Hardie-Shake Shock! (Quote is in- Unico too!)

[cjd]

Our one and half story bungalow is brick on the first story and cedar shake (currently painted by PO) on the top gable sides and dormer. We also have a small side room that is mostly windows and chimney but has some cedar shake siding. The shakes on the sides that get some southernly exposure are in rough shape so I called out the authorized Hardie installer for a quote.

I wasn't expecting cheap but I think his rough guide MUST be in error. He told me the Hardie plank siding is exactly half the price (materials and labor) of the same job in the shake style. He said the shake runs about $140/ft2! (installed) He's going to give the full quote in about a week, but he said that is the rough price. I was puzzled/floored... unless I misunderstand something that would be $14k/square, correct? I asked him three times the rough price and then followed that up with a confirmation that the plank would be about $70/ft2. He confirmed that too so I know there was no communication error. That price doesn't include any sheathing work or insulation, fwiw.

Any ideas? That cannot be correct.

[shazapple]

It would make more sense that it be $140 per square (10sqft)

[Daniel Meyer]

That's way too high.

We re-shaked the tower on our building AND a back wall on our Old Vic for around $1000 worth of premium cedar shake

I did the labor.

Bought here:
http://www.woodroof.com/cat36_1.htm

The Building tower:


The back wall on our mudroom:

[SkipW]

Premium cedar shake runs about $275/sq so does (don't shoot!) the "good" Vinyl shake look-alike. $140 sq/ft is laughable. I think you would do much better asking a good referenced local contractor for a quote.

A google search gave me this company, with some very reasonable prices:

http://www.buildingsupplyhouseusa.com/hardie_siding_and_tile_backer

Certainly not $70 sq/ft. more like $140 per square for the product.

Let's hope it's just a misunderstanding....

[jwesevich]

We went through similar sticker shock this past summer trying to get quotes for a garage design that mimicked the main house. Most of the time, the contractors wouldn't actually even bother to call back after checking with the lumber yards for cedar shakes.

I think Skip has it right.

jeff

[Sombreuil_Mongrel]

Hi,
I was unable to find a "Hardie Shake" siding. Did you mean Hardie Shingle siding?
The installation of hardie shingle is more than for their lap siding, but the material is also higher because so much of it is double-coverage that you are only seeing less than half of the material you are buying.
This is the one house that we sided with hardie shingle:






The prices you were provided with are totally nuts!
Casey

[cjd]

Finally got the quote on the Hardie Shingle (thanks Casey for the proper terminology). Our house is a 1 1/2 story bungalow with 90% of the first level being brick. There are two dormers and the side gables. To do the non-brick portion was $22,000 installed. That does NOT include changing the fascia, freeze boards, soffits, or other trim- those would all remain wood. He didn't give the the number of squares he calculated it would take to do the job, even after I called and asked, twice!

He said we could have the lap siding for $13,000 installed. After seeing the photos from Casey's job, I really do like the look of the Hardie shingles (even if a bit uniform) ,but not for those prices.

Is Hardie really that expensive or is this a job they just don't want to do?

We also just had a Unico system quoted for our 2400 ft2 house. For the upstairs and 'spot cooling' of the first floor (kitchen and living room only), they are quoting $19,000.

I think I will start researching the place that Daniel Meyer used. There's no way either of these projects are fitting into the budget this year (ever?).

[downtowndahlgren]

If you look at the Hardie website and enter yout zipcode, you'll find a list of Hardie Preferred Remodeler. You can talk to them and contrast the estimate you received from your contractor. Not many make the Preferred Remodeler list, because there are a lot of contractors that "say" they do Hardie siding, but are really primarily vinyl installers. I got a quote of $13,000 to reside my whole house with HardiePlank, but the installer wasn't going to do it the correct way, even though I would have a warranty anyway. The Preferred Remodeler I consulted confirmed what I read in the Hardie installation manual, so I declined the $13,000 offer. Hardie is not cheap at all, and it's not in my budget this year either.

[cjd]

That was one of the few preferred installers that came through the James Hardie website. they claim to be #2 in the whole Midwest for number of installs last few years.

[YinzerMama]

I have nothing to say about the siding, but we have had several quotes on AC for our house and they have almost all made me want to vomit. When we first moved here we got a quote before moving in because I really wanted air conditioning, and it was $8,000 which didn't seem too horrible. But then we moved in and really thought about it and his proposal just didn't seem like it would really adequately cool the house. So we have had a few more and they have all been in the $15 and up ball park. And aside from swallowing the cost, I would have ducts in my closets, which are big but laid out funny so we never have gotten around to doing it. A minisplit won't work so well for us because there's not really a good place to put one, we have so many windows.

Last summer we broke down and got air conditioners for the windows in the bedrooms - we had a new baby and new babies like to sleep swaddled but I couldn't swaddle him on a 90 degree night without fear of cooking his brain. So now we can sleep comfortably in the summer at least. We have a finished basement so we hang out down there a lot when the weather is hot, it's like free air conditioning.

The funny thing is we recently made and walked on an offer for a house that had forced air heating and cooling - and I couldn't get excited over it, I just felt it would be WEIRD to have AC. The girls room would have been the attic so we would have had to cool their area (there was a wall unit up there, rest of the house was central) - the basement was unfinishable, we would have lost our "free" AC. So weird that I have gone from wishing we had AC to feeling like it would be weird to have it!

Even our first floor doesn't get TOO bad during the day in the summer, I guess they planned for such things back then. It's the upstairs that can be bad. So, we will just get by with window units.

As a bonus, the units we bought have this water recycling system so when the unit cycles on, it makes a very pleasant gurgling sound... it's really enjoyable to listen to at night. Sometimes I wake up at night and wait to hear the AC gurgle before I go back to sleep.

So strange the things you come to love about old houses...