Extremely Heavy Loads

Estimating-Concrete Work

Overview

Concrete is mixture of cement, sand, gravel, and water. You can buy concrete either pre-mixed in liquid form, delivered via cement mixer truck and poured in large quantities directly where you want it, or in dry form—up to 80-pound bags—from the big-box stores. Delivery of pre-mixed concrete is great for poured foundations and large driveways but isn’t nearly as convenient as mixing small quantities of dry concrete with water at your own convenience.

There are lots of different types of concrete work you may need to do on a renovation, from little stuff (repair cracks, your deck footers, build a driveway or porch) and everything in between.

While some cement tasks consist of the basic concrete material and the labor to apply and mold the concrete, other jobs involve a lot of associated tasks. For example, pouring a new concrete driveway, while a and creating molds, so, while it may be easy to determine the labor and materials pricing for the concrete portion of the job, you’ll often need to consider other related tasks and materials as well.

Because there are so many variations on concrete work, from the very big jobs of pouring a foundation, building a porch, or installing a drive way, to the small jobs including fixing cracks in a sidewalk or installing a deck footer, I just can’t cover every concrete task in this section. But I do want to provide some general pricing guidelines for both large and small concrete jobs.

For large jobs, you’ll buy concrete from a supplier who will deliver and pour the liquid concrete from their cement truck. Concrete is purchased by the cubic yard. For small jobs, you’ll buy bags of dry concrete from the big-box stores, mix it with water in batch sizes as needed, and use at your convenience, for medium sized projects, many concrete contractors will have a portable cement mixer that can hold several bags of dry concrete mix and water. This will allow you to do large concrete jobs without the overhead of having the concrete delivered by truck.

Inspection Tips

There are two types of concrete repairs you’ll need to consider on you rehabs:

Structural and functional issues. This includes things like cracked or bowing concrete retaining walls, major concrete driveway issues, and concrete steps that have deteriorated or pulled away from a porch or deck.

Cosmetic issues. This includes typical concrete issues like cracks, discoloration, and other aesthetic issues can detract from the value of the property.

With any structural or functional issues related to concrete, it’s best to bring in an engineer or specialized contractor to evaluate and make a re-pair recommendation. Any decisions related to fixing cosmetic concrete issues including cracked sidewalks or discoloured garage floors should ultimately boil down to the estimated cost of repair versus the impact that repair will have on the ARV or the salability of the house.

Life Expectancy

Bag of dry cement: one to two months.

Poured concrete: driveways will last 30-50 years, while buildings could last 1,000 years or more (like the ones built by ancient romans!)

Scope of work (SOW) tasks

In the section below, I will discuss how the labor and material costs generally break down for both small and large concrete jobs:

Large Concrete Jobs

Large concrete jobs include things like:

Poured foundation
New driveway

Concrete porch
Concrete steps
Concrete walls

Small Concrete Jobs

Small concrete jobs include things like:

Cost Guidelines

Here are some very basic costs guidelines for both small and large concrete jobs:

Large Concrete Jobs

$5-$10 per square foot.

Liquid concrete generally costs between $ 100 and $120 per cubic yard (27 cubic feet). Given that a typical concrete pour for a porch or driveway is 4”-6” deep, a yard of concrete will cover between 50-80 square feet of space. That means the concrete costs for a large project will run $1.50=$2.50 per sf. There will be additional material costs in addition to the concrete. Note that the cost of delivering concrete to a jobsite will vary based on the distance from the concrete plant to the site and the amount of concrete you order. If you purchase less than a full truckload of concrete (about 10 cubic yards), you will pay a premium for delivery.

Labor costs will depend on the scope of the work. If the job is a simple pour into a location that requires a simple mold, you may be looking at only $3-$4 per square foot. More complicated projects that require excavation, grading, or complex molds could be closer to $8-$10 per square foot.

Small Concrete Jobs

$5-$10 per square foot.

An 8-pound bag of dry concrete mix will cost between $3.50 and $5.50 and will cover approximately0.6 cubic feet. For a project that requires a 4”-6” thick slab of concrete, one bag will cover approximately 1-2 square feet of space. That means the concrete alone costs $1.75-$5.50 per sf. And there may be additional material costs on top of the concrete.

For small jobs, labor prices will likely be determined by the amount of time spent completing the work, and a good concrete layer or carpenter will run $25-$35 per hour.

Determining your local prices

For large concrete jobs, you can estimate based on the square footage (for a large estimate range), but you will want to get bids to see what the actual cost will be. This in one area where I would recommend you speak with other investors to get references for good concrete layers in your area. Prices will vary greatly, and if you’re paying retail for concrete work, you’re going to spend way too much.

For small jobs, you’ll likely purchase the concrete yourself and pay your concrete work will be part of a larger job (for example, pouring footers for a deck) and the price will be included in the larger job.

How to pay for the job

How you pay for the job will depend on what the specific job is and what type of contractor you’re working with. If it’s a large company, you may be able to gay in instalments or when work is completer; if you’re working with individual laborers, you may have to purchase materials upfront and pay as you go.