Does this sound like a reasonable price to have Crown Molding installed?

[debden]

I'm having 133 feet of Crown Molding (for 3 rooms) installed in my home.It's 3 1/4" crown and the guy is giving me a price of $800.
I think that sounds kind of high?
Does it sound reasonable to you?
Thanks for any input.

 

[Boo'sMom]

That sounds about average for our area, central New Enland

 

[mickeyboat]

Is he supplying the material?
Is he painting it?

 

[mlynn]

I'm having 133 feet of Crown Molding (for 3 rooms) installed in my home.It's 3 1/4" crown and the guy is giving me a price of $800.
I think that sounds kind of high?
Does it sound reasonable to you?
Thanks for any input.

Are you purchasing the molding yourself or is the contractor going to get it withthe $800? Either way $800 doesn't sound high to me.

 

[debden]

I purchased the crown myself and painted myself.
I've never had it installed before and it just sounded like a high quote.
As long as he does a good job I'll be happy.

 

[Purseval]

I just did that, about 160 linear feet. I paid .65/lf for 4-inch crown moulding, no tax, from a lumber yard that is going out of business. In Home Depot that same moulding is about $1.80/lf plus 7% tax. I painted it myself and I paid the man who installed it about $180. After he installed it I did the caulking and paint touchup myself. It took the installer about 4 hours from the time he set up his equipment to the time he left, he measured everything, made his cuts and put it up. That same job would have taken me days and lots of wasted wood. After the job was done we had about 2 feet left over. Because of the deal I got on the wood the entire job, labor included, cost me about $400, less than just buying the wood itself from HD.

I had about the same footage of wood as you so you should figure on the same for labor. If they are supplying the wood, doing the painting or staining and caulking $800 wouldn't be too bad. If you are doing everything but the install it should be a lot less. That $180 got me a finish carpenter with 20 years experience on high-end homes and it showed in his results. That's also $45/hour, which is pretty darn generous in this economy.

So, now that you know what it cost me, do a cost breakdown and see what you are being charged for labor.

 

[Purseval]

I purchased the crown myself and painted myself.
I've never had it installed before and it just sounded like a high quote.
As long as he does a good job I'll be happy.

Since you are doing the grunt work, yes it does sound high I would get a few more quotes. There are a lot of good carpenters out there looking for work. The guy who did mine travels as far away as Texas and Louisiana to do jobs (I live in Georgia) so you should find some competetive bids.

No matter what you pay you'll be glad you paid someone with experience to do it for you. With crown moulding you either have to use a dual-mitre saw that sets both the cut and tilt angles (they have a book of settings for each degree of angle) or you have to hold it upside down and backwards when you do your cut or else you will never even come close to the proper fit. Because the first method is so time consuming most finish carpenters make one standard cut then use caulk to hide any mistakes. I caulked the entire base and top plus the corners. Since most ceilings are white you don't have to tape the top but you do have to tape the bottom. The big rage (thanks to HDTV) is that blue painter's tape, which is great stuff if you are going to be leaving it up for a week, but regular old masking tape put up right before you caulk and taken off as soon as you're done works just as well and is a lot cheaper. Keep a wet cloth handy both to wet the tip of your finger (makes it easy to spread and even out the caulk) and wipe up any spills.

As for painting, I put on a coat of primer to hide any knots, then my coat of gloss white. Once it was all installed and caulked I went over every inch of it again with one more coat of paint. You HAVE to do another coat once it's up no matter how nicely you painted it on the ground because when the carpenter installs it you are going to end up with hundreds of nail holes. Each one of those holes has to be filled in with spackling paste then sanded so it would look like crap unless you paint it all over again. If you're careful you don't need to tape for that last coat, just use a small brush and don't do worry about getting up to the last millimeter before the walls, at ceiling height nobody is going to notice anything other than the beautiful look of your new moulding.

I mentioned in another post that the install took about 4 hours. All of the other work took about a week in my spare time. Even if you went nonstop it would be a day or two's worth of work. In the end it was worth every minute.

 

[mickeyboat]

DH thinks it is a high price if you are supplying the materials and painting it yourself. He would charge about $300 - but his prices tend to be lower than many.

 

[corndog]

Agee that it's high. It's not 1/2 a day's work for one person.

 

[SC Minnie]

That price does sound high if you have they are only installing it.

 

[debden]

Thanks everybody for your replies.That helped me out alot.
I think that is a high price.Should I see if I can negotiate a lower price?
He's calling today to let me know when he can come over and install it.
Maybe I'll contact a couple more people and see what kind of quote they come up with.
Everyone on this site is so helpful.I really appreciate it.
Debbie

 

[Robinrs]

They call me the Molding Queen in my family I love it and I put it up myself.

I've put in chair railing, picture molding, and crown molding, the last one is definitely the hardest. I wish I charged that much!!

 

[Purseval]

Thanks everybody for your replies.That helped me out alot.
I think that is a high price.Should I see if I can negotiate a lower price?
He's calling today to let me know when he can come over and install it.
Maybe I'll contact a couple more people and see what kind of quote they come up with.
Everyone on this site is so helpful.I really appreciate it.
Debbie

Tell him his price seems very high. Ask him how long he thinks it will take and tell him you are going to look for some more quotes before you make a final decision. I had a 16x22 foot room with just 4 regular corners, a spare bedroom with inside corners, outside corners and a bay window, a spare bathroom with inside and outside corners and 2 other bathrooms with regular corners. That took the carpenter 4 hours. Look at your walls, the straighter everything is the faster it should go. If you have 4 walls with 90 degree angles at each corner and he says it's a full day's work he's cheating you.

 

[mickeyboat]

If you have 4 walls with 90 degree angles at each corner and he says it's a full day's work he's cheating you.

I don't know if I would go that far. If the house is an older home, and the walls are not perfectly straight, a good carpenter will take a lot of time to scribe the moulding to fit well. It also takes time to drag out tools and to set them up. Finally, hopefully the carpenter won't set up his saw inside your house, and trucking back and forth outside takes time.

DH thinks it would probably take close to a full day, but that $800 is too much to ask for a full day. You could ask for an hourly rate, but it will probably be higher than normal since you have bought the materials already.

Eta - also factor in moving furniture around in all the rooms, and clean-up.

 

[Robinrs]

If you have 4 walls with 90 degree angles at each corner and he says it's a full day's work he's cheating you.

Wow, that is hard to find.

I've done old houses AND brand new ones and have yet to find a room with 4 90 degree angles on each corner.

 

[Purseval]

I don't know if I would go that far. If the house is an older home, and the walls are not perfectly straight, a good carpenter will take a lot of time to scribe the moulding to fit well.

I mentioned that earlier. That method is very time consuming and also not used very often for that same reason. It's a lot easier to caulk away the margin of error.

It also takes time to drag out tools and to set them up. Finally, hopefulyl the carpenter won't set up his saw inside your house, and trucking back and forth outside takes time.

My house is 3 stories. One room done was on the first level, the rest were on the third level. With tool setup and takedown, measuring, cutting outside, hauling hoses and wood back and forth the entire job from start to finish took 4 hours. That was 2 large rooms, 2 generous-sized bathrooms and 1 small bathroom, about 160 feet total.

DH thinks it would probably take close to a full day, but that $800 is too much to ask for a full day. You could ask for an hourly rate, but it will probably be higher than normal since you have bought the materials already.

Eta - also factor in moving furniture around in all the rooms, and clean-up.

We did all of the moving around and cleanup. The only cleanup the carpenter did was his mess outside.

 

[Purseval]

Wow, that is hard to find.

I've done old houses AND brand new ones and have yet to find a room with 4 90 degree angles on each corner.

See the picture of the lovely baby in your posting? My 16x22 foot room, the large bathroom and the small bathroom all had 4 corners just like that, with nothing but a straight line from corner to corner. Not exactly complicated cuts for an experienced professional.

 

[debden]

Thanks for all the great info.I just called someone else to get another estimate.
I'm going to ask about getting a better price from the other guy.He's done work in our home before and usually gives me a fair price.But I'll give him a chance to rethink his price quote.
He was also going to fill the nail holes with painters culk.No big deal.I could do that myself.
Just because he's done work for me before he should be giving me a better deal.
Oh well I'll just talk to him and see what he says.
I'll let you know.
Debbie

 

[debden]

Well I just spoke with the contractor I called and he said between $200-$250 but he would have to take a look before he can give a definite estimate.
That sounds more like it....$800 is just rediculous.