How much do damp proofing leads cost in the UK?

Leads Do Work charges £25 plus VAT for a damp proofing lead from a homeowner and £35.95 from a business, plus a £11 weekly service fee. Zapo's search ad plans start at £400 a month before VAT for an estimated 10 leads. Damp Proof UK, Leads Everyday and Checkatrade don't publish a price. A click on a mould, DPC or tanking search costs £3.40 to £29.12 if you buy it from Google yourself.

Are damp proofing leads shared with other firms?

Often. Leads Do Work says each job goes to between 1 and 3 other tradesmen, and never more than 5. Its Damp Proof UK site says some leads are shared so the customer can compare, and tells contractors not to call a lead exclusive unless it was sold that way. MyJobQuote sends each job to up to 3 trades. Zapo and Leads Everyday say their leads are exclusive.

Does Awaab's Law apply to private landlords?

Not yet. Awaab's Law came in for social landlords in England on 27 October 2025. The Renters' Rights Act lets the government set the same kind of timescales for private landlords, but it has said it will consult first, and its roadmap gives no date. Rented homes are already assessed under HHSRS, where damp and mould growth is the first hazard listed.

How quickly must a social landlord deal with damp and mould?

Under Awaab's Law, the landlord must have a significant damp or mould hazard investigated within 10 working days of hearing about it, send the tenant a written summary within 3 working days of the investigation, and finish the work that makes the home safe within 5 working days. Emergencies get 24 hours. Work to stop the problem coming back has a 12 week backstop to start.

Do I need a qualification to carry out damp surveys?

No law we read requires one. The government's damp and mould guidance says damp surveyors might hold CSRT, CSSW, CRDS or CSDB certificates and tells landlords to check training, qualifications and references. Awaab's Law leaves it to the social landlord to judge whether an investigator has the skills and experience, so the certificate is what gets you through a landlord's door.

Can a damp meter diagnose rising damp?

Not on its own. RICS tells homeowners to be wary of anyone who uses only a damp meter, because the meters are accurate in timber but can read high in other materials for reasons other than moisture, salts included. The government's guidance says rising damp is often misdiagnosed and that chemical testing is the most reliable way to confirm it.

When do people look for mould specialists?

UK searches for "mould specialist near me" peaked at 880 a month in January 2026 and fell to 170 in August 2026, about 5.2 times fewer. "dpc injection" moved far less, about 2.8 times from top to bottom.

Is it legal to buy damp proofing leads?

Yes, but the checking is yours. Under ICO guidance, whoever buys marketing data carries out proportionate checks of their own rather than relying on the seller, and permission to text or email a customer only counts if it names your firm.

Last updated 25 September 2026

A damp lead never says whether the diagnosis in it is right.

Leads Do Work charges £25 plus VAT for a damp proofing lead from a homeowner and £35.95 from a business, on top of £11 a week. Zapo's search ad plans start at £400 a month for an estimated 10 leads. Buy the click from Google yourself and a mould, DPC or tanking search costs £3.40 to £29.12.

What none of them can sell you is a correct diagnosis. Plenty of damp leads arrive with one already inside them, from a meter, a house survey or another firm's quote, and RICS warns against trusting the commonest of those, a damp meter reading on its own.

A real lead, 23 September 2026

"Damp shown in house survey would like inspection please. Reading is 182 on the damp machine."

That came through Leads Do Work's damp proofing feed. RICS warns homeowners off anyone who diagnoses with a damp meter alone, because the meters are accurate in timber but can read high in walls and floors from conductive materials other than water. A reading isn't a cause, so the customer is asking you to start from scratch. What the surveying bodies say.

Where we stand

We don't sell damp proofing leads. We help you get your own.

This guide is the honest version of what buying damp proofing leads costs, and who else gets them. What we do instead is build damp specialists a website that turns visits into calls, and run Google Ads in an account in your own name, so every lead that comes in is a customer who found you, and nobody else was sold it.

Job against lead

A £175 mould check and a £5,000 new DPC come at one lead price.

Checkatrade's June 2026 cost guides put a mould inspection at £50 to £300, a damp survey at £100 to £600 and an injected damp proof course at £1,000 to £3,000. Leads Do Work has a single damp proofing line, so every row below is bought at £25.

Job	Typical UK price	Leads Do Work lead	Cost of one won job
Mould inspection	£50 to £300	£25 + VAT	£75, 43% of the job
Mould removal, one room	£200 to £400	£25 + VAT	£75, 25% of the job
Damp survey	£100 to £600	£25 + VAT	£75, 21% of the job
Mould removal, whole house	£700 to £3,000	£25 + VAT	£75, 4% of the job
Injection damp proofing	£1,000 to £3,000	£25 + VAT	£75, 4% of the job
Physical damp proof course retrofit	£2,500 to £7,500	£25 + VAT	£75, 2% of the job

Every job price is from Checkatrade's damp proofing and mould removal cost guides, both dated June 2026, which call their figures ballpark averages and leave out making good. Each job is priced at the middle of its range. The last column buys 3 leads for every job won, which is the rate MyJobQuote says its own trades should expect. Lead prices are before VAT.

Trades often say the cost of winning a job should stay within 10 to 15 percent of its value. That's trade folklore rather than a measurement. By that yardstick the inspection is at 43%, a single room of mould at 25% and the survey at 21%, while the whole-house clean, the injected DPC and the new physical one come in at 4%, 4% and 2%.

If mould and condensation are most of your work

A £75 cost per win on a £300 room only works if the visit turns into the ventilation or repair that stops the mould coming back. Price that second job on the first visit, or the lead has eaten the margin.

If you inject, tank and replaster

The lead price hardly registers on a £2,000 DPC. Tanking is priced by area, at £100 to £200 a square metre in the same guide, so measure before you quote. Checkatrade's DPC prices leave out making good afterwards, and what plasterers pay for that work is in our plastering leads guide.

Run your own sums

Choose a damp job, say how often you win, and try a lead price.

It opens on a damp survey. Switch to a mould clean or a DPC, or type in what your average job really comes to, then change how many quotes it takes you to win one and enter what a seller wants per lead.

WHAT CAN YOU PAY FOR A DAMP LEAD?

Pick a job, or type in what yours are worth

Type of job

What one job is worth to you

Quotes it takes you to win one

Starts on one in three, the figure MyJobQuote tells its own trades to expect. Put in yours.

What a lead costs you

You can pay up to about

£18

a lead, winning one in 3

Healthy range, per won job: £35 to £53
Which per lead is: £12 to £18

Put a seller's price in the last box and this will tell you what each won job would cost you.

The 10 to 15 percent line is a guide, not a rule. If your surveys usually lead to treatment, put the treatment in the job value.

The sellers

Who sells damp work, and how many other firms ring first.

Here's what each seller says about itself, in its own words, and how many other firms it says get the same job.

Seller	Price	Who else gets it	In their words
Leads Do Work	£25 home, £35.95 business, + VAT; £11 a week	1 to 3 others, never over 5	"Contracts can be canceled anytime"
Damp Proof UK	Packs of 5, 10 and 20, price not shown	Some are shared	"No lock-in contracts"
Zapo	From £400 a month + VAT	Nobody, it says	"exclusive leads to damp proofing companies"
Leads Everyday	Not published	Nobody, it says	"never shared with competitors"
Bark	£1.80 credits, count not shown	Up to 5 respond	"Damp Proofers" category
MyJobQuote	Not on its damp page	Up to 3 trades	"Up to 3 local trades"

Leads Do Work: one damp line, whatever the job

Its Connect price list has one entry for the trade, "Damp Proofing", at £25 for a homeowner and £35.95 for a business, before VAT. Add the £11 service fee and you're £572 a year plus VAT down before the first lead lands. Every job goes to 1 to 3 other tradesmen and never more than 5, returns are judged one at a time, and signing up takes public liability insurance and photo ID.

Its damp feed shows who is asking. On 24 September a Dover homeowner pasted in a spec another firm had written, "They've advised we need the following work done", down to "Inject liquid damp proof course" and plaster off to 1.2 metres. A Kelty seller wanted a price "so i can pass to buyers", and a Dalkeith lead was a communal stairwell. Pricing a spec you didn't write means standing behind a diagnosis you didn't make.

Damp Proof UK asks you not to oversell

Damp Proof UK is one of Leads Do Work's own quote sites. It sells packs of 5, 10 and 20 leads or single leads in the app, says "Some enquiries may be shared with other suitable contractors", and warns contractors not to call a lead exclusive unless it was sold that way. Its rules for contractors include "Avoid misleading claims or unnecessary treatment recommendations". PCA membership and CSRT help an application but are "not always required".

Zapo and Leads Everyday run the ads instead

Zapo, which is taking over from Get Work, says its search ads deliver "exclusive leads to damp proofing companies". Its cheapest plan is £400 a month before VAT, with £200 of that going on the ads themselves, and it estimates 10 leads a month from it. If the estimate holds, each lead costs about £40, and half that money is Zapo's fee. Leads Everyday also runs Google Ads for damp firms, calls its leads "never shared with competitors", takes "No commission on any jobs" and shows no price.

Bark, MyJobQuote and Checkatrade file you under damp proofer

Bark has a Damp Proofers category and sells credits at £1.80 each, without saying how many a damp lead takes; up to 5 professionals can respond. MyJobQuote tells homeowners that up to 3 local trades will quote. Checkatrade lists damp proofers with condensation control, rising damp, damp surveys and mould control among their services, and keeps its lead plan price to itself. The three contracts are set side by side in Checkatrade vs MyBuilder vs Bark.

Ask which Google category they mean before you sign

One London agency's damp page names Google Local Services Ads as the "primary channel" for damp proofing. Google's UK list of Local Services categories has water damage, foundations and home inspection services on it, but nothing for damp proofing, mould or waterproofing. Lead Pronto, which sells leads for other trades, had no damp page at the obvious address.

Everything here about Leads Do Work's contract comes from its own published terms and conditions, last read on 25 September 2026. Terms get revised, so check yours against the current version before you act on anything.

Rather have damp proofing leads that are yours alone?

That's what we do. We don't sell leads. We build the website and run the Google Ads that bring damp proofing customers straight to you, in an ad account in your name that stays yours if you ever leave.

See pricing

Your own clicks

The dearest clicks in damp work are the mould searches.

"Mould specialist" runs at about 5.6 times the price of "dpc injection", and every search from £29.12 for "mould inspection near me" down to £13.30 is a mould search, while the cheapest is £3.40 for "dpc injection". To turn clicks into leads we divide by 7.33%, the rate WordStream measured for home improvement advertisers in the United States. Treat it as a planning figure.

Search	Searches a month	Per click	Per lead
mould inspection near me	110	£29.12	£397
mould survey	210	£24.74	£338
mould inspection	210	£23.48	£320
mould removal company	260	£21.90	£299
mould specialist	320	£19.19	£262
mould specialist near me	480	£13.42	£183
mould removal near me	1,300	£13.30	£181
condensation and mould	480	£9.13	£125
mould testing	880	£8.61	£117
basement waterproofing near me	590	£7.20	£98
black mould removal	260	£5.97	£81
basement waterproofing	1,000	£5.05	£69
cellar tanking	1,600	£4.76	£65
chemical dpc	390	£4.46	£61
mould removal	2,400	£4.07	£56
dpc injection	2,400	£3.40	£46

The click and search figures are Google's UK keyword data, read on 25 September 2026. The per-click figure is an average across advertisers, and your own bids set what you pay. Search counts are a twelve-month average. "Cellar tanking" and "basement tanking" share one figure, as do "mould removal near me" and "mould remediation near me".

At £46 to £397 a lead, your own ads cost more per lead than Leads Do Work's £25 on every row of that table. That gap is real. Here's what it buys:

Nobody else was sent the customer
Mould and DPC work in separate campaigns
A form that asks who diagnosed it
Landlords and agents targeted on their own
Your card, paid straight to Google
The ad account stays in your name

The law itself gets searched too: "awaab's law" averaged 12,100 searches a month and peaked at 18,100. Local Services Ads won't help here, since Google's UK list has no damp category. For a first monthly figure to put behind all this, see how much to spend on Google Ads.

Before you price it

A meter reading or somebody else's spec is not a diagnosis.

The government's damp and mould guidance for landlords says rising damp "is often misdiagnosed" and that "chemical testing is the most appropriate way of confirming it". It also says condensation is the most common form of damp, and that wiping off surface mould won't stop it coming back. RICS names the usual mistake outright: being told the cause is rising damp and the house needs a new damp-proof course.

The meter reads salts as well

RICS says damp meters are accurate in timber, but in other materials can give high readings because of other conductive materials as well as moisture. The surveying bodies' joint statement expects a surveyor to know how salts can sway a resistance meter.

Quoting is fine. Overselling isn't

The 2022 joint position statement from RICS, Historic England and the Property Care Association accepts that contractors survey and quote. It expects them to suggest only remedial work that is "proportionate to any defects discovered", and to declare any product they'd profit from.

Some damp starts on the outside

RICS suggests going out in the rain to see whether the gutters overflow. When they do, the fix is on the outside of the wall, and the firms who clear them are in our gutter cleaning leads guide.

So charge for the survey and say what you tested with. The PCA keeps surveyor members with no stake in the repair apart from those with a declared interest, and a landlord who reads RICS will ask which you are. Where water is getting through old or cracked render, the rules for the wall itself are in our rendering leads guide.

Landlord work

Awaab's Law puts a social landlord's damp repairs on a clock.

Since 27 October 2025, the Hazards in Social Housing Regulations have set fixed deadlines for councils and housing associations in England. The first phase covers damp and mould that poses a significant risk to a tenant, and every emergency. The work goes to the landlord's own staff or to contractors, and the guidance expects both to be appropriately qualified.

The deadlines

Investigate within 10 working days of hearing about it. Written summary to the tenant within 3 working days of that. Work that makes the home safe done within 5 working days of the investigation. Emergencies inside 24 hours. Work to stop it coming back started within 12 weeks at the latest.

Who counts as competent

The regulations define a competent investigator as someone the landlord reasonably believes has the skills and experience. They name no certificate. The government's guidance tells landlords to use properly qualified specialists where relevant, and makes them answer for their contractors' qualifications.

Private landlords come later

The Renters' Rights Act lets the same kind of deadlines be set for private landlords, after a consultation, and the government has given no date. Rented homes are already assessed under HHSRS, where damp and mould growth is hazard number one.

The guidance also asks landlords to make sure contractors know the deadlines, feed back what the written summary needs, and report any other hazards they spot on the visit. Faulty extractor fans and leaking gutters are among the problems it lists for triage. A firm that can turn round a report in days, and say so on its website, is answering the question a housing officer is already asking.

What customers check

No licence to hold, so certificates and guarantees do the talking.

Nothing we read requires a licence to trade as a damp specialist. The government's guidance says a damp surveyor "might have" certificates such as CSRT, CSSW, CRDS or CSDB, and tells landlords to check training, qualifications and references. That makes the certificate a sales tool as much as a skill.

The PCA audits its members

The Property Care Association is a trade association that says it audits members regularly, and its contracting members are registered with TrustMark. Joining is a choice, and so is putting the badge where a landlord will see it.

A guarantee that outlasts the firm

The PCA says company guarantees usually run no longer than 10 years, and an insurance backed guarantee honours yours if you stop trading. It also says a fee is usually payable for the visit that assesses a claim.

Fans and ventilation are building work

The same government guidance calls installing ventilation controlled building work. It has to be done by someone in a competent person scheme or go through building control, and that includes an extractor fan fitted after a mould clean.

Put the certificate numbers, the guarantee terms and the scheme you're registered with on the website the ads send people to. They answer what the guidance tells landlords to ask before anybody has to ring you to ask it.

Month by month

Mould work is a winter search. DPC work barely notices the season.

"mould specialist near me" reached 880 UK searches a month in January 2026 and sank to 170 by August 2026, a drop of about 5.2 times. Leads Do Work tells damp firms to expect "steady demand for your services throughout the year". That fits the DPC side better than the mould side.

UK searches for "mould specialist near me", by month

UK searches each month, September 2025 to August 2026. Google groups the counts into bands, so treat them as rounded.

Sep: 590

Oct: 590

Nov: 720

Dec: 720

Jan: 8800.9k

Feb: 720

Mar: 720

Apr: 390

May: 260

Jun: 260

Jul: 210

Aug: 1700.2k

SepOctNovDecJanFebMarAprMayJunJulAug

Rising damp searches hold steadier

"dpc injection" peaked at 3,600 in September 2025 and bottomed at 1,300 in July 2026, about 2.8 times apart. If injection is your main work, a flat budget across the year is closer to right.

The fee runs through the summer

Leads Do Work's £11 a week is the same in August, when mould searches are at their lowest, as in January. Ad spend can follow the curve, heavier from November to March and lighter through the summer.

Questions for the seller

Ask where the lead came from as carefully as you ask where the water did.

The ICO puts the checking on the buyer: proportionate checks of your own, and a seller's promise doesn't count as one. A customer who agreed to texts or emails must have agreed to them from you by name. Lead Pronto found out what happens otherwise, with a £30,000 penalty in November 2025 for texts sent on consent that didn't list any of its 18 clients.

Before you pay for a damp lead, ask:

Which website did the customer use?
Does their consent name my firm?
How many other firms got it?
Who diagnosed the damp, and how?
Is it an owner, a tenant or a landlord?

Keep the answers with the lead. The first three show the ICO you checked. The last two tell you whether you're quoting against someone else's spec, and whether a landlord's deadline is running.

Our verdict

Buy leads for the big jobs. Build your own for the repeat ones.

Buy per lead if

Most jobs are injection or tanking
You survey before you quote anything
A £75 win cost is small to you
You can visit within days

Think twice if

Most jobs are £300 mould cleans
Leads arrive with a spec to match
A weekly fee runs all summer
The seller won't say who else got it

Run your own if

You want landlord and agent work
You hold CSRT or a PCA badge
You want mould and DPC kept apart
You want the ad account in your name

The trades on either side of a damp job have guides of their own: the replaster in our plastering leads guide, the outside wall in our rendering leads guide, and roofs in our roofing leads guide. How the sums compare across every trade we cover is in our guide to trade leads.

Where it comes from

The sources behind every figure.

Read this knowing what we sell. Our business is building trades' websites and running their Google Ads, which gives us a reason to prefer the click to the lead. That's why the sellers are quoted from their own pages, and why our own table shows the click route costing more per lead than Leads Do Work.

Seller wording was last read on 25 September 2026, and the keyword figures are UK Google Ads data from 25 September 2026. Job prices come from Checkatrade's damp proofing and mould removal cost guides. The deadlines are from SI 2025/1042 and its guidance, the private rented position from gov.uk, and the diagnosis advice from gov.uk, RICS and Historic England.

Damp firms ask

Damp leads, landlords and diagnosis, in brief.

How much do damp proofing leads cost in the UK?: Leads Do Work charges £25 plus VAT for a damp proofing lead from a homeowner and £35.95 from a business, plus a £11 weekly service fee. Zapo's search ad plans start at £400 a month before VAT for an estimated 10 leads. Damp Proof UK, Leads Everyday and Checkatrade don't publish a price. A click on a mould, DPC or tanking search costs £3.40 to £29.12 if you buy it from Google yourself.
Are damp proofing leads shared with other firms?: Often. Leads Do Work says each job goes to between 1 and 3 other tradesmen, and never more than 5. Its Damp Proof UK site says some leads are shared so the customer can compare, and tells contractors not to call a lead exclusive unless it was sold that way. MyJobQuote sends each job to up to 3 trades. Zapo and Leads Everyday say their leads are exclusive.
Does Awaab's Law apply to private landlords?: Not yet. Awaab's Law came in for social landlords in England on 27 October 2025. The Renters' Rights Act lets the government set the same kind of timescales for private landlords, but it has said it will consult first, and its roadmap gives no date. Rented homes are already assessed under HHSRS, where damp and mould growth is the first hazard listed.
How quickly must a social landlord deal with damp and mould?: Under Awaab's Law, the landlord must have a significant damp or mould hazard investigated within 10 working days of hearing about it, send the tenant a written summary within 3 working days of the investigation, and finish the work that makes the home safe within 5 working days. Emergencies get 24 hours. Work to stop the problem coming back has a 12 week backstop to start.
Do I need a qualification to carry out damp surveys?: No law we read requires one. The government's damp and mould guidance says damp surveyors might hold CSRT, CSSW, CRDS or CSDB certificates and tells landlords to check training, qualifications and references. Awaab's Law leaves it to the social landlord to judge whether an investigator has the skills and experience, so the certificate is what gets you through a landlord's door.
Can a damp meter diagnose rising damp?: Not on its own. RICS tells homeowners to be wary of anyone who uses only a damp meter, because the meters are accurate in timber but can read high in other materials for reasons other than moisture, salts included. The government's guidance says rising damp is often misdiagnosed and that chemical testing is the most reliable way to confirm it.
Is fitting an extractor fan building work?: Yes. The government's damp and mould guidance says installing ventilation is controlled building work, so it has to be done by someone in a competent person scheme or go through building control. Damp Proof UK lists extractor fans and positive input ventilation among the damp jobs it passes on.
When do people look for mould specialists?: UK searches for "mould specialist near me" peaked at 880 a month in January 2026 and fell to 170 in August 2026, about 5.2 times fewer. "dpc injection" moved far less, about 2.8 times from top to bottom.
Is it legal to buy damp proofing leads?: Yes, but the checking is yours. Under ICO guidance, whoever buys marketing data carries out proportionate checks of their own rather than relying on the seller, and permission to text or email a customer only counts if it names your firm.

Keep reading

Damp and mould jobs from searches you chose yourself.

We build your website and run Google Ads in an account in your own name, split between the mould, DPC and tanking work you actually want. See what it costs, then tell us about your business and we'll put your certificates and guarantee where landlords and homeowners look first.

See pricing Got a question? Message us