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The paperwork

Reading a Landscaping Estimate

Landscaping bids are not comparable by default. The expensive work is buried, the cheap bid is usually cheap by omission, and the difference is invisible until the second winter.

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The problem in one sentence. Every large cost in outdoor work — excavation, compaction, base, drainage, disposal — is invisible in the finished yard, so a bid can be genuinely lower by leaving it out and still describe something that photographs identically. Comparing totals compares nothing. Comparing the eleven lines below compares the job.

Why two honest bids differ by forty percent

Start with the assumption that neither company is dishonest. They can still be a long way apart, for four reasons that have nothing to do with margin.

  • They have priced different scopes. One has included demolition, haulage and disposal of the old surface; the other has assumed it is going in a skip you hired. This is the largest single source of spread and the easiest to eliminate.
  • They have assumed different ground. One has established what the subgrade is and priced a base for it; the other has priced the favourable case. On hardscaping that difference is close to double the excavation, the aggregate and the disposal.
  • They have assumed different access. Whether a machine reaches the work is often the largest labour variable on a small job. Wheelbarrowing aggregate through a side gate is a different project from driving a skid-steer to the site.
  • They have priced different materials at the same description. “Shrubs” covers a one-gallon container and a fifteen-gallon one. “Base” covers 4 inches of compacted aggregate and two inches of screenings.

None of those is visible in a total. All four are visible the moment you put the bids side by side against a fixed list of lines.

The eleven lines

1. Site preparation and excavation

What is being removed, to what depth, and by what method. A price that starts at “install” has skipped the half of the job that decides the outcome.

If it is missing: assume the surface is going on top of what is already there, or that the excavation will appear later as a variation.

2. Subgrade and base specification, in inches

For anything paved or built — patio, path, driveway, wall. A depth, a compaction standard, and a lift thickness. ICPI publishes 4 inches of compacted base as a minimum for pedestrian areas on well-drained soils and 6 inches for a residential driveway, compaction of the subgrade to 98% of standard Proctor density, ASTM D698 for pedestrian work, and base placed in lifts of 4 to 6 inches. The base specification page has the full list, written so you can paste it into a request for a quote.

If it is missing: the bid has priced the pavers, not the patio. This is the single most consequential absence on the list.

3. Drainage — scoped and priced, or stated as adequate with a reason

Both answers are fine. Silence is not, particularly in a yard where you have seen water stand. Water is the mechanism behind settlement, heave, joint loss, plant failure and most of what eventually gets blamed on materials. The Web Soil Survey from the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service will tell you the mapped soil, its drainage class and its hydrologic soil group for your parcel, free, in a few minutes — useful context before you read anyone’s answer to this line.

If it is missing: nobody has taken responsibility for where the water goes after the work changes the grade.

4. Plant schedule with species and sizes

Botanical name, common name, container or caliper size, quantity. Size is where the money is: the same species at two sizes is two different prices described by one word in a summary. Ask what happens if something on the list is unavailable — a substitution clause decides whether you are consulted or simply told afterwards.

If it is missing: you are comparing quantities against quantities and the sizes will be settled by whoever is buying.

5. Soil amendment

What is being added to the planting soil, in what quantity, and on what basis. On new-build lots in particular the growing medium is frequently compacted subsoil under a thin skin of topsoil, and planting into it without amendment is a slow, expensive failure that nobody attributes to the estimate two years later. If a soil test informed the answer, ask to see it.

If it is missing: the plants are going into whatever is already there, whatever that is.

6. Edge restraint

For any segmental paving. Which type, and how it is fixed. ICPI asks for “A minimum of 1 in. (25 mm) vertical restraining surface should be in contact with the side of the paver to adequately restrain it.” It is cheap, it is quick, it is invisible once installed, and that combination is exactly why it disappears from low bids.

If it is missing: assume it is not in the price, and expect the perimeter joints to open first.

7. Disposal of spoil and green waste

Excavating a patio to base depth produces several tons of material that has to leave the property, and removals produce green waste that has to go somewhere too. Hauling and tipping both cost money. This line is small in words and rarely small in money.

If it is missing: it is either a variation later or a pile in your yard now.

8. Access, and whether machinery reaches the work

Gate widths, slopes, overhead wires, soft ground, where a truck can park, what gets protected on the way in. A quote produced from a satellite image has assumed the best case on all of these. Access is also the line most likely to explain a legitimate price difference between two competent companies.

If it is missing: nobody has visited, and the price is provisional whether or not it says so.

9. Permits, and who pulls them

Whether the work needs one, who applies, and whose cost it is. Thresholds for walls, grade changes and structures are local and vary widely, and a permit-exemption is not an exemption from zoning, a deed restriction, an easement or a homeowners association covenant. Our retaining wall permit thresholds and tree removal permit rules pages cover what varies.

If it is missing: the question has not been asked, and the answer does not become less true for having been skipped.

10. Establishment watering, and whose responsibility it is

How much, how often, for how long, and who does it. This is the condition almost every plant warranty depends on, so it is also the line that decides whether that warranty is worth anything. See plant warranties for what the condition normally requires.

If it is missing: it is yours, and the warranty is probably contingent on something nobody wrote down.

11. Maintenance, priced separately from installation

A project and a recurring contract should never be one number. Ask for the installation total and the annual maintenance figure as two lines, and read the maintenance agreement on its own terms — term, renewal, notice, price escalation. Lawn care contracts covers the clauses.

If it is missing: the headline number is not comparable with anybody else’s.

And the one that governs the other ten: the warranty and its conditions

What is guaranteed, for how long, what triggers it, what it pays for, and what voids it. A warranty with no stated conditions is not generous; it is unspecified, and unspecified resolves in favour of whoever wrote it. Plants, workmanship and settlement are usually three different guarantees with three different terms.

What a comparison sheet looks like

Placeholder companies, invented values. The row labels are the useful part — most of them describe work that is buried by the time you see the finished yard.

Line Company ACompany BCompany C
Base specification Stated depth + compactionNot statedStated depth + compaction
Drainage Scoped and pricedNot mentionedAssessed, none needed
Plant list Species and sizesQuantities onlySpecies and sizes
Plant warranty 1 seasonNone1 year with watering terms
Applicator licence HeldSubcontractedHeld
Disposal included YesExtraYes
Maintenance plan Optional, pricedRequired 12 monthsOptional, priced

This table is a format, not a finding. Example layout only. The three companies are fictional and the entries invented to illustrate the format; no real landscaper is rated above. Company A, Company B and Company C do not exist, no real landscaping company is described or rated above, and the entries were written to demonstrate the row labels. The row labels are the part worth copying.

Read the table by column rather than by row and the point emerges: the company with entries in every row has quoted a job, and the company with blanks has quoted a result. Only one of those can be held to anything.

Quantities you can check yourself

Volume is the one part of an estimate a homeowner can verify independently, and it is worth doing when a material quantity looks surprising. Our gravel calculator, mulch calculator and paver calculator do the arithmetic from your own dimensions. On aggregate, note that the loose volume delivered is larger than the compacted volume in place; our tools apply a +20% allowance, which is editorial and ours. Compaction is a real volume change and ICPI requires the base to reach 98% of standard Proctor density. The ratio between the loose volume you buy and the compacted volume you end up with depends on gradation, moisture and the compactor, and there is no published national figure for "crushed stone". Twenty percent is our planning allowance, not a measurement of your quarry.

Before you sign

  1. Write one scope and send the same document to everyone.
  2. Ask for site preparation, drainage, materials, disposal and maintenance as separate lines.
  3. Get the base specification in inches, with the compaction standard, in writing.
  4. Get the plant schedule with sizes, and ask about substitutions.
  5. Establish who waters, for how long, and what a warranty claim would require you to show.
  6. Establish who pulls any permit.
  7. Read the maintenance agreement as a contract, including its renewal terms.
  8. Ask each company what they would do differently if the budget were fixed. The answer tells you what they think matters.

What HyreYard can and cannot tell you here. We do not landscape, excavate, plant or build, we do not price work, and we do not publish average landscaping costs — access, soil, regional labour and material availability move them too far for an average to guide a decision. What this page offers is the set of lines to ask about, so that the bids in front of you become comparable. The agreement you sign is what binds you.

Related

Sources

  • ICPI Tech Spec 2 — Construction of Interlocking Concrete Pavements , Interlocking Concrete Pavement Institute, © 1995 ICPI, revised February 2020. Retrieved 5 September 2026. Read as the PDF republished by an ICPI member distributor. ICPI has since merged into the Concrete Masonry & Hardscapes Association and icpi.org redirects to masonryandhardscapes.org, so the member mirror is the copy we were able to retrieve on 5 September 2026.
  • Web Soil Survey , USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service. Retrieved 5 September 2026.

Questions

Why do two landscaping bids for the same yard differ so much?
Usually because they are not bids for the same job. The largest costs in outdoor work are excavation, base preparation, drainage and disposal, and all four are invisible in the finished result — so a bid can be genuinely lower by leaving them out and still describe something that looks identical in a photograph. The second reason is scope drift: one company has priced removing and hauling the old surface, the other has assumed you will deal with it. Before comparing prices, make the two scopes match line for line. Once they do, a remaining gap is information about the companies rather than about the yard.
Should I always get three quotes?
Three is a useful number because it shows you the shape of the distribution rather than a single point, and an outlier in either direction tells you something. But three quotes that each describe the work differently are not comparable, so the value comes from making them answer the same questions rather than from the count. Send every company the same written scope, including the base specification lines, and ask for the same items to be priced separately — site preparation, drainage, materials, disposal, maintenance. Three answers to one question beats three answers to three questions.
Is the lowest bid always cutting corners?
No, and assuming so is its own mistake. A company with its own machinery, a yard close to your address, an existing disposal arrangement or slack in its schedule can be genuinely cheaper on the same specification. The way to tell is to compare the specification rather than the total: if the low bid names the same base depth, the same compaction, the same drainage scope and the same disposal as the others, it is cheaper for a reason you can identify. If it names none of them, it is cheaper for a reason you will find out later.
What does "drainage addressed" mean on an estimate?
One of two things, and both are acceptable. Either drainage is scoped and priced as work — a specific measure, in a specific place, for a specific price — or it is stated as adequate with a reason, such as an existing fall away from the house that the finished grade will preserve. What is not acceptable is silence in a yard that has a water problem, because water is the mechanism behind most hardscape and planting failures. If you have seen standing water after rain and no bid mentions it, ask all of them why not.
What should a plant schedule contain?
Botanical name, common name, size and quantity, for every plant. Size is the line that matters commercially: the same species in a one-gallon container and in a fifteen-gallon container are different prices for what is described identically in a summary line. A schedule that gives quantities without sizes cannot be compared with one that gives both, and a schedule that gives no botanical names leaves substitution entirely open. Ask also what happens if a listed plant is unavailable at installation — the substitution clause decides whether you are consulted or informed.
Who is responsible for watering new plants?
Whoever the contract says, and if it says nothing, in practice it is you. Establishment watering is the most common source of disagreement after a planting job, because it is the one part of the work that continues for months after the crew has left and it is the condition that nearly every plant warranty depends on. Get it written down: how much, how often, for how long, who does it, and what evidence is expected if a warranty claim is ever made.
Should maintenance be included in an installation price?
It should be priced separately, whether or not you buy it. Installation is a project with an end; maintenance is a recurring commitment, often with its own term and renewal terms. Blending them produces a headline number that is not comparable with anyone else’s and obscures what the ongoing obligation is. Ask for the installation total and the annual maintenance figure as two lines, and read the maintenance agreement as a contract in its own right.
Does the estimate need to say who pulls the permit?
Yes, and in most cases you want it to be the contractor. Permitting requirements for walls, grade changes, drainage work and structures are set locally and vary widely, so the question is not whether a permit is generally needed but whether one is needed at your address for this work. An estimate that is silent on permits has either established that none is required — in which case it can say so — or has not asked. Whoever pulls it, the work still has to satisfy the authority that inspects it.
Can I ask a company to re-quote against a written scope?
Yes, and it is the single most effective thing you can do with an estimate you do not understand. Write down the scope you want priced — dimensions, base specification, drainage treatment, plant sizes, disposal, maintenance separately — and send the same document to everyone. Re-quoting against a fixed scope is normal practice and a company that will not do it has told you how the rest of the project would go.

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