How to Bid a Multifamily Painting Job | Reddit & LinkedIn

A multifamily painting bid starts with an inventory, not a square-foot guess. Count units by floor plan type, then list common areas: hallways, stairwells, lobbies, amenity rooms, and mechanical spaces. Add exterior elevations if the scope includes them. Each category paints at a different rate, and a two-bedroom turnover unit takes far more prep than a hallway repaint.

Spec matters as much as area. Property managers often require a specific sheen and durability in high-traffic corridors, a washable finish in units, and a weather-rated coating outside. Price primer and paint by area and by spec, and note the product line, because substituting a cheaper paint to win the bid becomes a callback problem across dozens of units.

The single biggest variable in multifamily painting is prep. A freshly built block paints fast, but an occupied property at turnover is full of nail holes, drywall damage, water stains, and previous-tenant repairs. Two buildings with identical square footage can differ by 30% in labor once prep is real. Bid prep per condition, not as a flat rate across the whole property.

Walk a sample of actual units before you commit a number, and state in the proposal what level of patch and repair is included and what bills as extra. Property managers respect a bidder who distinguishes clean repaints from heavy turnover units, because they have been burned by low bids that discovered the prep after the contract was signed.

Occupied multifamily work is a scheduling job as much as a painting job. You cannot close every hallway at once, and interior unit work has to fit tenant availability or turnover windows. That coordination, along with protecting floors, fixtures, and resident belongings, is labor that a naive per-square-foot bid ignores.

Price phasing and protection explicitly. If the property wants exteriors done without disrupting parking or entrances, that constrains your sequence and adds time. A property manager comparing bids values the contractor who shows a phasing plan and a realistic timeline, because a painting job that drags on and irritates tenants costs them renewals.

Multifamily painting commonly carries 20 to 30% markup, though large-volume repeat work with a management company sometimes runs leaner in exchange for steady scheduling. Apply markup to materials and any lift or swing-stage rental over a loaded labor rate. On a big building, small per-unit estimating errors multiply, so tight unit-level numbers protect the whole contract.

Structure payment as milestones tied to buildings or floors completed, not calendar dates, so your cash flow follows the work. For a larger property, progress draws keep you from carrying weeks of labor and paint before any money arrives. State change-order terms clearly for prep beyond the included level, since that is where multifamily disputes usually start.

ContractShield lets you build the multifamily bid from your own unit-type and area templates, so units, common areas, exteriors, prep, and access each stay visible lines. Photograph a sample of units and elevations, note counts and spec, and the AI drafts line items you approve, each tagged as your template or an AI estimate and never an invented rate.

After the property manager signs, milestone invoicing ties draws to buildings or floors completed, sends automatic reminders, and runs Collections on past-due balances. The platform fee is a flat 2% per job, 1% client and 1% contractor, capped at $250 per job, with no per-lead fees ever, so a large multifamily contract is capped at $250 rather than paying a percentage that grows with the job.