Comparisons
September 11, 2026
Not all siding holds up the same in San Diego. Here's what the materials actually cost, how they perform, and what local experts look for before recommending anything.
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Most homeowners don’t think about their siding until something goes wrong — a crack, a soft spot, paint that won’t stop peeling no matter how many times it’s been touched up. By that point, moisture has usually already found its way in.
If you’re at the stage where you’re researching options, getting quotes, or just trying to figure out what this is actually going to cost, you’re in the right place. We’ve been doing exterior remodeling in San Diego County for 16 years, and the questions we hear most often are the same ones we’ll answer here — material costs, what holds up in this climate, and what separates a good siding installation from one that causes problems five years later.
Based on thousands of completed projects across San Diego County, the average siding replacement runs between $8,995 and $13,001 for most homes. That range moves depending on the size of your home, what material you choose, the condition of the substrate underneath, and whether tearoff is involved.
The per-square-foot numbers tell a clearer story. Vinyl siding typically runs $4.50 to $8.20 installed. Fiber cement — which includes James Hardie products — comes in at $7 to $18 per square foot installed, with an average around $12.50. Stone veneer is higher, ranging from $15.10 to $32.20 per square foot in the San Diego market. Those aren’t arbitrary differences. They reflect real differences in material durability, installation complexity, and how long the product will actually last on your home.
This is one of the most common upgrades we see in San Diego County, and it makes sense once you run the numbers over time. Vinyl siding installed might cost $8,000 to $10,000 on a typical home. Hardie Board on that same home might run $14,000 to $18,000. On paper, vinyl looks like the smarter financial move. But vinyl lasts 15 to 25 years. Fiber cement lasts 50 or more.
That means vinyl costs you more per year of protection — and that’s before you factor in San Diego’s specific conditions. Coastal communities like Encinitas, Carlsbad, La Jolla, and Coronado deal with salt air that accelerates the degradation of vinyl and corrodes the metal fasteners behind it. Inland areas like El Cajon, Santee, and Lakeside regularly hit 95 to 105 degrees in summer, and vinyl warps and buckles under that kind of sustained heat. Fiber cement doesn’t.
There’s also the tearoff to account for. Removing existing siding before new installation runs $0.25 to $2.00 per square foot depending on what’s there and how it was installed. Some contractors skip this step and install over old siding to save time — which traps moisture and causes exactly the kind of rot and structural damage you were trying to avoid. A proper installation means getting down to the sheathing, inspecting what’s there, repairing anything compromised, and then building back up correctly with a water-resistive barrier before the new material goes on.
If you’re in a wildfire-adjacent community — Ramona, Alpine, Escondido — there’s another reason to consider the upgrade. Fiber cement is non-combustible. That’s not a marketing claim; it’s a material property that matters in CAL FIRE zones.
Stone veneer is the option most homeowners don’t seriously consider until they see it done on a neighbor’s house. Then they want to know everything about it.
Modern manufactured stone veneer is not the heavy, structurally demanding material people assume it is. It’s lightweight enough to be applied to standard wood-framed homes — which covers most of San Diego County’s residential housing stock — and it installs similarly to other cladding systems. The cost in San Diego runs $15.10 to $32.20 per square foot installed, which puts it at the higher end of the siding spectrum.
What makes it worth considering is the return. A 2023 national study found that a stone veneer siding project with an average installed cost of $10,925 returned $11,177 in home value — that’s more than a 100% return on investment. In a county where median home prices sit above $800,000, that math gets even more compelling. A $15,000 exterior upgrade on an $850,000 home is a relatively small investment to protect and improve a significant asset.
Stone veneer also holds up well in San Diego’s coastal environment. It doesn’t corrode from salt air the way metal-accented siding systems can, and it handles UV exposure without fading the way painted surfaces do. We typically recommend it as an accent — a band across the front of the home, a gable treatment, or a full front-facing installation — rather than wrapping the entire structure, which keeps the cost manageable while maximizing curb appeal impact. If you’re in a neighborhood like Rancho Santa Fe, Del Mar, or the hillside communities around La Mesa, stone veneer tends to fit the architectural character of the area naturally.
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If your siding is at the end of its life, your windows are probably worth a close look at the same time. It’s not just about efficiency — though there are real savings in combining the work. It’s about how the two systems interact.
Siding and windows share a weatherproofing boundary. When you replace one without the other, you’re integrating new material with old, and that junction is exactly where water finds a way in. Doing both together means the flashing, sealing, and stucco integration can all be done as a single system — which is how it should have been built in the first place. Window replacement in San Diego averages around $6,170, with a typical range of $2,788 to $9,883 depending on the number of units, window type, and what’s involved in the installation.
When we do siding and windows together, the process starts with the full removal of existing siding down to the sheathing — not a patch job over what’s already there. That gives us a clear view of what’s underneath, which matters more than most people expect. Older San Diego homes, particularly those built in the 1960s through 1990s, often have moisture damage or rot hiding behind original siding that’s been painted over repeatedly. Finding it before the new material goes on is how you avoid discovering it again in five years.
Windows go in with proper flashing at every penetration — head, sill, and jamb. In San Diego’s coastal communities, where morning marine layer and periodic rain events create real moisture pressure on the building envelope, this step isn’t optional. It’s the difference between a window that performs for 20 years and one that starts leaking at the frame in year three.
After windows are set and flashed, the new siding integrates directly with the window frames, and any stucco work — if the home has a stucco finish at the base or around openings — gets done as part of the same scope. This is how you get a clean, watertight result rather than a patchwork of different trades trying to meet in the middle.
One permit covers the full scope when the work is done together, which also simplifies the inspection process. We handle all permitting for San Diego County projects, and the cost is included in the estimate from the start — not added on later as a line item that surprises you.
This is the question that doesn’t get asked enough, and it’s the one that matters most when you’re comparing quotes.
In California, any contractor performing work over $500 in combined labor and materials is required to hold an active license from the Contractors State License Board — the CSLB. You can verify any contractor’s license at CSLB.ca.gov in about 30 seconds. Look for a Class B General Contractor license, which covers the structural and exterior scope of siding work, and ask whether they hold any specialty licenses relevant to the work. We hold both a B General Contractor and a C33 Specialty Contractor license, which together authorize the full scope of exterior remodeling we do — siding, painting, stucco, and the rest.
Beyond licensing, the question of who is actually doing the work is one of the most important things to nail down before signing anything. The most common complaint we hear from homeowners who’ve had bad experiences is some version of: “I hired a company, and then a crew I’d never seen before showed up.” That’s the subcontractor model, and it’s standard practice for a lot of exterior contractors. The company you hire passes the job to a subcontractor they may have never worked with before, and you have no direct accountability when something goes wrong.
We use our own crew — the same seven people — on every job. That’s not a small operational detail. It means the people doing the work are accountable to us, and we’re accountable to you. When you call with a question on day three of a ten-day siding job, you’re not waiting for someone to relay a message to a subcontractor’s foreman.
We also know that San Diego County’s military community deserves a straight answer on cost: active-duty and veteran homeowners get a 10% discount on all work. With installations at Camp Pendleton, Naval Base San Diego, MCAS Miramar, and NAS North Island, a significant portion of the homeowners we work with have served or are currently serving. That discount is real and it applies automatically.
The short version: material choice matters, installation quality matters more, and who actually shows up to do the work matters most of all. Fiber cement outperforms vinyl in San Diego’s climate over any honest time horizon. Stone veneer returns more than it costs in most markets. And doing siding and windows together produces a better result than sequencing them separately.
If you’re getting quotes, verify the license, ask directly whether the crew is employed by the company or subcontracted out, and make sure permits are included — not an afterthought. Those three things will tell you most of what you need to know about who you’re dealing with.
We’ve been doing this work across San Diego County for 16 years, and we’re happy to walk through any of it with you before you make any decisions. Reach out to MRH Pro Construction & Painting and we’ll give you a straight answer.
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