Interior repaint, three bedrooms and a hallway, walls and ceilings, trim and six doors. Occupied house, furniture moved to the middle and covered. Here is the quote, and then why each line is priced the way it is.
The line items
Five lines. A painting quote with twenty lines on it is not more thorough, it is harder to say yes to.
Prep is hours, not square feet
This is the line that separates estimators who make money from estimators who do not. Coverage scales with area; prep does not. A smooth new wall and a wall with forty nail holes, a skim patch and failing caulk are the same square footage and four hours apart.
Price prep in hours, state the hours on the document, and describe what they cover. Then the client understands why the identical-looking quote from the guy who did not open a single closet door is $400 cheaper.
Say how many coats, every time
“Paint the bedrooms” is not a scope. Two coats over an existing similar colour is a different job from two coats over dark red, which is really three. Write the number of coats on every surface line, and write what happens if coverage needs another one.
Allowance versus included
The materials line above is an allowance: nine gallons at $58. If the client picks a designer line at $92 a gallon, the allowance covers $522 of it and the difference is a change order. Say that on the document in one sentence.
The alternative — folding an unnamed materials cushion into your wall rate — works until the client asks what paint you are using, and then you are explaining your pricing rather than your work.
The exclusions that actually matter in painting
Lead is the one to never leave off on anything built before 1978 — it is a legal question before it is a pricing one. Closet interiors are the one that costs you a day every time you forget it.
