How to read a contractor quote

Three quotes for the same job routinely come back thousands apart. That is not usually because one contractor is cheap and another is greedy. It is because they have quoted different work, and the document rarely makes that obvious.

Here is what to check before you put the totals next to each other.

1. Whether it was measured

A quote that arrives without anyone having been on site, or up a ladder, is an opening position. For a roof, the document should state the area and the pitch. For solar, the DC system size in kilowatts. For HVAC, the result of a load calculation rather than a rule of thumb from your square footage. If the number that drives the price is not in the quote, nothing was measured.

2. What happens when they find something

Rotten decking under a roof, failed waterproofing behind a bathroom wall, wiring that no longer meets code — these are found after work starts, which is precisely when you have no leverage. Ask for the unit price of the likely discoveries as a line item up front. A contractor who has quoted this work before will have a number ready.

3. Whether disposal and permits are in it

Tear-off, skip hire, tip fees and permits are real costs, and they are the easiest things to leave out of a bid to make it look competitive. On a roof or a driveway, disposal is a meaningful fraction of the job. Ask explicitly rather than assuming "all-in" means it.

4. What the allowances are

On remodel work especially, a quote often contains allowances — a placeholder sum for fixtures you have not chosen yet. Two quotes with identical totals can carry wildly different allowances, and the difference lands on you later. Write a fixture schedule with actual models and give the same one to everybody.

5. Whether it is a like-for-like scope

Some of the largest gaps are not padding at all. Interior drainage against exterior excavation. Insert windows against full-frame replacement. Reusing ducts against replacing them. Refacing cabinets against new ones. In each pair the more expensive option is a different job, not a worse deal.

6. How it compares with the local range

This is what this site is for. Where we have sourced data — solar in California, HVAC and water heaters nationally — every page carries a quote checker: enter the number you have been given and it tells you where it sits against the local range and by how much.

A quote below the range is not automatically good news. Unusually low bids most often mean something has been excluded, and the line items above are where to look for it. A quote above the range is worth two more conversations before you sign.

One last thing

Get three quotes, and get them in writing. Not because the third one will be cheapest — it usually is not — but because three documents describing the same job are the fastest way to see what any one of them left out.