Rendering in East Boldre, and who you ask first
Your planning authority here is the National Park rather than the district council, and that catches people out on the day they want to change a finish.
The site visit is free and so is the written itemised quote. Thomas Hannen prices every job himself.
Render work in the village is ordinary render work with one difference: the National Park Authority is the planning authority, so any question about changing the look of an elevation goes there rather than to the district council.
Most people ring because a wall has gone hollow, a crack has opened at a window head, or a whole gable has greened over on the sheltered side. Some ring because an outbuilding or a boundary wall has lost its coat entirely.
The work is the same either way. We tap the elevation on the free site visit, find out how much has parted from the wall and what the background is made of, and put the hack off, the beads, each coat, the scaffold and the waste on separate lines in writing.
The work
What we get called to on the forest edge
Tapping the elevation. A survey here starts with a scutch hammer rather than a tape. Sound render rings, blown render sounds like a drum, and the hollow areas have already parted from the background. That percentage, not the square metres, is what sets the price and the programme.
Hacking off and preparing. Loose render comes off to a firm background. We clean down, prepare and stabilise anything dusty with a primer, and cut a key where the face is too smooth to hold a coat. Brick that has spalled at the arris is cut out and made good first.
The system for the wall. On a cavity wall in good order, a silicone thin coat: primer, a mesh and scrim reinforced basecoat, a through-coloured topcoat scraped or floated to a texture off a sample board. Monocouche is the one coat alternative and holds up on a long plain elevation. Acrylic and polymer rich finishes craze over time. Traditional sand and cement still earns its place on garages, stores and plinths.
Lime on solid walls. A period cottage built pre-1919 is likely to be solid walled and breathable. Water gets in and leaves through the face, so a plastic rich topcoat leaves it trapped, pushes damp inside and blows the render off in sheets within a few winters. Those walls get a haired lime basecoat, a soft topcoat and limewash rather than a modern system.
Insulation under the render. On a cold wall EWI is worth pricing beside a plain re-render: external wall insulation board fixed and dowelled on, a render carrier and mesh, then the same topcoat, with Part L setting the thermal standard. It thickens the elevation, so sills, reveals, eaves and pipework all move out with it.
Edges, cracking and staining. A bellcast bead at the base throws water off the plinth, stop beads finish the render at reveals and verges, and stainless goes on wherever the wall gets wet. A crack that takes a coin lets water behind and the coat will delaminate around it. Green algae on a shaded face, or the streaking under a leaking gutter, is a cleaning job unless the wall behind is wet. Pebbledash and Tyrolean hide all of it, so a dashed wall gets tapped rather than looked at.
How it runs
From your call to a written price
Same team from first visit to last, one person to ring, and no sub-contracting your work out to somebody you have never met. The quote is itemised, not a figure on the back of a card: access and scaffold, protection, preparation of the existing wall, the system and number of coats, beads and stop ends, and making good on separate lines, so you can compare it properly against anyone else's.
Nothing is left open or unusable overnight. The site is swept at the end of each day rather than the end of the job, and what comes out leaves with us. If something turns up once we start that nobody could have seen, you get a photograph and a price before we carry on.
Rendering an ordinary unlisted house is normally permitted development where the new finish is similar in appearance to the old, and inside the National Park that test is applied by the Authority rather than by the district. The village sits within the Forest South East conservation area, where appearance is controlled, and there are 8 listed entries in the parish on which the render itself is protected fabric. the National Park Authority publishes the conservation area boundaries and its property map will tell you what covers your address before you commit to a colour or a texture.
Cost
What decides the price of a rendering job
No rate per square metre, because the square metres are the easy part; what is already on the wall decides the price.
Getting to it. A low cottage on the lane comes off a tower, a two storey elevation facing the open forest wants a full scaffold, and a wall reached only through a paddock gate has to be hand loaded. A bungalow gable comes off a tower, a three storey elevation wants a scaffold, and the platform has to stand for the whole system rather than a day. The work at height rules are why it is a priced line rather than something folded into a rate.
What is already on the wall. Rendering over sound brick is one job. Hacking off blown sand and cement, or a pebbledash that has parted from the background, is another, and it is the part nobody can see from the road. We tap the whole elevation before quoting, because the hollow areas set the hours.
The system, and what the wall behind it needs. Silicone thin coat over insulation, monocouche through-coloured, or traditional sand and cement all price differently and behave differently. On a solid wall that has to breathe, a plastic-rich modern system traps moisture and moves the problem inside, so the right system is a wall decision rather than a colour decision.
Comparing quotes? Ask which system is being quoted and how many coats, whether the old render is being hacked off or overlaid, whether beads, bellcast and stop ends are included, whether the scaffold is in the price, and what happens to the existing sills and pipework. Two quotes for the same job are usually two different jobs.
If it has started to come away
Render that has blown or cracked open
Ring rather than use the form. A section that sounds hollow when you tap it, or a crack you can get a coin into, is letting water behind the render and the frost does the rest. We make the loose area safe, sheet it if the weather is against us, and price the elevation once we can see how far the blown area actually goes. An elevation that has already opened up on the exposed side is worth ringing about before the winter, because the frost gets into a crack far faster than the rain gets out of it. The phone is answered 24 hours for emergencies; scheduled work runs Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm.
Worth knowing
Your planning authority is the National Park, not the district
This catches people out more often than any other local detail. Most of the surrounding area answers to a district or unitary council. Here the plan making and the planning decisions sit with the New Forest National Park Authority, and that is who you talk to about anything touching the look of your house from the outside. Ring the wrong office and you can lose a fortnight before anyone tells you.
It matters for render specifically because appearance is what the Park cares about. Repairing a render in the same material and the same texture is maintenance and nobody needs to weigh in. Changing a dashed wall to a smooth coloured finish, or picking a colour that stands out against everything else on the lane, is a change of appearance in a designated landscape with a conservation area running through it. Ask first, in writing, and keep the answer. It is a free question and a short one, and it is a great deal cheaper than a scaffold that has to come back down. On a listed building the render is protected in its own right, so consent comes before the job rather than after it.
Who you are dealing with
A local firm you can check
We cover East Boldre, Beaulieu, Boldre, Lymington and the villages on the eastern side of the forest, broadly SO42, with the New Forest National Park Authority for planning and the district for building control. You are dealing with Bournemouth Roofing & Building, the trading name of Bournemouth Roofing & Building Ltd, registered in England and Wales, company number 15471719, which you can look up in a minute. Thomas Hannen's business, and he is the one who comes out to price the job, not a salesman. A verified customer's 10 out of 10 on Checkatrade. The visit and the written quote are both free.
Questions
East Boldre questions we get asked
Who do we ask about changing the colour of our render?
The National Park Authority, not the district council. It is the planning authority for this village, it holds the conservation area boundaries and the listed entries, and it is the office that will tell you whether the change you want counts as a change of appearance.
Are we allowed to render inside the conservation area?
No. It controls what the result looks like. Like for like repair is maintenance and needs nobody's permission. A different texture, a different material or a colour that stands out is where the question arises, and it is quicker to ask than to guess.
Our garage and stores are rendered too. Are they included?
They can be, and they are priced separately so you can see what each one costs. Outbuildings usually take a simpler specification than the house. If the property is listed, be aware that outbuildings in the same curtilage can be covered by the listing as well.
How much of the old render actually has to come off?
Only what has parted from the wall, and we find that by tapping the whole elevation rather than by guessing. Where a third or more of a face is hollow it is cheaper to take the lot off than to chase patches. We tell you the figure before you commit.
Can you render in winter?
Not reliably, and people usually want to know how long that pushes things back. Render has to stay above freezing while it goes on and cures, and lime is fussier than cement. We survey and quote all year, but a winter enquiry usually turns into a spring start rather than a rushed job that will not hold.
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Get the elevation tapped and the question asked early
Thomas comes out, taps the wall, tells you what has actually blown and prices the hack off, the system and the scaffold line by line. The visit and the written quote are free.