I'm seeing couple hundred dollars in materials at the most and maybe 5-6 hours of labor. Round that up to full day if you want, you are still making like 300-350 an hour on labor.
I'm probably doing that job for maybe 1000 -1500 depending on details.
Extra trips? Did you forget something? This should be less than a one day job.
If they are willing to pay 3000, then that is what it is I guess.
No on all accounts
Running wires before cabinets go in is one trip
Installing lights after cabinets is another trip.
I need at least an hour to get an exact layout for shelves so I can stub cables exactly where I want them. Maybe 2 hours depending on whether or not it's already designed
Demo drywall and/or run cables in basement. How many cables? 12-16 of them? At 15 minutes each, that's 3 or 4 hours.
Add switch for control and receptacle for plug-in driver, add another 1 or 1½ hour
Materials - 5mm cables would be $10 each x 12 to 16, so $120-160
The strips are $28 each. Depending on a person's soldering skills, he might want to buy a separate strip for each shelf - 28 x 12 = 336 or 28 x 16 = 448 although you might cut that in half if you find strips with 5mm connector on each end.
Otherwise you'll need to buy 12 to 16 short 5mm cables to solder onto short pieces of strip. If so, you save 250-350 on strips, but spend $80 on short cables and spend 2 hours soldering. It's really a wash, imho
The footage on the shelves is 24 - 32
Depending on the wattage per foot, it might be 48-64 watts. If 64 watts, you'll need a 100 watt driver. That's $120
Receptacle and switch materials will be $25
Need a dimmer, too. Add $35
The return trip to install The strips, driver, etc.
Strips will be 15 minutes each so add 3 to 4 hours. Managing all those cables will be a chore. I had to manage that many prefab cables cables when I put in some ikea lighting lighting, and it took almost an hour just to get them all strapped neatly.
Driver installation will be at least a ½ hour, and cleaning up everything will be at least another ½ hour.
I didn't add it all up, but just at a cursory glance it looks like $700 in material cost and at least 2 full days with 2 trips.
By the time you mark up your materials, It's $3000