Stucco repair costs in Austin

In Austin, which side of MoPac you live on tells you a lot about your stucco. The Balcones fault zone runs roughly alongside that highway. West of it, the city climbs into hills of limestone. East of it, the land goes flat over younger rock that includes the Taylor Clay. State geologists call the area's clay units weak and unstable, and the limestone units generally stable. So on the east side, the ground under a wall is more likely to move.

Up in the western hills, check one more map. Austin's Wildland-Urban Interface Code sorts lots by how close they sit to wildland. In the closest zone, within 50 feet of it, the joints where a wall meets the ground, a deck or a roof need 6-inch noncombustible flashing. If a stucco job opens one of those joints, the city's interactive WUI map tells you which zone you're in.

Check the permit rules before a big job. Austin Development Services lets siding work of 128 square feet or less skip a permit. Re-coating a whole wall can run past that, so ask who's pulling the permit before work starts.