Repair & redecoration works in Singapore: scope & real costs

Repair and redecoration, R&R, is the middle ground most Singapore homeowners actually need and rarely find a name for: not a handyman call-out for one broken thing, and not a full renovation that hacks the flat apart, but one coordinated job that fixes what's worn, makes good what's damaged, and repaints the lot. Below are three real RK E&C jobs itemised in full (S$850, S$3,675 and S$4,380) so you can see what the scope and the money actually look like at each level.

What repair and redecoration works cover

R&R restores a home without changing it. The layout stays; the condition improves. A typical package pulls from these trades:

• Repairs. Sagging doors, jammed locks, dripping taps, loose sockets, cracked tiles, failed silicone, damaged skirting.
• Making good. Filling holes left by removed shelves and brackets, patching hacked or scarred wall sections, re-plastering and skim coating.
• Servicing fixtures. Aircon cleaning and gas top-up, water heater replacement, toilet bowl and bidet swaps, cabinet re-fixing.
• Waterproofing. Where a wall or toilet floor shows the signs, done before anything is covered up.
• Repainting. Whole flat or selected rooms, over properly prepared walls.
• Final clean. The job isn't finished until the dust is gone.

The value isn't in any single trade. It's in one team doing them in the right order. That's the part that goes wrong when people engage a painter, a plumber and a cleaner separately.

R&R vs a full renovation: which do you need?

	Repair & redecoration	Full renovation
Layout	Unchanged	Changed, walls, doorways, zones
Flooring	Repaired / cleaned	Replaced
Carpentry	Repaired, re-fixed, repainted	New, built to measure
Typical duration	Days to about two weeks	Six to twelve weeks
Typical spend	Hundreds to low thousands	Tens of thousands
HDB permit	Usually not required	Required
Can you live in it?	Often yes	Usually no

If you're weighing the other side of that table, our HDB renovation cost guide and the itemised $38,000 whole-flat breakdown cover full renovation properly. This page is for everything short of that.

Real job 1: condo handover, S$850

A 689 sq ft unit at One-North Eden, at the end of a tenancy. The flat was structurally fine; it needed to look and work like it did on day one.

Item	Price (SGD)
Move-out deep clean, whole unit	$500
Aircon servicing, 4 units @ $25	$100
Make-good and repaint	$400
Total after discounts	$850

The line items add up to $1,000; the invoiced total was $850 after discounts for taking the whole package as one job. That gap is the entire argument for bundling. Three separate contractors would each have charged their own minimum call-out, and nobody would have owned the sequence.

This is the lightest form of R&R and the most common: clean, service, make good, repaint. If it's specifically a tenancy handover you're facing, the deposit-and-inventory side is covered in our end-of-tenancy reinstatement guide.

Real job 2: resale HDB refresh, S$3,675

A flat at 187B Rivervale Drive. Same idea, but the toilet had reached the end of its life and had to be taken back to bare surfaces, which is where R&R starts overlapping with renovation.

Item	Price (SGD)
House cleaning + aircon servicing (3 units)	$575
Full-house painting	$530
Toilet hacking, re-tiling & waterproofing	$1,500
Cabinets × 2, supply & install	$300
Toilet bowl installation	$150
Tiles (materials)	$280
Toilet bowl (materials)	$340
Total	$3,675

Two things worth reading off this invoice. First, the toilet is 41% of the job on its own: hack, re-tile and waterproof is the single most expensive thing you can add to an R&R package, and it's covered in depth in our HDB toilet renovation guide. Second, materials are listed separately from labour ($280 tiles, $340 bowl). Insist on that split in any quote you receive. It's the only way to compare two contractors honestly, and it lets you upgrade or downgrade a fitting without renegotiating the whole job.

Note also how modest full-house painting is at $530 once someone is already on site with protection sheets down. Our HDB painting cost guide explains why painting quoted as a standalone job usually comes in higher.

Real job 3: quoted at S$4,380

A quotation for a flat with a longer defect list, the kind of scope that builds up when maintenance has been deferred for a few years.

Item	Price (SGD)
Termite treatment	$350
Water heater + bidet installation	$650
Doors × 3	$380
Aircon, leak repair, cleaning & gas top-up	$750
Wall waterproofing + re-plastering	$750
Full-house painting	$1,500
Total	$4,380

Painting is $1,500 here against $530 in job 2, same trade, very different number. That gap is scope and wall condition: job 2 was a straight repaint over sound surfaces, this flat needs damaged walls made good first. It's the clearest illustration on this page of why a single "painting price per flat" doesn't exist.

The instructive line is wall waterproofing and re-plastering at $750, sitting immediately above painting at $1,500. Those two are inseparable. Paint over a damp, unrepaired wall and you are buying a finish that will bubble and peel within a year, you'd be paying the $1,500 twice. Any quote that offers to repaint a stained wall without addressing what caused the stain is quoting the wrong job. Our guides on bathroom waterproofing and wall plastering and skim coat cover the diagnosis.

Note too that termite treatment and a water heater sit on the same invoice as the painting. That's normal for R&R and it's the point, the flat's problems don't arrive sorted by trade.

The sequence, and why it's the whole job

Get the order wrong and you pay for the same work twice. The correct sequence:

1. Inspect and list. Every defect written down before anyone quotes. Surprises found halfway through are what turn fixed prices into variations.
2. Pest treatment, if any. Before surfaces are closed up.
3. Wet works and repairs. Waterproofing, tiling, plumbing, electrical, door and hardware repairs.
4. Plaster and skim. Every patched and hacked surface made flat.
5. Drying time. Non-negotiable. Painting over damp plaster is the most common cause of a paint job failing in its first year.
6. Prime and paint. Last finishing trade, over prepared walls.
7. Fixture install and servicing. Heaters, bowls, cabinets, aircon.
8. Final clean. After the dust, not before.

The mistake we're called in to correct most often is painting too early: a flat repainted last month, then a leak repaired this month, and now there's a patch of new plaster in the middle of a fresh wall and the whole room needs doing again.

When people book R&R works

• End of a tenancy. Landlord or tenant restoring the unit to handover condition.
• Between tenants. A landlord turning a unit around quickly so it shows well and lets faster.
• Before selling. The cheapest presentation upgrade there is. Fresh paint and no visible defects change how a flat photographs and how it shows at viewings.
• After buying a resale flat. When the layout is fine and you don't want a full renovation, just everything working and clean.
• Deferred maintenance catching up. The job-3 scenario, where five small problems have quietly become one list.
• After a leak or water damage. Repair the cause, waterproof, re-plaster, repaint.

Getting a quote you can actually compare

Insist on four things and most of the risk goes away:

• Itemised lines, not a lump sum. All three invoices above are itemised. It's the only way to see what you're paying for and to drop a line if the budget tightens.
• Materials priced separately from labour, as in job 2.
• An on-site inspection before the number. Condition drives cost, and condition can't be assessed over WhatsApp.
• A written sequence and duration. If a contractor can't tell you what happens on which day, they haven't planned it.

More on vetting in our guide to choosing a renovation contractor in Singapore.

Permits

Straightforward repairs, repainting, servicing and make-good generally fall within permitted works and need no renovation permit. A permit becomes necessary once the scope crosses into renovation territory: hacking, replacing floor finishes, altering walls. Job 2 above is exactly that boundary case: the toilet hack and re-tile puts it into permit territory even though the rest of the package doesn't.

Check the current requirements with HDB and have your contractor apply where one is needed. Workmanship and construction standards more broadly sit with the Building and Construction Authority (BCA). See also our guide to HDB hacking and demolition rules.

Frequently asked questions

What are repair and redecoration works?

Restoring a property to good condition without changing its layout: repairing what's broken, making good damaged surfaces, servicing fixtures, repainting, then cleaning. It sits between a handyman call-out and a full renovation.

How much do repair and redecoration works cost in Singapore?

Condition decides it. Three real RK E&C jobs: $850 for a 689 sq ft condo needing clean, aircon servicing and a make-good repaint; $3,675 for a resale HDB with full painting, a toilet hack, re-tile and waterproofing, cabinets and a new bowl; $4,380 quoted for termite treatment, water heater, three doors, aircon repair, wall waterproofing and a full repaint.

How is R&R different from a renovation?

A renovation changes the home (hacking, new flooring, new built-in carpentry) and needs an HDB permit. R&R keeps the layout and restores what's there. It's faster, much cheaper, and usually doesn't need the same permits.

Should painting be done before or after repairs?

After, always. Paint is the last finishing trade. Painting before repairs means paying to repaint the same wall twice, the most common sequencing mistake we're called in to correct.

Is bundling cheaper than hiring separately?

Usually. One mobilisation instead of three, sequencing handled for you, and no gap where a cleaner hands you a defect list they can't fix. In job 1 the bundle discount was $150 on a $1,000 scope.

Do I need an HDB permit?

Not for straightforward repairs, repainting, servicing and make-good. You do once the scope includes hacking, floor finish replacement or wall alteration, such as a toilet hack and re-tile. Confirm current requirements with HDB before starting.

Getting it done by RK E&C

RK E&C is a Singapore-registered renovation and handyman company (UEN 202442767D) doing repair and redecoration works in HDB flats and condos island-wide. The three invoices above are our own jobs. Because we handle repairs, waterproofing, painting, fixture fixing and cleaning in-house, you get one itemised quote and one team working in the right order, rather than a cleaning company handing you a defect list it can't fix, or a painter working over walls that should have been repaired first.

Send photos of the flat and your postal code via our contact form or WhatsApp and we'll arrange a free site visit and an itemised fixed-price quote. Browse our other guides for individual trades.