Restumping advice

Timber vs concrete stumps: which should you choose?

Published 20 August 2026

If your Melbourne home is due for a restump, the material question comes up in almost every quote: timber or concrete? The short answer most contractors give is “concrete, obviously” — and for the majority of jobs that’s the right call. But it’s worth understanding why, because the exceptions are real, and a quote that skips straight past the question without explaining it is a quote worth asking more of.

How long each one actually lasts

Timber stumps are the original material under almost every Melbourne home built before about 1970, and their lifespan depends heavily on species and ground conditions. Red gum, the timber most commonly used in the older inner suburbs, can genuinely push past 100 years in well-drained ground — several of the original stumps we find under Coburg and Brunswick weatherboards are still sound at that age. Treated pine and lower-grade hardwood are a different story: 40 to 60 years is typical, and in a subfloor that stays damp through winter, that number drops further. The failure point is always the same spot — the “collar” at ground level, where the timber sits in the zone that alternates between wet and dry and where rot organisms and oxygen both have access. Below that collar, buried timber often stays sound for decades after the ground-line section has gone.

Concrete stumps, which became standard from roughly the 1940s onward, don’t rot, and a properly poured concrete stump in a well-compacted footing is effectively permanent — there’s no maintenance clock running the way there is with timber. But “doesn’t rot” isn’t the same as “can’t fail.” Concrete stumps fail two other ways: settlement, where the footing itself was shallow or poorly compacted and the whole stump sinks with it, and concrete cancer, where the steel reinforcement inside corrodes, expands, and splits the stump from the inside out. That second failure mode shows up as rust staining and flaking down the face of the stump, and it’s now common in Melbourne’s early post-war concrete stumps, which are pushing 60 to 80 years old. Coburg, which has a large body of interwar and post-war stock, is a suburb where we see it regularly — worth reading if your house falls in that era, because the inspection is looking for different evidence than a timber-stump home.

Galvanised steel adjustable stumps are the third option, less common but worth knowing about. They’re a screw-jack style stump that can be re-levelled without full excavation, which makes them useful specifically on reactive clay where a house might need re-levelling again down the track rather than just once. They cost more per stump than concrete and aren’t the default choice, but they turn up in quotes for suburbs where stump failure and clay movement overlap — Sunshine is the clearest example in our coverage area, where a timber-floored front section can sit on reactive basalt clay behind a slab extension, and adjustability has real value.

What each one actually costs

Restumping is priced per stump, then multiplied by how many the house has — a standard three-bedroom weatherboard typically has 40 to 60 of them. On a machine-accessible block, expect roughly $250 to $500 per stump; where every hole has to be hand-dug and spoil carried out, that rises to $600 to $900 per stump. Material is one input into that per-stump figure, not the dominant one — access and labour usually move the price more than the choice between timber and concrete does.

Where the material choice genuinely matters is the multi-decade math. A concrete stump installed once is, for practical purposes, a cost you pay a single time. A timber stump installed today, even a good one, is a cost your house’s next owner may pay again in 50 to 80 years — sooner if it ends up in a damp, poorly ventilated subfloor like some of the lower-lying streets in Footscray, where subfloor moisture from the Maribyrnong flats shortens stump life noticeably compared with a drier suburb. That’s the real argument for concrete: not that it’s dramatically cheaper stump-for-stump today, but that it removes the job from the to-do list permanently instead of deferring it.

When timber is still the right call

Despite all that, timber hasn’t disappeared from restumping quotes entirely, and there are genuine reasons it still turns up:

• Heritage overlay constraints. In parts of the inner west with heritage protections — much of Yarraville and Seddon fall under this — council conditions occasionally require original materials or methods to be matched for street-visible elements. It’s worth checking with council before assuming concrete is automatically acceptable on a heritage-listed property, though for underfloor stumps that aren’t visible from the street this is increasingly rare.
• Genuinely impossible access. Where a stump location is physically inaccessible to concrete pouring equipment or ready-mix delivery — a tight subfloor corner with no room to work — treated timber can be the only practical option for that specific stump, even where the rest of the house goes concrete.
• Budget staging. Occasionally a homeowner facing a large stump count chooses treated timber for a partial or lower-priority section to bring the job within budget now, accepting they’re deferring part of the cost rather than eliminating it. This is a legitimate trade-off, but it should be made knowingly, not by default.
• Matching an existing partial restump. If half a house was restumped years ago on quality treated timber and is sound, some contractors will match it rather than mix materials — though just as many will recommend moving the whole house to concrete while the jacks are already in and paying labour once rather than twice down the track.

Outside of those situations, treated pine or hardwood stumps specified purely to save money on a full restump are usually a false economy: the saving is small against the per-stump labour cost, and the job — permits, jacking, lifting, re-levelling — gets paid for again in full when those stumps fail.

The one thing worth asking any quote

If a quote specifies timber stumps for a full restump without explaining why, ask the reason directly. “That’s what’s normally used” isn’t a reason — check whether it’s actually the cheapest available material rather than the right one for your subfloor. Conversely, if you’re set on concrete but the site has one or two spots a machine genuinely can’t reach, ask what happens there rather than assuming the whole quote fails on a technicality.

Either way, the material is one line in a subfloor inspection that should also cover stump count, access conditions and current ground line rot or damage — not a decision made from the footpath.

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Not sure what’s under your floor? Our restumping page covers the full process, permits and typical cost bands for a Melbourne restump, and our suburb pages cover the housing era and stump type typical for your area. Or book a free on-site assessment and we’ll tell you exactly what’s down there.

Common questions

Do I have to use the same material the house originally had?

Almost never. There is no general requirement to match original stump material, and concrete is now the default for good engineering reasons. The one exception worth checking is a heritage overlay, where council conditions can occasionally require original materials or methods for elements visible from the street — though stumps under the floor are rarely visible and this is increasingly uncommon. If your property is heritage-listed, confirm with council before assuming, but expect concrete to be acceptable.

Are galvanised steel adjustable stumps a good option?

They have a genuine niche. Adjustable steel stumps allow the floor level to be tweaked later without a full re-level, which is useful on reactive soil where some future movement is anticipated, and on houses where access makes returning for a conventional re-level expensive. They cost more per stump than concrete and they introduce a mechanical component that has to be maintained and protected from corrosion. For a standard house on stable ground, concrete in engineered footings is simpler and cheaper. For a house that is expected to move again, adjustability can be worth paying for.

Will concrete stumps last the life of the house?

Modern ones, set in properly sized and founded footings, effectively yes — they do not rot, they do not attract termites, and with adequate cover over the reinforcement they are not going to fail from corrosion. That last qualifier matters, because it is exactly where early concrete stumps went wrong: minimal cover over the steel, which then corroded, expanded and split the stump from the inside. The material is not the guarantee; the mix, the cover and the footing are.

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