Planning estimate · Herriman, Utah
Deck repair cost calculator
Tick what is actually wrong and get a realistic range for putting it right. Most Herriman decks are the same age and fail in the same four places, so this calculator is built around those rather than around a square-foot average.
What is behind the number
What decides the price of a deck repair
Repair pricing is not a rate, it is a list. Two decks with the same footprint can be $600 apart or $6,000 apart depending on whether the problem is on top of the frame or inside it. So this calculator asks you to tick what is wrong rather than asking for a square footage and multiplying.
Nearly every house in Herriman went up after 1998, which makes the housing stock unusually uniform and the deck problems unusually predictable. A large share of the original builder decks are now twenty to twenty-five years old, and they fail in the same four ways: a ledger nailed rather than bolted, no flashing behind it, hangers sized for the wrong lumber, and footings that stopped above frost depth. Three of those four are invisible from the top of the deck.
The honest thing a repair calculator can do is tell you when repair stops being the right answer. Where the range here approaches what resurfacing or rebuilding costs, the tool says so instead of quietly selling you the repair.
Whether it is on top or inside
Boards, fasteners and a wobbly rail are surface work and priced by the foot. Joists, beams, the ledger and the footings are structure, and they mean opening things up before anybody knows the size of the job.
The ledger
The most common and the most serious. A ledger nailed to the outside of the rim, or bolted without flashing behind it, does two things: it holds the deck on with fasteners in the wrong direction, and it lets twenty years of water into the wall. The wall repair is often bigger than the deck repair.
How much of the surface is going
Replacing a handful of boards is cheap. Replacing most of them is not, and at some point you are paying repair prices for something close to a new surface. This calculator flags that point rather than letting you walk past it.
Access underneath
A deck at 24 inches has to be worked on from your back, or partly dismantled to get at a joist. A deck at six feet you can stand under. Access changes the labour on identical work by a large margin.
Age
An older deck opens up worse. Fasteners have corroded, framing has moved, and the parts you thought were fine turn out to be next. The calculator carries a bigger contingency on an older deck for exactly this reason.
Whether the guard still complies
A twenty-year-old guard often sits below 36 inches or has spacing that will not stop a 4 3/8 inch sphere. If the deck is over 30 inches, that is not cosmetic; it is the part of the deck whose failure hurts somebody.
What pushes it higher
- Anything structural: joists, beams, the ledger or the footings.
- A ledger that has been letting water into the wall behind it.
- Replacing most of the deck boards rather than a few.
- A low deck with no room to work underneath.
- An older deck, where more of what you open up needs doing.
- Bringing an out-of-date guard back to code at the same time.
What brings it down
- Catching it early, while it is still boards and fasteners.
- A deck high enough to stand under.
- Replacing a section of surface rather than all of it.
- Doing several small items in one visit rather than three separate ones.
- Cleaning and sealing on a schedule, which is what prevents most of this list.
- Knowing what is wrong before the visit, so the estimate is not carrying an allowance.
Turn the estimate into a real number
Send a couple of photos, rough dimensions, and the height down to the lowest corner. You will get a straight answer about the permit, the guard and what the ground is likely to want, before anyone talks about boards.
What people ask about this
Is my deck safe to use?
The honest answer is that nobody can tell from the top. The two things that hurt people are a ledger that lets go and a guard that does not hold a 200 pound push, and both look fine from the deck surface. If the guard moves when you lean on it, or you can see rust streaks or gaps where the deck meets the house, stop using it and get somebody underneath it.
What does the average deck repair cost?
National figures put the average around $2,245, with a range from a few hundred dollars to well over $10,000. That spread is not noise; it is the difference between a surface job and a structural one. This calculator asks which you have rather than reporting an average.
Why do you ask when the deck was built?
Because Herriman’s housing stock is unusually uniform. Nearly every house here went up after 1998, so most original decks are the same age and were built to the same details, or the same missing details. A deck from that first building wave is far more likely to have a nailed ledger and shallow footings than one built in the last ten years.
Do I need a permit to repair a deck?
Like-for-like repair and maintenance is normally not permitted work, but replacing structure, changing the footprint or adding height can be. Herriman’s Building Division on 801-446-5327 will answer this in one phone call, and it is worth making before work starts rather than after.
My railing wobbles. Is that a big job?
It depends entirely on why. If the infill is loose, it is small. If the posts are moving, the posts are usually nailed or lag-screwed to the outside of the rim joist, and those connections have to be redone with blocking and tension hardware. A guard has to take a 200 pound push at the top rail, and end-grain fasteners do not.
When is repairing not worth it?
Roughly when the repair starts approaching half of what a new surface would cost, or when the frame itself is the problem. This calculator tells you when your answers have taken it there, and points you at the replacement calculator so you can compare properly rather than guessing.
Can you fix the ledger without taking the deck apart?
Sometimes, if the deck boards nearest the house can be lifted and the wall finish will come back. Often it means taking a strip of decking off and cutting back stucco or siding to see what is actually behind it. It is the single line in a deck repair with the widest spread, which is why this calculator carries an allowance until somebody has looked.
Is this a quote?
No. It is a planning estimate to get you to a realistic budget and to tell you whether you are looking at a repair or a replacement. A firm number comes after somebody has been underneath the deck.