What does siding replacement cost per square foot?
HardiePlank ColorPlus fiber cement is $16.50 per square foot installed on our published price book. With tear-off, weather barrier, trim and the sheathing allowance, the complete wall assembly runs $27.93 to $42.60 per square foot of wall, so a house with 2,000 square feet of wall lands near $55,850.
What siding costs, per square foot of wall
Siding is quoted per square foot of wall, not floor area. A two-storey 2,400 square foot house typically has somewhere between 1,800 and 2,600 square feet of wall once gables, dormers and the garage are counted and window and door openings are deducted. Getting that number right is the first half of getting the price right.
| Line item | Our published rate | Why it is there |
|---|---|---|
| HardiePlank ColorPlus, installed | $16.50 per square foot | Factory-finished fiber cement. The colour is baked on rather than painted on site, which is the difference between repainting in year eight and year fifteen. |
| Remove the old siding and haul it away | an adder of $2.40 per square foot on top of the cladding rate | Siding over siding hides whatever is behind it. Coming back to bare sheathing is the only way to see the wall. |
| House wrap and weather-resistive barrier | an adder of $1.35 per square foot | Taped, continuous, and lapped shingle-fashion. This is the actual water barrier. The siding is the rain screen in front of it. |
| HardieTrim at windows, doors and corners | an adder of $5.20 per square foot | Trim is where siding meets everything else, and it is where cheap jobs get cheap. |
| Sheathing inspection and repair allowance | an adder of $2.25 per square foot | Billed only where rot is found, photographed before it is covered. On a wall that has leaked, this is the line that matters. |
| Soffit, fascia and gutter tie-in | $14 per foot of eave | Coordinated so the water path from roof edge to ground is continuous rather than three trades meeting at a corner. |
| Permit, warranty registration and cleanup | $685 | Registering the Hardie warranty is a step, not a formality. An unregistered install has a shorter one. |
Taken together, the complete wall assembly comes out at $27.93 to $42.60 per square foot of wall, which on a 2,000 square foot elevation is roughly $55,850 to $85,200. That is a real number from our own book and it is higher than the aggregate Maryland market, which published 2026 cost guides put in the single-digit-to-low-teens range per square foot for fiber cement. We would rather show you our rate and let you decide than quote you a market average we do not charge and then explain the difference on the driveway.
Vinyl is the other half of this market and it is a legitimate answer on the right house. Insulated vinyl installs faster, costs materially less than fiber cement, and does not need painting. What it does not do is hold up to a lawnmower stone, a stray baseball or a west-facing wall in August the way fiber cement does. Most of our exterior work is fiber cement because most of it follows a storm.
The four things that move a siding price
- Measured wall area, minus openings. Gables and dormers add area fast. A house with a lot of glass has less wall to clad and more trim to cut around, which is not the saving it sounds like.
- What is behind the old siding. Nobody knows until it is off. Rotten sheathing, a missing weather barrier and rusted flashing at every window head are common on 1970s and 1980s housing stock, and all three are priced per square foot rather than negotiated.
- Trim, corners and details. Corner boards, window and door surrounds, band boards, frieze and the transition where siding meets stone or brick. Trim is slow work and it is what the eye actually reads from the kerb.
- Height and access. Third storeys, walls over a slope and anything needing staging rather than ladders costs more in setup than in cladding.
Siding does not keep water out. The weather barrier behind it keeps water out, and the siding keeps the sun and the wind off the weather barrier. Any quote that does not name what goes on the sheathing is quoting a skin, not a wall.
A siding number with no measured wall area and no line for what happens if the sheathing is rotten is a number that will move. The question is not whether it moves but whether you find out before or after the old siding is in a skip.
Ask instead: What wall area did you measure, and what is your published rate per square foot if you find bad sheathing?Sometimes legitimate on sound vinyl over sound sheathing, and a genuine saving when it is. But it also means nobody looked at the wall, the new fastening is going through two layers into who-knows-what, and any water already getting in stays in. It is a decision, not a default.
Ask instead: Have you opened a section to see the sheathing and the barrier before deciding to go over it?When siding is actually due, and when it is not
Siding is due when the wall behind it is at risk, not when the colour has dated. The things that mean it is at risk: chalking and cracking that lets water into the substrate, planks that have pulled away or buckled, soft spots when you press a corner board, visible rot at the bottom course or around window heads, and paint that will not hold for more than two or three years.
The things that do not mean it is at risk, on their own: fading, a dented panel, one loose length, or a colour you have stopped liking. Those are repairs and refinishing, and there is a separate page on the alternatives to replacing the whole house.
Siding cost questions
How much does it cost to replace siding on a house?
On our published price book, the complete wall assembly runs $27.93 to $42.60 per square foot of wall. A typical Maryland two-storey house has somewhere between 1,800 and 2,600 square feet of wall, so most whole-house fiber cement projects sit in the tens of thousands rather than the single-digit thousands. That is a retail list rate, not a quote: the number comes off a measurement of your own elevations, and how much sheathing repair the wall needs is not knowable until the old siding is off.
Is fiber cement worth the extra over vinyl?
It depends on the wall and how long you are staying. Fiber cement is heavier, holds a factory colour far longer, does not soften in heat and takes an impact that would hole vinyl, and it is the material that survives a hail event that dents everything else on the elevation. Insulated vinyl costs less, installs faster and is a perfectly honest answer on a rental, a smaller house, or a wall that is not taking weather. What is not a good answer is thin uninsulated vinyl over a wall nobody inspected.
Do you need a permit to replace siding in Maryland?
Usually yes for a whole-house re-side, and it is a county-level question rather than a state one. Montgomery, Howard, Frederick, Anne Arundel and Baltimore County all treat a full siding replacement as permitted work, and the permit matters because it puts an inspector on the weather barrier before it is covered. Small repairs are generally exempt. Anyone offering to skip the permit is offering to skip the inspection.
Can I replace my own siding?
A single damaged plank, yes, with the right zip tool for vinyl or a scoring blade for fiber cement, and a matching piece. A whole elevation is a different proposition: fiber cement is heavy, needs specific fastening and cutting equipment, must be kept off the ground and away from wet, and the flashing detail at every window head and wall-to-roof intersection is where the job succeeds or fails. Getting a plank on straight is the easy part.
Where can I buy replacement siding to match what is on my house?
Start with the manufacturer and the profile name, which is sometimes stamped on the back of a plank or printed on a nailing hem. A siding supply house rather than a big-box store will identify a profile from a sample and tell you whether it is still made. Discontinued vinyl colours are the common wall: matching is often impossible, and the usual answer is to pull matching planks from a hidden elevation such as behind a garage and put the mismatched new pieces there instead.
Does homeowners insurance cover siding replacement?
When the damage is from a covered event, commonly hail, wind or an impact, and not from age or moisture that has been getting in for years. Hail on siding is assessed the same way as on a roof: an adjuster looks for physical damage on the elevation that faced the storm, and matching becomes the argument because a discontinued colour cannot be repaired invisibly. Coverage and any matching allowance are your carrier decision. On an approved claim your deductible is typically your out-of-pocket cost.
Where to go next
Siding, roof and gutters are one water-management system with three trades on it. These are the neighbouring pages.
Siding and exterior restoration
Fiber cement and insulated vinyl, installed as a water-management system rather than a skin.
See the service →AlternativesAlternatives to replacing all the siding
When siding can be cleaned, painted or partly replaced, and where to find matching planks.
Read the guide →CostWhat gutter replacement costs
Published per-foot rates for gutter, guard and downspout, with a worked example.
See the numbers →EstimateHow to read a roofing estimate
What the price is made of, the seven places a cheap bid gets cheap, and how to compare two quotes line by line.
Read the standard →