Painter Nigel Frisby and builder Brad Schumacher say it's a busy time

Nigel Frisby has been painting houses for years and is currently going through one of his busiest periods ever.

The trend seems to be across the board, with a lot of other painters in Bathurst also fully booked well in advance.

"It's unbelievable the amount of work I've knocked back in the last month or two," Mr Frisby said.

"Most of us painters in Bathurst are fairly close-knit, we pass work onto each other.

"I've tried to pass on work to my group of painters, there'd be half a dozen of us, and they can't take it either."

Mr Frisby said it's also difficult at the moment to find apprentices or tradespeople to employ.

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Mr Frisby said while there's a few one-man-bands around, they often can't take on bigger jobs on their own.

"I have a mate who is crying out looking for tradesmen. He's been advertising non-stop, he said he can't get anybody," Mr Frisby said.

"There's builders running around looking for painters, they can't get them.

"I think most painters are in the same way, a lot of people already have their schedule in for the next month or two."

Bathurst builder Brad Schumacher said it's been difficult with all trades, not just painters, and it's been a challenge for a while.

Mr Schumacher said he believes it's stemmed from COVID, and people spending money on doing their houses up instead of going on a holiday.

These smaller, private jobs make it harder for builders to hire subcontractors when they need them.

"The private market has driven it I believe. People are choosing to renovate their own place, renovate their bathroom and stuff like that," Mr Schumacher said.

"The town is just busy. I put it back to the COVID thing with people doing their stuff at home and wanting the smaller contractors to do work for them which makes it hard for us to keep the contractors going."

Mr Schumacher said he has never seen the industry as crazy as it is now, in terms of shortages in tradespeople, materials and the high prices of land and construction.

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