Homeowners in Des Moines and central Iowa often ask, “how much does siding cost?” and want a rough estimate. This can be a difficult question to answer as there are many variables that go into the final price – it is almost impossible to answer without more info. This article will provide an overview of the main components that affect the cost of siding replacement. Our goal is to provide you with enough information so you can make a better-informed decision when it comes time for you to replace your home’s siding.
The areas that we will cover are:
- Analyzing the Home to be Sided
- Removal and Disposal of Old Siding
- Condition of the Exterior Walls
- Underlayment Used
- Types of Siding Upfront Cost/Colors
- Overhang Areas of Home
- Gutters Gutter Protection
- Miscellaneous Materials
- Company Installing your Siding + Workmanship Warranty
Analyzing the Home to be Sided:
Not all homes are created the same way. One look down your block will show you how many different types of houses exist on your street alone, so you can only guess how many different floor plans exist in your neighborhood and your city.
Estimating the cost of siding replacement is challenging because it’s important to treat each house uniquely and find out what makes them different. How many stories is the house? Are there a lot of windows? Are there large walls with windows and doors with a lot of siding to be replaced?
As a general rule, walls without windows, doors, chimneys, lights, etc. require less amount of labor and time, resulting in a lower overall cost. Why is this? It’s because of all the trim detailing and work that is necessary no matter what type of siding you are installing. It’s like painting a room in your house: the cutting in and trim work always takes longer than rolling or spraying the walls.
Removal and Disposal of Old Siding:
This is one of the sticking points when talking to customers about a siding project. There are a lot of vinyl siding installers who try to talk homeowners into leaving their old siding on to save money and keep a minuscular R-Value. Depending on the type of siding you have, it may need to come off no matter what which can help with the pricing comparisons because all quotes will include the removal. Examples of siding that must be removed include are aluminum, vinyl, steel and cement board. That means that there are only a few wood based sidings that could be left on including cedar, Masonite and T 111. It’s important to understand that if you are putting on a wood based, fiber cement, engineered wood or stone siding, your contractor will also need to remove the old siding as well for proper install. As previously mentioned, there are many contractors who go over old siding to save time. As a homeowner, this is where you should consider two main things.
First, why are you replacing your old siding? For many, it’s the condition of their existing siding. Your siding may have holes from woodpeckers, it may be warping, have water damage or be rotting. Even customers who are looking at a lower maintenance material (that doesn’t require paint) usually don’t start looking at options if they’re not seeing any weathering or water damage. For most people, their home is one of their biggest assets, so why leave a deteriorating material on to save some money?
For the next point, when deciding whether to tear off or not, consider what you can’t see. Below are some pictures in our showroom from one of our previous projects that demonstrate why tear off was the right course of action. For this particular job, after removing the water damaged Masonite siding, we found considerable rot in the walls including the sheeting and framing. You can see in the before pictures there was no indication of the extreme level of damage.
It may cost an additional 5 to 10% more to tear off, but it will also ensure there are no hidden problems that could cost you way more. As for keeping the R-Value, as you will see later in this guide there are other ways to replace that. If wall insulation is a concern, then when researching siding it would also be prudent to talk to an insulation company. Dollar for dollar they can do much more for you than any siding-related solution.
Condition of the Exterior Walls:
As discussed above, there are times where damaged structures are exposed and should be addressed. In our 20 years of experience, the percentage of jobs where this arises and results in a charge is less than 10%. Homeowners also find that the cost to make things right is way lower than what they expect. In these cases, it’s very important to work with a reputable contractor who will show the damage, explain what needs to be done, break down the cost and ask for your approval to make necessary repairs.
Underlayment Used:
Once the old siding is removed and any necessary repairs have been done, an underlayment will be installed. Installing fan fold foam or polystyrene insulation under siding is a choice for homeowners who are seeking to protect their homes against moisture infiltration, as well as improve energy efficiency, instead of installing house wrap only. The best bang for your buck will come from having insulation blown into your walls before replacing siding. From a cost perspective, house wrap will be the least expensive underlayment, next will be all of the varieties of fan fold insulations, whether form or polystyrene. The most expensive option would be to have insulation blown into the wall, however this will also perform better than the other options.
Types of Siding Upfront Cost/Colors:
There are many types of siding that you can have installed, but for this article we are going to focus on the most common options. The two categories we will discuss are paintable and low maintenance. For the paintable category, there are two products that are offered the most for home siding replacement, Hardie Plank fiber cement and LP Smartside engineered wood.
Paintable Siding Options
There are a few factors that affect price, the material cost, installation cost and finishing cost.
First, let’s look at material cost. If we just look at only the actual material cost, Hardie Plank would more expensive than LP Smartside. Most contractors will also charge more for installing Hardie Plank because it is more difficult to handle. The finishing can vary a lot as well. Some siding installers have painters they work with, so depending on the cost that a subcontractor charges them, you could see variances in your quotes from contractor to contractor. The type of paint used, and the painting process used will also affect your pricing.
As for the process, consider one or two coats and how much trim detail will be involved. The more trim work that needs to be done, the more it will cost. For example, at Sherwin Williams you could spend anywhere from $500 to $1000, depending on paint you use. Both options in the paintable category can come pre-finished. Pre-finishing will typically be less expensive than when the finishing is done after installation. Then you need to remember there will be maintenance cost and the home will need to be painted, adding to the life cost of a paintable product.
Low Maintenance Siding Options
Now let’s look at the low-maintenance home siding options. Here we will look at the four most popular options including vinyl, insulated vinyl, polymer shake and Everlast Polymer Cladding. There are others including aluminum and steel, but you really don’t see those in the residential replacement market as much as others.
Here there aren’t as much possible variations as in the paintable group. The main driver of cost difference is between product material and color. It’s important to keep in mind that “low” maintenance isn’t the same as no maintenance, so you should consider the cost of a power washing every 3 to 4 years to keep your siding looking great. With the prior group we had 3 pricing areas to consider, here we will as well. Material cost, labor cost and color upgrade cost will affect pricing between these options.
Vinyl siding will be the least expensive option and will fall about 25% less in material cost than insulated siding, 36% less than polymer shake and 40% less than Everlast Polymer Cladding when considering labor and material. Since Everlast charges the same for all colors, you can decrease these differences depending on color choices. Let’s say you have a deep gray color you want with vinyl or insulated vinyl, you may pay a 15 to 20% premium over standard pricing. Let’s combine the two categories and list them generically from most expensive to least. Now remember this list is for UPFRONT pricing, not life cost.
Everlast will be the most expensive option, followed by the two paintable options, when you also add in finishing cost. Polymer shake would be next, followed by insulated vinyl and then finally vinyl. If you factor in lifetime cost, these rankings will change dramatically and both paintable products will be more than Everlast.
Overhang Areas of Home:
Although not a necessity, included with most siding replacement quotes is replacement or covering of soffit and fascia. With the paintable siding options, it is more common to rebuild all overhang areas of home with the soffit and trim in the Hardie Plank or Smartside material. With the low maintenance options, you will usually get quoted replacing rotten wood and covering overhangs with aluminum. From a cost perspective completely replacing the overhangs with new siding material can add 23 to 28% including the finishing cost. Assume an addition of 10 to 15% for covering the overhangs with an aluminum or vinyl soffit and fascia system.
Gutters/Gutters Protection:
Another project that happens with many siding replacements is the replacement of gutters and/or gutter protection. Depending on the material used, replacing gutters can add 4 to 6% to the overall cost of the project. Adding gutter protection can range greatly depending on system, but usually increases the price 7 to 20%.
Miscellaneous Materials:
You can usually assume 3-5% of a siding replacement project’s cost will be fasteners, dumpsters and other miscellaneous materials and labor including moving equipment and cleaning up the job site.
Company Installing your Siding + Workmanship Warranty:
Improper installation can ensure your siding project becomes very expensive, very quickly. What happens if the installer does something wrong? Or how about companies only offering 1-2 year labor warranties? You will be surprised how many of the big names only offer that long of a workmanship warranty. Shortly after the warranty window something could wrong with the product installation and you get to pay for it to be fixed – along with any other work that might have been produced by damage.
Hopefully this will help you to understand the primary factors that can affect the cost of your siding replacement in Des Moines or central Iowa. When shopping for siding, you should think about the long-term cost compared to the initial cost. It’s usually more cost-effective to hire a company that offers a Lifetime Workmanship Warranty than to pay for repairs due to faulty installation.