Is My Electrician A Little High On His Prices?

nriddock

we are having a hot tub installed, i called the electrician who wired our house. he walked off the distance from the panel to the hot tub site (outside and quite a ways away from a direct line of sight). he called me the other day to give me a quote....

$2100.00 for a 60A circuit

he cited the rising price of wire and required equipment, etc.

i asked what his hourly rate was - $55.00

so my simple math comes out to 18.5 hours of labor and 1000.00 worth of materials (just cutting the 2000 in half - half to labor half to materials).

does this sound off / right?

Bone Saw

the man you need to talk to is bmf5150

__________________
Custom Decks & Carpentry LLC.
Chester County Custom Decks
Custom Deckbuilder Mainline
Philadelphia Deck Builder
Custom Decks & Carpentry on Facebook

RobertF

With copper prices what they are, his wire alone not including any other materials is probably close to $700-1000 depending on his footage.

__________________
-Robert F

Bone Saw

I thought your contracting trade was Low voltage wiring ???

__________________
Custom Decks & Carpentry LLC.
Chester County Custom Decks
Custom Deckbuilder Mainline
Philadelphia Deck Builder
Custom Decks & Carpentry on Facebook

nriddock

Bone Saw - yes my specialty is LVW....thats why i needed a "big guy" to do the heavy wire

for the prices this guy is asking i could pull CAT5 for the next two weeks and still not reach $2K.

the hot tub is for my family home...i respect electricity TOO MUCH to try and do this myself.

Teetorbilt

I think that you're underpriced. Ol'#2's co. charges $135/hr. for cat 5 or 6.

__________________
You can't solve you're problems with the same level of thinking that created the problems.

Albert Einstein

Bone Saw

are you good at it and do you like being in biz for yourself and getting paid?

__________________
Custom Decks & Carpentry LLC.
Chester County Custom Decks
Custom Deckbuilder Mainline
Philadelphia Deck Builder
Custom Decks & Carpentry on Facebook

Disturbed Elect

To anyone who wants to start a sub contracting buisness,I have been a Licensed Electrical Contractor For 10 Years in New Jersey and have had as many as 25 employees....My Advise, go back to work for a stable company. Unless of course you don't mind the following. Chasing after your money, dealing with people who sometimes own major companys who will screw you and go home to sleep like a baby, homeowners who can be a major pain in the ass,
trying to be honest and trustworthy when most around you are not, trying to pay your bills to suppliers when you haven't collected all your money yet, trying to pay your bills in general,and last but not least my favorite...Retainage, so you know also General contractors very rarely lay out there own money, most of there contracts have pay when get paid clauses. Which basicly means they don't front money and as soon as they collect they deduct right away thier overhead,profit and general conditions, this is after usually getting a deposit from the owner that they rarely foward to subs. They are very smart and clever. Be carfull. I know of one GC that did 25 Million in sales and was compleatly debt free at the end of the year.He did not spend a dime of his profits to operate his buisness like us measly little Subs Do.

mdshunk

This site is for contractors, and I have a fundamental objection towards answering your question on an up/down basis. I do realize t hat you're a LV guy, so I'm way surprised that you'd ask such a Harry Homeowner type question. There's no possible way to see your actual situation, nor am I personally interested in looking at picture of such.

Let it be known that rates and prices vary wildly from localle to localle, based on local prevailing market conditions. Also, the degree of difficulity will vary from dwelling to dwelling, based on the construction type and how highly finished/unfinished certain portions of your home are. For all we know, the guy has to install a subpanel too. Who knows. Certain types of hot tubs (field built) may even require a complete conduit run (ie, no NM cable) to serve the spa. There's a whole section of the code that specially applies to pools and spas, with additional requirements above and beyond the typical branch circuit.

That said, I've done spa connects for as cheap as $600 bucks and as expensive as $4000 with basically the same end result. A working hot tub. It "just depends" (on a lot of things). Remember, you're free to use another electrician or get another estimate. Remember also, you get what you pay for. Realize that, in many locations, this is inspectible work. This may add to the cost as well.

Life is expensive... deal with it. After all, a hot tub is a luxury item.

BIGRED

Disturbed and MD, I couldn't agree more with both of your replies.

Sparky Joe

Good points by MD

I'd say get a second opinion from someone out of the phone book, just to get a ballpark figure, then go with the guy who wired your house.

Perhaps he may let you dig the trench for him and could save some money there, Don't offer to do anything else though, it may sound like an insult

Cat 5 and 6 price is based on the complexity of the cable, and has always been inflated. You should ask around about prices of copper and steel nowadays, compared to what they were 6 months ago. Hell even 1 month ago.

copusbuilder

He walked quite a ways away from a direct line of sight?
Call H.D. price the wire. Is it direct burial or in pipe?
Call around get a few prices. If the guy is cheap do the right thing and pay him the extra money he undercharged

__________________
www.copusconstruction.com
www.etexasrentals.com
www.thelakevoice.com
AkA Richard Cranium

Sparky Joe

Perhaps he saw obstructions beneath the sod, he built the place afterall.

How long is the run anyway?