Repair the fence when the damage sits in one area and the posts are still solid. Replace it once the repair would cost about half of a new fence, or once most of the posts are failing.
A simple way to decide
- Repair: one damaged spot, posts that stay put when you push them, panels or boards still in fair shape.
- Rebuild a single run: the posts along one side have failed and the other sides are straight.
- Replace everything: loose or rusted-through posts all around, wood that is cracked and brittle from end to end, or a repair bill close to half the cost of new.
My fence is about 15 years old, a few posts are rotted and it leans. Posts or whole fence?
Check every post and count. Push each one and look where it meets the ground. Wood shows soft, crumbling fiber. Steel shows scale and holes at grade. A few bad posts in a long line means new posts only. More than half means a new fence. Fifteen Las Vegas summers also cook the boards, so see whether they can survive being taken off and nailed back.
The repair quote is $1,400 and a new fence is $5,200. Which makes sense?
Take the repair, provided the remaining posts are sound. $1,400 is roughly 27 percent of $5,200, well under the half mark. Ask how many of the other posts were tested. If several are close to failing, a second repair after the next wind event could bring your total near half anyway.
Half my pickets are rotting and the gate will not close. Fix it section by section?
You can, if the posts and rails are still good. In this climate wood only rots where it stays wet, so look for the sprinkler head, drip emitter or raised planter soaking those pickets and fix that too. Sort out the gate first, since a gate that will not shut points to a post problem. Then work through the pickets section by section as money allows.
How long does a wood fence last in Las Vegas?
We will not quote a number of years, because care decides it. Dry air keeps rot slow. Sun and heat do the damage here, splitting and cupping boards that have no finish. Cedar moves less than untreated pine as it dries. A wood fence lasts in Las Vegas when it is sealed regularly, kept out of the sprinkler pattern and mounted on steel posts.
Nobody can price a fence from a desk. We come out, measure the line and write the number down, and the visit costs nothing. Call (702) 829-5267, or text photos of the yard to that number.