You type a low and a high installed $/ft from bids or a material-plus-labour pair. Gates and old-fence removal are their own lines. Height, setback and who owns the line are zoning and survey questions. This form will not answer them. HyreYard does not build fences.
LF x your $/ftplus gates and removal you type150 ft at $18 to $32 per foot, plus $900 gates and $600 demo, is $4,200 to $6,300. That is a band on figures you supplied, not a style catalogue.
On a worked example of 150 linear ft at a quoted $18 to $32 per foot, plus $900 of gates and $600 to remove the old fence, the fence line is $2,700 to $4,800 and the total is $4,200 to $6,300. If both rates are the same, the band collapses to a single number: 80 ft at $45/ft with a $400 gate is $4,000. Height and setback are not in the arithmetic. Ask zoning. This is an estimate you typed, never a quote. HyreYard does not build fences.
Length, your $/ft band, gates, removal
The rates are yours. Height is zoning. Nothing is emailed.
—Estimate (your figures)
—Fence line
—Gates and removal
What this assumed—
Linear feet times rates you typed, plus gates and removal. Height and setback are zoning. HyreYard does not build fences.
A fence does not fail at the panel. It fails at the post
Walk any street and look at the fences that have gone wrong. Almost none of them has failed in the middle of a panel. They lean, they heave, they gap at the corners, and every one of those is a post problem — which means it is a hole problem, which means it is a problem that was decided before anyone bought a single board.
Why this matters for a price per foot. A per-foot rate is dominated in most people’s heads by the material: cedar or vinyl, six foot or four, board-on-board or plain. Those choices are real and they are visible, which is why bids compete on them. The post specification is invisible once the job is done — the hole is filled, the fence stands up, and two fences built to completely different depths look identical on handover day and for about the first two winters.
So the line that separates a good bid from a cheap one is a line most bids do not carry at all. Depth of hole, diameter of hole, what goes in it, and how the bottom of it drains. If two quotes differ by a meaningful amount per foot and neither states any of those, you are not looking at a price difference. You are looking at two documents that have both declined to say the thing that matters.
The mechanism, because "set the posts deeper" is folklore until you know why. Water in soil expands when it freezes, and it expands upward because that is the only direction with no resistance. A post whose bottom sits inside the layer that freezes gets lifted a little each time — and it does not go all the way back down, because soil slumps in beneath it. Repeat that over a few winters and the post has walked out of the ground. This is frost heave, and it is why the same fence detail behaves impeccably in one state and disgracefully in another.
Which is also why there is no national answer. The depth that works is a function of your local frost line, and the frost line is not in any model document — it is a number your own building department publishes. The frost line itself is not in the model code. It is set locally in Table R301.2 by the adopting jurisdiction, and it is the number your building department publishes for your county. It ranges from nothing in the warm south to several feet in the north, and it is the single figure that decides how deep a post or a footing has to go.
And the soil half of it. A post in free-draining sand and the same post in a heavy clay that holds water are two different engineering problems. Clay both holds the water that freezes and shrinks and swells with moisture on its own account. This is knowable before you build: A parcel-level lookup of the mapped soil, its drainage class, its hydrologic soil group and its shrink-swell potential. It is free, it takes about five minutes, and it is the cheapest useful thing a homeowner can do before buying hardscape. It is a survey map, not a site investigation of your lot.
What this tool is, and is not. It multiplies a length by a rate you typed and adds gates and removal as separate lines, because those two are the items most often folded invisibly into a per-foot figure. It holds no dataset of fence prices and publishes no national rate, so it cannot tell you whether your number is high. What the rest of this page can do is tell you what has to be in the bid before the number means anything.
What the model code says about how deep things go
The figures below are model-code provisions about footings for buildings and structures. A garden fence is often outside them, and that is exactly why they are worth reading: they describe the physics the exemption does not repeal.
This chart is illustrative and says so in its own note. Its only job is to make one point: in a cold climate the model minimum is the floor, not the answer, and the number that governs comes from your building department rather than from any national source including this one.Model minimum as recorded in IRC R403.1.4, minimum depth; frost depths illustrative and not sourced. Verified 5 September 2026.
The minimum depth, and the frost provision
IRC R403.1.4, minimum depth. Exterior footings placed not less than 12 inches below the undisturbed ground surface, and where applicable also meeting the frost provisions that follow. Recorded as consistently published; we did not read ICC’s own library, so this is not offered as a verbatim quotation.
IRC R403.1.4.1, frost protection, as reproduced in the Indiana Administrative Code, 675 IAC 14-4.4-43: "foundation walls, piers, and other permanent supports of buildings and structures shall be protected from frost by one or more of the following methods":
1. Extended below the frost line specified in Table R301.2(1)
2. Constructed in accordance with Section R403.3
3. Constructed in accordance with ASCE 32
4. Erected on solid rock
And a sentence that reads like common sense and is not. "Footings shall not bear on frozen soil unless the frozen condition is permanent."
Setting a post or a footing on frozen ground in January produces a structure that is level in January and is not level in March, because the support underneath it has changed volume. Winter fence installation is not automatically wrong, but it is a question worth asking, and the answer should be about how the ground was prepared rather than about the crew being available.
The exception, and why its numbers are not yours
That state adoption carries an exception for freestanding accessory structures at or below 721 square feet, and a further exception for decks not supported by a dwelling. Both the threshold and the wording are that state’s own — other adoptions we saw referenced in the same search used different areas and different construction types. Treat the existence of an exception as normal and its numbers as strictly local.
Read what that tells you about model codes generally. A model document is a starting point. Every adopting jurisdiction amends it, and the amendments cluster precisely on the thresholds homeowners care about — how big, how tall, how deep, what needs a permit. A figure quoted confidently on a national website is a figure that has probably been amended somewhere between the document and your county.
Our retrieval, stated honestly. We did not read ICC’s own code library for these sections. What we read was a state adoption reproduced in that state’s administrative code, and a code-hosting service’s reproduction of the model administrative provisions. Verified 5 September 2026. We publish what we read and we name where we read it, and we do not present either as a verbatim quotation of an ICC edition we did not open.
What a bid should therefore say about posts
Depth, stated in inches, and how it relates to your local frost line. Not "set in concrete" — a depth. If the local frost depth is thirty-six inches and the bid says thirty, somebody should be able to explain why that is acceptable here.
Hole diameter, and what fills it. Concrete, compacted aggregate, or backfill. Each has a case; each behaves differently with water. A concrete collar that traps water around a wooden post can accelerate the rot it was meant to prevent, which is why the detail at the bottom and top of the hole is a real question rather than a fussy one.
Post spacing, and what happens at corners, ends and gates. Those four locations carry loads the intermediate posts do not. A gate post in particular is a cantilever with a swinging weight on it, and it is the single most common failure point on a residential fence.
And the material specification for anything in the ground. Timber intended for ground contact is a different product from timber intended for above-ground use, and the difference is not visible across a builder’s merchant yard. Ask for it in writing. We have not published a treatment standard here because we did not retrieve one we could quote, and we would rather tell you to ask than give you a half-remembered code.
Not needing a building permit is not permission
The seven-foot exemption is the most quoted sentence in residential fencing and the most misread. It exempts one thing, from one code, and the sentence immediately after it says so.
The exemption. "Fences, other than swimming pool barriers, not over 7 feet (2134 mm) high." That is the model administrative list, Texas Windstorm Insurance Association Building Code, 2024, section 105.2, read on 5 September 2026.
And the sentence people stop reading before. "Exemptions from permit requirements of this code shall not be deemed to grant authorization for any work to be done in any manner in violation of the provisions of this code or any other laws or ordinances of this jurisdiction."
This is the sentence people skip and it is the whole point. Not needing a permit is not permission to build it wrong, and it is not permission at all under zoning, a deed restriction, a homeowners association covenant, or an easement. Those are separate instruments with separate consequences, and none of them is waived by a building-permit exemption.
So here is the full set of things that can stop a fence, only one of which is a building permit. Your zoning ordinance sets height limits, and they are commonly different in a front yard than a rear one — a fence that is fine along the back boundary can be unlawful at four feet across the front. A homeowners association covenant can regulate material, colour and style, and enforcement is private and does not need a public official. A recorded easement — utility, drainage, access — can mean you are not permitted to build a permanent structure on a strip of your own land at all. A corner lot may have a sight-triangle rule for traffic visibility. And a deed restriction can outlive several owners without anyone mentioning it.
Every one of those is checkable before you take a bid, and none of them is checked by the building department confirming you do not need a permit. That confirmation is genuinely useful and it answers exactly one question.
The one that generates the most conflict is the boundary itself. Fences are built to fence lines, and fence lines are frequently not property lines. An existing fence is evidence of a previous owner’s belief about where the line was, and nothing more. Replacing a fence "in the same place" reproduces whatever error is already there, and does so in a form that is expensive to move and awkward to discuss with a neighbour afterwards.
Which makes a survey the cheapest insurance available on this job, in the specific case where the line is in any doubt: an old fence, a disputed strip, a new neighbour, a hedge that has been creeping, or a boundary you have simply never seen documented. It is not needed on every fence. It is needed on exactly the fences where people skip it, because the reason for doubt and the reason for skipping are the same reason.
And the conversation before the bid. Telling a neighbour what you intend to build, before it is built, costs nothing and prevents most of what goes wrong here. Some jurisdictions and some covenants have cost-sharing rules for a boundary fence; most do not, and a voluntary contribution is a negotiation rather than an entitlement. HyreYard does not give legal advice and takes no position on your boundary — we are pointing at the question, not answering it.
The lines a fence bid should carry, and what their absence means
The last column is the one to read. Each absence transfers a specific risk, and in every case it transfers it to you.
Line
What it should say
What its absence means
Length and the line it follows
Linear feet, and what the run is being set out from — a survey, existing pins, or the old fence.
"The old fence" is the default assumption, and it reproduces whatever boundary error already exists in a form that is now yours.
Post depth and diameter
Inches, and a statement of the local frost depth being worked to.
The single most important variable on the job is undefined. Two bids differing on this look identical for two winters.
What fills the hole
Concrete, compacted aggregate or backfill, and how the bottom drains.
A detail that determines whether water sits against the post for the next twenty years is being left to whoever turns up on the day.
Post spacing, and corner, end and gate posts
Spacing, plus a different and stated treatment for the four loaded positions.
Gate posts set like intermediate posts. This is the most common single failure on a residential fence, and it shows up in year two.
Material grade for anything in the ground
The specific product for ground contact, named.
Above-ground material in the ground. Indistinguishable on site, and the difference emerges as rot at the groundline years later.
Gates, itemised
Each gate: width, hardware, hinges, latch, drop rod, and any operator, priced as a line.
Gates folded into a per-foot rate. They are not fence, they are mechanisms, and they are where the cost and the failures concentrate.
Removal and disposal of the old fence
Take-down, haulage, and specifically what happens to old posts set in concrete.
Old concrete footings left in the ground, which either force the new line to shift or become an extra on the day.
Grade and how the fence follows it
Stepped or racked, and what happens at the low points where water runs.
A solid fence across a drainage path becomes a low dam. Water arrives somewhere it did not before, usually on the uphill neighbour’s side.
Access, and what gets damaged
How material and spoil move to and from the line, and across whose ground.
Ruts across a lawn, a damaged bed, or a machine that cannot reach the back run and becomes hand labour at a variation price.
Utility locating before digging
A statement that the underground locate will be requested, and who requests it.
Holes being dug at depth on top of unknown services. This is a safety matter before it is a cost matter, and it is free to arrange.
Our analysis of what makes a fence bid auditable, assembled from the code material sourced on this page and from the failure modes it describes. It is not a price list, a specification, or a contract review. We publish no fence rates and hold no dataset of them.
A solid fence is a small dam, and nobody puts that in the bid
A drainage problem is the consequence people discover in the first heavy rain after the fence goes in, and it is the one that turns a fence into a neighbour problem.
The mechanism
Surface water moves across a garden as sheet flow. It does not need a channel; it moves as a thin film following the grade, and on most suburban lots it has been doing so since the site was graded. A solid fence built across that path with its bottom rail near the ground interrupts it.
What happens next is not subtle. Water backs up on the uphill side, drops whatever silt and leaf litter it was carrying, and the accumulated debris makes the obstruction more complete each season. Within a couple of years the uphill side is wetter for longer after every storm, and the fence itself is sitting in that.
And the general point behind it. US Environmental Protection Agency describes the underlying mechanism this way: "much of the land surface is covered by buildings, pavement and compacted landscapes. These surfaces do not allow rain and snow melt to soak into the ground which greatly increases the volume and velocity of stormwater runoff" The EPA page states the mechanism and does not publish a runoff percentage. We do not publish one either. A fence is not a paved surface, but it is a change to how water moves across a lot, and it belongs in the same conversation.
What to do about it, cheaply, at design time
Walk the line during or immediately after heavy rain. Not from a plan — physically, with wet feet. Where water crosses the intended line will be obvious for about twenty minutes and invisible for the rest of the year.
Then ask for the fence to be detailed at those points. A raised bottom rail, a gap, a gravel-filled trench beneath, or a section built to a different height. All are ordinary carpentry when specified in advance and all are a variation when discovered afterwards.
Check the soil group before you assume the water will infiltrate. The four hydrologic soil groups describe exactly this: "A" is low runoff — Deep sands and gravelly sands. Water goes down. "D" is high runoff — Clays with high shrink-swell, a high water table, a claypan, or shallow soil over near-impervious material. On the second, water that lands on the surface largely stays on it.
And look your parcel up, because it is free. Web Soil Survey, USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service. A parcel-level lookup of the mapped soil, its drainage class, its hydrologic soil group and its shrink-swell potential. It is free, it takes about five minutes, and it is the cheapest useful thing a homeowner can do before buying hardscape. It is a survey map, not a site investigation of your lot.
What to establish before you accept a fence price
The first four cost nothing and can be done this week. The last three are questions for the bidder, and they are short.
Ring the building department and ask for the local frost depth
One question, one number, free. It is the figure that governs post depth, it is published for your jurisdiction, and it is not in any national document including this one. Write it down before you read a single bid.
Ask the same call whether a permit is needed, and separately what the zoning height limit is
Two different questions to possibly two different desks. The permit answer does not contain the height answer, and the height answer is commonly different for a front yard than a rear one.
Look up your parcel on Web Soil Survey
Five minutes, free, and it tells you the mapped drainage class, the hydrologic soil group and the shrink-swell potential — the three things that determine how a post in your ground will behave. It is a survey map, not a site investigation of your lot.
Establish whether the boundary is actually in doubt
An old fence, a new neighbour, a creeping hedge, a disputed strip, or a line you have never seen documented. Any of those and a survey is the cheapest thing in the project. None of those and it probably is not needed.
Ask each bidder for post depth, hole diameter and what fills it
In writing, in inches. Then compare that answer with the frost depth you already have. This single exchange separates bids more reliably than any other question on the list.
Ask what happens at gates, corners and ends
Different posts, different depth, different bracing, or the same as everywhere else. If the answer is the same as everywhere else, you have found the thing that will fail first.
Ask who calls for the underground utility locate
Somebody must, before anyone digs a line of holes to depth across a garden. It is free to arrange and it is a safety question first. The bid should say who does it.
The words on a fence bid
Frost line (frost depth)
The frost line itself is not in the model code. It is set locally in Table R301.2 by the adopting jurisdiction, and it is the number your building department publishes for your county. It ranges from nothing in the warm south to several feet in the north, and it is the single figure that decides how deep a post or a footing has to go.
Frost heave
The upward movement of ground, and anything set in it, caused by water freezing and expanding. It is cumulative: each cycle lifts a post slightly and soil slumps in beneath, so it does not return.
Groundline
Where a post meets the soil, and where wooden posts almost always rot first. It is the wettest, most oxygenated part of the post — both conditions decay needs — which is why the material grade for ground contact is a different product.
Racking versus stepping
Two ways of following sloping ground. A racked fence keeps rails parallel to the slope; a stepped fence keeps them level and steps down, leaving triangular gaps at the bottom. Which one you get changes the look and the gaps, and it should be in the bid.
Hydrologic soil group
A four-part classification of how readily water moves into soil, from A to D. Published per parcel on Web Soil Survey and directly relevant to how a post hole behaves.
Easement
A recorded right somebody else has over part of your land — a utility, a drain, an access. It can prohibit a permanent structure on that strip regardless of what any building code says, and it is invisible on the ground.
Sight triangle
A zoning rule limiting the height of anything near a corner or a driveway so drivers can see. A common reason a lawful fence height elsewhere on the lot is unlawful at one specific corner.
Permit exemption
A provision saying a building permit is not required for a defined category of work. It removes one administrative requirement from one code, and the model list says so explicitly in its own closing sentence: "Exemptions from permit requirements of this code shall not be deemed to grant authorization for any work to be done in any manner in violation of the provisions of this code or any other laws or ordinances of this jurisdiction." It grants nothing under zoning, covenants or easements, and it does not change the physics of your soil.
What this calculator cannot do
Six real blind spots, each one something a reader might expect it to handle.
It cannot tell you a fair rate per foot. We publish no fence prices and hold no dataset of them, for your area or any other. Both rate boxes default to zero deliberately. A tool that shipped a national default would be giving you a number to anchor on, and it would be a number with nothing behind it.
It cannot tell you how tall you may build. That is zoning, it varies by yard within the same lot, and it is frequently further restricted by a covenant. A building-permit exemption does not answer it.
It cannot tell you where your boundary is. Only a survey does that, and no calculator, aerial photograph or online parcel map is a substitute for one where the line is genuinely in doubt.
It cannot specify your posts. Depth follows a local frost line we do not have, on soil we cannot see. That state adoption carries an exception for freestanding accessory structures at or below 721 square feet, and a further exception for decks not supported by a dwelling. Both the threshold and the wording are that state’s own — other adoptions we saw referenced in the same search used different areas and different construction types. Treat the existence of an exception as normal and its numbers as strictly local.
It cannot see the grade. Whether the fence crosses a drainage path, and what that will do, is knowable only by standing on the ground — ideally in the rain.
And it cannot assess a contractor. We do not verify, rank or refer anyone, and we take no fee from anyone who does. Licence and insurance are checkable free with your state and the carrier, and a walk past a fence the crew built four years ago is worth more than any number on this page.
When the honest answer is a shorter fence, or none
Most sources in this space earn when a fence gets built. This one does not, so it can say the thing they cannot.
Name the conflict. Fence cost guides are overwhelmingly published by fencing companies, marketplaces taking a referral fee, or material manufacturers. None of them is necessarily dishonest and all of them are structurally unable to conclude "build less of this". HyreYard does not build fences, sell materials, rank contractors or take a referral fee from anyone who does.
Three cases where less is the right answer. First, when the fence is being run around the whole perimeter but the actual need — privacy on a patio, containing a dog, screening one window — is satisfied by a third of it. Fencing the need rather than the boundary is frequently the largest available saving and it is almost never proposed. Second, when the line is in doubt and nobody wants to pay for a survey: build inside your own line by a foot, entirely on your own ground, and the question never arises. Third, when the run crosses a drainage path and the honest fix is a gap and a planted screen rather than a solid panel and a future dispute.
And the thing worth doing before any of it. Stand where you actually sit, and look at what you actually want screened. A six-foot fence at the boundary and a five-foot screen ten feet closer to you block the same view, and one of them is a fraction of the length. That is a design decision with a price attached, it is made before any bid is requested, and no per-foot calculator — including this one — will raise it with you.
How this calculator works
The calculator multiplies length by each rate, then adds gates and removal to both ends:
fence = length x min($/ft) to length x max($/ft)
extra = gates + demo
total = fence + extra
If you type only one of the two rates, the missing one copies the one you typed, so a single bid still produces a number. If both rates are 0, or length is 0, the total asks for length and a quoted $/ft. Extras still print. That is the honest default.
Height is not an input. Setback is not an input. A national average $/ft would hide both, and would hide whether the old fence is in the price. The model IRC fence sentence, where adopted, is about building-permit exemption at 7 ft. Zoning in the front yard is often much shorter. This page will not mix those rules into a price.
HyreYard does not build fences, does not pull permits, and does not settle property lines.
What each input means
Inputs on this tool, in the order they appear on the form.
Input
What it is actually asking
Length
Linear feet of run. Corners still count. Gates are usually extra, not a subtraction, unless the bidder said so. Measure twice if the line is the neighbour’s as well.
Low $/ft
The lower installed rate from a bid or a material you are considering. 0 is the honest default.
High $/ft
The upper installed rate. Type the same as low if you have one number. This page will not invent a spread.
Gates
A lump from the bid. Hardware, infill, and whether a drop rod or an electric operator is included. Ask.
Removal
Taking down what is there, hauling it, and dealing with posts that were set in concrete. Or 0 if the bid already includes it.
Worked examples
Including one where the naive answer misleads, which is the example most calculators leave out.
150 ft with a real bid band, gates and demo
Length 150, low $18/ft, high $32/ft, gates $900, demo $600. Fence line $2,700 to $4,800. Extras $1,500. Total $4,200 to $6,300. That is the arithmetic this engine is tested against. The width is the two rates you typed, not uncertainty this page added. Replace the rates with the two bids on your table.
One rate, so the band collapses
Length 80, low $45, high $45, one walk gate at $400, nothing to remove. Fence $3,600. Extra $400. Total $4,000. A single number is what you get when you type a single number. It is still not a quote. Posts in rock would move it.
The one where a national fence average misleads
A roundup that says "the average fence costs $X per foot." One house wants 4 ft of open picket on a surveyed back line. The next wants 6 ft of solid screen in a front-yard setback on a corner lot with a sight triangle. Applying one average hides that the second fence may be illegal at that height in that yard. This form will not take height, because the honest output is: ask zoning, then type the $/ft for the fence you are actually allowed to build.
What changes the result
Length moves both ends of the band linearly. Gates and demo do not: they are lumps. A 40 ft run with two drive gates can cost more in hardware than in panels.
Material, height and post depth change the rate you should type. They do not change this formula. If a masonry screen is really a wall, use the retaining-wall calculator for the structure and come back here only for any fence on top.
Slope, rock and a missing survey change the job more than an extra 10 ft of panel. If the bidder has not walked the line, the $/ft is a guess with a unit attached.
Local considerations
Fence height, front-yard rules, corner sight triangles, easements and HOA design boards are local. Neighbouring lots in the same HOA can still sit in different overlay districts. Confirm current zoning for this parcel before you treat a bid as buildable.
The IRC 7-ft building-permit sentence is model language, locally adopted, and it is not a substitute for the zoning height in the front yard. A state average $/ft would be a fake localiser. We do not ship one. The survey and the bids are the local data.
When not to use this
Do not use this as a quote, a permit application, or a property-line opinion. It cannot see pins, an easement, frost, or an HOA packet.
Do not use it to choose a height. Height is zoning. Type the rate for the fence that is actually allowed.
Do not use a $/ft you found in a roundup of "average fence cost." If you cannot name who priced it, at what height, in which city, leave both rates at 0.
HyreYard does not perform fence work. Matching is still being built. The enquiry form is not a dispatch line.
Linear feet times the installed $/ft for that material, height and access, plus gates, posts in your soil, and removal of what is there. We do not publish a national average because a 4 ft cedar on a flat lot and a 6 ft masonry screen on a slope are different jobs. Type the rates from written bids. Leave them at 0 until you have them.
What height can I build?
A zoning question, and often an HOA question, and sometimes a different number in the front yard than in the back. This form does not take height as an input, on purpose. The 2024 IRC, where adopted, lists some fences not over 7 ft as building-permit exempt. That is a building-permit sentence in a model code, not a zoning setback, and not a national height law. Call planning.
Do I need a permit for a fence?
Sometimes for building, almost always for zoning if you are in a front yard, on a corner, or over a common height. Easements and sight triangles catch people. A call to the building and planning desks is free. A fence on the wrong side of a survey pin is expensive.
Who owns the fence line?
The survey, not the neighbour’s memory and not this page. If the line is disputed, stop. A cheap fence on the wrong lot is a demolition plus a lawsuit. Get the pins found before you bid the length.
Why two rates, low and high?
So you can type two bids, or a material range, without this page inventing a national spread. If you only have one number, type it in both boxes and the band collapses. If you have none, leave both at 0.
Does this include gates?
As their own line. A walk gate and a 12 ft double drive gate are not "a little extra lineal footage." Type the gate bid. Two 3 ft gates are not one 6 ft gate.
Does this include tearing out the old fence?
As the demo line. Old concrete posts, rotten rails and a vine-covered run are labour and a dumpster. If the bid says "removal included," you can leave demo at 0 and say so to yourself. If it does not, type it.
Wood, vinyl, chain-link or masonry?
Material changes the $/ft you type. It does not change the geometry. Masonry is often closer to a wall than to a fence, and may pick up the retaining-wall and permit questions. Type the rate for the system you were actually quoted.
What about posts in bad soil or on a slope?
They are why two bids at the same $/ft still diverge. Rock, a high water table, and stepping a fence down a grade are extras. If the bid is silent, ask. Do not hide them inside a national average.
Is this a quote?
No. It cannot see the survey, the HOA, frost, or a utility easement. Use it to check whether a bid started from length and named gates and removal. Minus something to plus a lot, lopsided because unseen posts add money.
Does HyreYard build fences?
No. HyreYard is an information and matching layer. Matching is still being built. The enquiry form is not a dispatch line.
Sources and methodology
Figures dated 26 August 2026. Last reviewed .
Work exempt from permit (fences, retaining walls, flatwork) (Model administrative provisions, read as reproduced in a state-adopted building code (Texas Windstorm Insurance Association Building Code 2024, section 105.2), retrieved 2026-09-05. Fences other than pool barriers not over 7 ft, retaining walls not over 4 ft measured from the bottom of the footing, and the closing sentence that an exemption grants no authorization to build in violation of any code or ordinance. We did not read ICC’s own library; this is a state adoption reproducing the model list, and adoption and amendment are local.)
Section R403.1.4.1, frost protection, as adopted (Indiana Administrative Code 675 IAC 14-4.4-43, published by Cornell Legal Information Institute, retrieved 2026-09-05. The four frost protection methods and the prohibition on bearing on frozen soil. The exception thresholds in this text are Indiana’s own amendments and are not the model numbers — which is itself the point: adoption and amendment are local.)
Web Soil Survey (USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service, retrieved 2026-09-05. Parcel-level mapped soil, drainage class, hydrologic soil group and shrink-swell potential. Free, and directly relevant to how a post hole behaves. A survey map, not a site investigation of your lot.)
Hiring a contractor (Federal Trade Commission, retrieved 2026-08-26. Written estimates, licence where required. A fence bid should state material, height, post depth and who pulls the permit.)
Cooperative Extension System (USDA NIFA, retrieved 2026-08-26. Regional plant-and-property guidance. Setbacks and fence height remain the zoning office.)
Related
FencingPost depth is set by your county’s frost line, and the exemption waives no setback or covenant.