You charge what?
- Thread starter ceb58
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Fred B
Senior Member
- Location
- Upstate, NY
- Occupation
- Electrician
I have mostly done T&M work but current job is looking for a bid pricing on a job much bigger than usual. Home is a early 70's about 7200sqft rambling ranch, looking for complete re-wire upgrade, wanting 2 Tesla chargers added to undersized service. Tired of just breaking even would like to start earning enough for a vacation (first in 20yrs), not going to get it on one job but would be a start. What would be your suggestions as to a reasonable bid?
No way on earth can we answer this. Only you can. We have no clue what your overhead is, what your expenses are, how many hours it would take you, nor how much profit you want.
Fred B
Senior Member
- Location
- Upstate, NY
- Occupation
- Electrician
I'm curious as to what others might charge for similar job in their areas?
jeff48356
Senior Member
- Location
- Livonia, Michigan
Why did they have to redo a lot of the work? Did it not pass rough inspection? In that case, they would have not gotten approval to hang the drywall in the first place.
Still unanswerable. Does 'complete rewiring' mean all the existing wires are abandoned and/or removed, or only adding specific circuits to newer loads? How many circuits are needed? What are the power requirements for the heating and cooling? Water heater? Dryer? Stove? Oven? Cooktop/range? What about hot tubs, whirlpools, well pumps. Are you adding recessed lights? Dimmers?
Is the house slab-on-grade, or is there a crawlspace or basement? What's the attic like to work in? Will you be allowed to make some minor holes in the walls and ceilings? If so, who patches them?
You say the service is already undersized. Are you going to change it as well, or leave it as is and hope for the best?
Have you even done a service calc?
Ad nauseum, ad infinitum.
James L
Senior Member
- Location
- Kansas Cty, Mo, USA
- Occupation
- Electrician
If you were to give me a total count of how many openings to demo and how many openings to wire back, and footages on your 240-volt home runs, I could get you within 10% sight unseen
ptonsparky
Tom
- Occupation
- EC - retired
I could use $30,000 extra this month, so I'll go with that...wait maybe $45000
- Location
- Tennessee NEC:2017
- Occupation
- Semi-Retired Electrician
Figure it like a new construction..................................then double or triple it!
ptonsparky
Tom
- Occupation
- EC - retired
For old work, triple is probably closer.
synchro
Senior Member
- Location
- Chicago, IL
- Occupation
- EE
Red Adair made a lot of money over the years but he certainly earned every penny of it!
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
I can't recall ever saying that to the client but do recall thinking that
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
Those people don't make enough as a general rule as it is for what they usually have to deal with.
Fred B
Senior Member
- Location
- Upstate, NY
- Occupation
- Electrician
Service calc looks to be minimum 250A, all existing panels obsolete, wiring evidence of heat damage, part basement, part easy access crawlspace; 2 seperate attic spaces.
Currently almost all switching done via old GE relay panel obsolete relays seem to be unavailable other than Ebay, longest 240V HR is about 45ft, entry from meter disconnect about 80ft from main panel barried cable, electric range, 2- 120 Gal electric water heaters, well pump, water treatment with UV, 2 oil hot air heat with UV filter, 1 hot tub, electric dryer. Has a Kolar generator but haven't been up hillside to check size but no transfer at house so must be up there, main panel in house only 3 wire with ground bond at it. Owner wanting to add 2 Tesla charging stations.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
Are they remodeling any portions? Opened walls/ceilings makes it more like new construction for those areas. If there is significant opened walls/ceilings it maybe isn't as big of a deal to have whoever is doing drywall to have to repair another spot here or there if necessary in other areas that are not completely opened if needed.
I have found many times I though something would be a PITA to fish, and ends up they demolish more than expected and it ends up being more like new construction when time comes. Don't necessarily count on that for everything but it will likely happen for many things.
hillbilly1
Senior Member
- Location
- North Georgia mountains
- Occupation
- Owner/electrical contractor
No inspections, a lot of stuff didn’t work because it wasn’t complete. HR’s left out, incomplete loops, incorrect wire for three ways.
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
There is the occasional incompetent service person that cost you more than their so called professional title is worth- I don't know how to tell you how to avoid them. They can get away with a lot with people that don't know anything technological wise (at least about the item in question). I had a mechanic replace batteries on my truck cause they tested "marginal" I ended up replacing the starter motor myself not too long afterwards and they fixed the problems I was having. Bet my batteries would have lasted quite a lot longer. Same guy found the waste gate valve actuator needed replaced. The computer tells him to remove right front wheel and the wheel well liner to access it, he can't quite get a good angle at it and is afraid of breaking something off and needing to remove the entire turbocharger, don't have the gaskets that will likely be needed if it comes to that, so bring it back when he has parts... before I brought it back I had the air intake duct removed and was looking down at turbocharger and wondered why he didn't try to work on it from that angle, everything was right there and easy to access
James L
Senior Member
- Location
- Kansas Cty, Mo, USA
- Occupation
- Electrician
Yup. Depending on how "lived in" the house is.
More = more
$45,000 might be a place to start
kwired
Electron manager
- Location
- NE Nebraska
or $20,000 might cover it. too little information to say for certain. Most cases probably not going to be much less than that though based on what we do know so far.
James L
Senior Member
- Location
- Kansas Cty, Mo, USA
- Occupation
- Electrician
I don't price by the square foot, but I know guys who have. Brand new construction was at $3.00 minimum 15 years ago. That would be almost $22,000
I'd be completely dumbfounded to see a 7,200 sf rewire at less than $5.00/sf which would be about $36,000
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