I have the following questions:

How many days must the stucco dry before rain may soak it without degrading it? We are heading into the rainy season and we don’t want an inferior job due to rain.

How long must the stucco dry before it can be painted?

Are there construction methods or materials I should ask for to guarantee a good long lasting repair?

Thanks for taking the time to read my post and consider my questions.

It is unwise to paint cement based stucco finishes unless you live in the desert. Paint might work for synthetic final coats but it is best to put the color into the final coat of stucco.

The underlayment behind cement-based should be double layered.

Source: Building Science Corp. Primer 020

A chimney cricket flashing may also be appropriate.

This appears to be a hard coat stucco installation with no drainage provisions so it will inevitably fail at other points too.

Macv,

We are not doing the stucco repair ourselves. We just wanted to educate ourselves to make sure we use the best techniques and materials to get a good repair when we hire a contractor. I have watched many so-called professionals come into our complex and their gross incompetence is staggering.

Regarding painting the stucco. Since we live in an attached townhouse our HOA requires that all exterior surfaces are painted and match other units. After doing extensive searching I find we should wait anywhere from 60 days to one year to paint the stucco depending on the paint we will apply.

Worthy,

We do have existing kick out flashing and our chimney was properly flashed when we did a remodel 12 years ago. See picture below of kick out flashing. The water was actually entering behind the old 2x3 downspout (we replaced them with 3” round recently) through an original defect in the stucco.

Check out the summons dated June 15, 1989 against the builder:

18.2 DEFECTIVE EXTERIOR WALL WATERPROOFING SYSTEMS:
The exterior wall waterproofing system is defective and has caused or contributed to conditions of leakage and failure in that, without limit: the paper waterproofing membrane behind the exterior stucco directs or permits water entry into building framing at doors, windows trim, corners, angles, and elsewhere; stucco weepscreed was variously not installed, improperly installed or installed at elevations too close to roofing surfaces; the stucco contains areas in which the final stucco coat or layer is missing. Contains areas in which the scratch coat or layer is missing, was installed prior to installation of flashings or proper flashings at and around door openings and window openings, contains voids or openings, otherwise fails to prevent water penetration at the building exteriors and was not installed in accord with project plans.

The lawsuit was settled 14 years ago and there is no way to go after the builder and our HOA said stucco is now the responsibility of the individual homeowners.