Drywall repair cost in Toronto and the GTA
Updated · Our figures come straight from our own quoting engine · Dylan, owner
Patching a small hole in drywall costs $75–$300 in the GTA on published price lists. Ours is $50 a patch when the room is being painted anyway; booked as a visit of its own, one small repair comes to $350 with us, against a typical call-out minimum of $150–$200 elsewhere.
There are two numbers for a drywall repair and they are very different: what the patch itself costs, and what the visit costs. Confusing them is why a single small hole can be quoted at several times what the repair is worth, and why the same hole is close to free if somebody is already painting the room.
What a patch costs
Priced by the size of the hole, because that is what decides the method. Something up to about a golf ball is filled and sanded. A fist-sized hole needs backing behind it before anything can be filled. Beyond that, or anywhere water has been involved, it is a cut-out and a new piece of board, taped and feathered in, which is a genuinely different operation rather than a bigger version of the same one.
| What it covers | Published GTA range | Our quote |
|---|---|---|
| A small hole, up to about a golf ballone small patch: a nail hole up to about a golf ball | Published GTA range$75–$300 | Our quote$50 / patch |
| A fist to a soccer ballone medium patch: a fist up to about a soccer ball | Published GTA range$250–$400 | Our quote$110 / patch |
| Larger than that, or water damageone large repair, or water damage | Published GTA range$400–$1,000 | Our quote$240 / repair |
You do not need to count scuffs, dents or nail holes. Those are normal preparation and are already inside a painting price. This section is only about holes you can see through.
The patch and the visit are different numbers
This is the part worth understanding before you ring anybody. A single small repair as a job of its own is priced by the visit, not by the patch, because somebody has to come, and that costs what it costs whether they fill one hole or six. The trade generally applies a call-out minimum for this. Ours works differently: we have no separate call-out charge, but a standalone repair still lands on our minimum booking, which is higher than a typical call-out. For one small hole and nothing else, we are the more expensive answer, and we would rather say so.
| What it covers | Published GTA range | Our quote |
|---|---|---|
| One small repair, as a visit of its ownthe typical minimum call-out for a repair visit | Published GTA range$150–$200 | Our quote$350 |
Where this reverses completely is when the room is being painted anyway. Then the repairs are added to work already happening and you pay the patch prices above rather than anything for the visit, which is why almost every repair we do is part of a decorating job rather than a call-out.
Every figure on this page is before HST, ours and the published ranges alike, which is how almost every painter in Ontario quotes. Thirteen per cent goes on at invoice time.
Questions about what this costs
Can a repair be matched into a textured wall or ceiling?
Yes, and it is charged as its own step because it is a separate skill from the patching. Orange peel and knockdown both get sprayed and worked back to match the surrounding surface, then primed so the repair takes paint the same way the wall around it does. A patch that is flat and smooth but catches the light differently is not a finished repair, and texture is usually why.
Do you have to repaint the whole wall after a repair?
Corner to corner is the reliable answer, and stopping short of it is the commonest reason a repair stays visible. Fresh filler and primer absorb differently from paint that has been on a wall for years, so a spot touch-up tends to read as a slightly different sheen even when the colour is a perfect match. On a flat ceiling paint you can sometimes get away with less. On anything with a sheen, or anywhere with a window casting light along the wall, you cannot.
The stain came from a leak. Will it come back through?
Only if the leak has not been fixed, or if the repair is painted over without being sealed first. A dried water stain will bleed straight through ordinary paint however many coats go on. It needs a stain-blocking primer over it, which is a specific product rather than an extra coat. What we will not do is cover a stain that is still damp, because that hides a live problem rather than repairing it.
Somebody already patched it and it looks worse. Can that be fixed?
Usually, and it is common work. The typical failure is a patch built up proud of the wall rather than feathered out wide, so it casts a shadow in side light no matter how well it is painted. Fixing it means taking the high spots back and re-feathering over a much wider area than the original hole. That is more surface than the first repair touched, which is why it can cost more than doing it properly the first time would have.
For how the work itself is done (preparation, products and what happens on the day), see Drywall Repairs.
We are a Richmond Hill crew and we work across York Region and North York. The ranges on this page cover the wider GTA, because painting costs do not stop at a municipal boundary. If you are outside where we work, though, we will tell you so rather than drive somewhere we cannot serve properly. Ask anyway if you are close; we answer honestly.
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