint or patching, and the access all change the output substantially. It is a trade that has to be priced from a survey rather than an average.
Can you repoint in winter?
Not in frost, and new pointing needs protecting from rain, wind and sun while it cures. Lime work in particular has a shorter working season and needs longer protection than cement-based mortar, which is worth allowing for in the programme rather than the rate.
Where these figures come from
The wages are the national minimums agreed between employers and unions, republished each July. The costs on top of them are the statutory ones every employer actually pays. The outputs — how much a gang gets through in a day — are blended from published estimating guidance, and they are the part worth arguing with, which is why every one is a control you can move.
Other trades
- Bricklaying£35.68/m²
- Blockwork£23.84/m²
- Plastering£8.50/m²
- Rendering£38.34/m²
- Floor screed£2.83/m²
- Concreting£7.92/m²
- Tiling£17.71/m²
- Roofing£32.80/m²
- Block paving£25.56/m²
- Tarmac driveways£15.34/m²
- Resin driveways£16.61/m²
- Painting£14.17/m²
- Stud walls£17.71/m²
- Patios£31.95/m²
- Plasterboarding£12.39/m²
- Decking£31.88/m²
- Fencing£25.56/m²
- Turfing£3.42/m²
- Coving£7.08/m²
- Loft insulation£4.27/m²
- External wall insulation£38.34/m²
- Soft strip£8.54/m²
- Hand excavation£85.41/m²
- Shuttering£8.50/m²
- Mesh and rebar£2.56/m²
Pricing a job like these?
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