Cost
What a Paver Patio Quote Actually Covers
Not a list of cost factors - a walk down the quote itself, line by line, so you know what each one is for and which are missing.
Most advice about pricing tells you what makes a patio expensive. Useful up to a point, but it does not help when you are holding two documents that look nothing like each other. So this is the other exercise: reading an actual quote from top to bottom.
Line: excavation
Should state a depth, and ideally why that depth. This is the number that separates a build for clay ground from one that ignores it, and it is also the easiest place to quietly save money because nobody can see it afterwards. If it says "excavate as required", ask what required means on your lot.
Line: disposal or haul-off
An excavation produces several times more material than people picture. Either it is graded into the property - realistic on the larger New Berlin parcels, and it still needs somewhere to go and a reason that will not create a drainage problem - or it leaves by truck. If a quote is silent on where spoil goes, that is a question, not an omission you can ignore.
Line: base material and depth
Should name the material and a compacted depth. "Compacted" is doing real work in that sentence: base placed in one lift and rolled once is not the same thing as base placed and compacted in layers, and only the second stays put. Ask how many lifts.
Line: geotextile or separation
Frequently absent, and on clay it matters. Without a separation layer, fine clay migrates up into the base over the years and gradually turns free-draining stone into something that holds water. It is inexpensive and it is the difference between a base that works at year fifteen and one that has quietly stopped.
Line: bedding
A thin, screeded layer the units sit on. Worth checking it is thin - a thick bedding layer is sometimes used to make up for an uneven base, and it is where ruts appear later under furniture legs and foot traffic.
Line: the units themselves
Range, colour, and - the part people forget - a note on what happens if that range is discontinued before a future repair. Also worth asking whether the quantity includes a sensible overage for cuts, and whether any surplus stays with you. A box of spare units in the garage is worth having.
Line: edge restraint
If it is not on the quote, it may not be in the job. This is the piece that stops the perimeter creeping outward, and it is inexpensive relative to what its absence causes. Its omission is one of the clearest signals about the rest of the work.
Line: jointing
What goes between the units, and whether it is a stabilising product. This affects how much water reaches the base and how much weed growth you deal with, so it is not purely cosmetic.
Line: drainage
Falls are usually mentioned. What is often missing is where the water actually ends up, and whether any downspouts are being rerouted as part of the work. Both belong in writing.
Lines that should exist and often do not
- Utility and irrigation locating, and who is responsible if something is hit.
- Lawn reinstatement along the access route - realistic scope, not a promise that nothing will be damaged.
- Ground-condition assumptions and what happens if the excavation finds otherwise.
- Payment schedule tied to stages rather than dates.
The comparison that actually works
Put two quotes side by side and compare line for line rather than total against total. Where one is cheaper, find which line accounts for it. Nine times out of ten around here it is excavation depth, base depth or separation - which is to say, it is the part of the job that determines whether you do this again in eight years.
Our cost page covers what moves each of those lines on a given lot.