Pebble Dashing and Pointing

[Aliswan]

Hello,
I have just bought my own home and it needs a lot of work externally, the pebble dashing has never been replaced since the house was built in the 30's (hence it's pretty messy). It is a standard 3 bed semi and the top half needs pebble dashing and the bottom half needs re-pointing.

I have had a number of builders out to give me quotes and have received so much mixed information I have no idea what to do next.

Firstly does the current pebble dashing need removing then new render then pebble dash putting on or can new pebble dash go over the top?

With the pointing does all the old pointing need digging out and if so how deep? Some have said we can skim over, others 1cm deep and some have said 1inch?

For this work roughly how long should it take to to (I've have some saying 3 days, 1 week and even 3-4 weeks)?

I hope you can help, I'm totally confused by it all.

ps. please don't say don't bother with pebble dashing, the whole estate is pebble dashed and I don't want my house to stand out with render and paint.

[surf]

any loose pebble dashing needs removing, if it was just small areas then it could be patched but it takes skill for it not to stand out afterwards
if the render under the pebbledash is not sound then that will also need removing

it is a better job to remove it all then re do it but without seeing it it is difficult to say if it needs it

as for the pointing, it needs racking out and could be anywhere from 10-25mm depending on how it is being pointed and again the condition of the original

timewise again without seeing it it is an unknown and depends how many blokes the builder is planning on putting on it

some builders quote for the best job replacing everything where as others think you want the cheapest job so quote for the minimum that can be done to get it looking right.

you need to decide how far you want to go with it then write down what exactly you want doing if you want to compare apples to apples

[Aliswan]

Thank you, I'm going to make a list of exactly what I want doing, I think it will be best to remove the current pebble dash and render as it is 70+ years old.

Also there is some controversy over a soil pipe vent on my back wall. My bathroom is at the front of the house and the soil pipe has a vent coming out of the top but on the back of the house is a separate vent pipe which has no pipe going into the house, it is a very old metal pipe that is corroding and a number of builders have said it can be removed whilst others have said it needs replacing but must be kept as a separate vent. My next door neighbour (attached) does not have this pipe and as far as I can tell all the other houses in the estate have one of these pipes between every block of 2 houses. What should I do, remove or replace?

Thanks, sorry for asking so many questions, I kind of wish I had never started looking into all this.