Free tool
Should you repipe? Six questions, one straight answer.
A repipe runs $4,000 to $15,000, so nobody should buy one on a salesman's hunch. This tool weighs the two things that actually predict pipe failure — what the pipe is made of, and whether it has already started leaking — and gives you one of three verdicts. Two of them do not involve buying a repipe.
0 of 6 answered
Answer all six and the verdict appears here. There are three possible answers, and two of them do not involve buying a repipe.
The assumptions
- Weighting: pipe material and leak history carry the most points (up to 3 each). Polybutylene and galvanized steel score highest because they fail by design — poly embrittles, galvanized rusts shut from the inside.
- Pre-1975 construction adds 2 points: it predates modern copper practice and correlates with galvanized supply lines.
- Pressure loss and discoloured first-draw water add 2 points each — both are symptoms of internal corrosion, not proof on their own.
- Staying 5+ years adds a point; leaving soon subtracts one. A repipe is a long-horizon asset, though it does recover some value at sale.
- Cost bands: individual pipe repairs average about $800 once access and drywall are counted. A whole-home repipe runs $4,000–$15,000 depending on square footage, fixture count, and access.
- Scores of 0–3 read repair, 4–6 read assess, 7+ read repipe. A quiz is a screen, not a diagnosis — the camera and pressure test are the diagnosis.
If the verdict says assess or repipe, start with what it actually costs in your house — see whole-home repiping for how we quote it.
How to read this verdict
Material dominates the score, and it should. Polybutylene — the grey plastic pipe installed by the mile through the 1980s and early 90s — fails chemically, from the inside, on its own schedule. Galvanized steel rusts shut. Copper and PEX mostly just work. If your pipes are the first two, the question is when, not whether. If they are the last two, one leak is a plumbing repair, not a referendum.
The middle verdict is the one to take seriously. A camera inspection and a static pressure test cost a few hundred dollars and replace this quiz with evidence from inside your actual pipes. That is the cheapest insurance in plumbing: either it clears the pipe and saves you five figures, or it catches a failure while it is still a scheduled project instead of a Saturday-night flood.
And the economics cut both ways. Repairs average about $800 each once drywall is opened and closed. Two leaks in two years is $1,600 spent on pipe that is telling you something. At that point the repipe is not the expensive option — it is the cheap one, bought early.
Get the verdict checked against your actual pipes.
Camera and pressure assessment first, repipe quote only if the evidence says so. Flat pricing either way, and the walls get patched before we leave.
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