Demolition cost calculator

Demolition crews price by the square foot of what is coming down, then add the things that are not in the floor area: the foundation, a basement, hazardous materials, hauling and permits. The rate depends most on what the structure is and how it is built.

We combined Fixr, HomeAdvisor and Bob Vila for each kind of job. Where three guides give a range, the low is the middle of their lows, the high is the middle of their highs, and the typical rate is the middle of their midpoints. Where there are two, we average them.

The examples are the demolition alone, at the US average, before haul-away and the permit. As whole jobs, Fixr puts a house teardown at $7,500 to $15,000 for 1,500 sq ft, HomeAdvisor at $6,000 to $25,000 with $15,800 typical for 2,000 sq ft, and Bob Vila at $3,000 to $25,000.

A whole-house teardown is usually done by machine. An excavator pulls the house down and loads it into roll-off containers or dump trucks. Fixr reports $5 to $10 a square foot as the usual range, as low as $3 for an old house with no real foundation and as much as $12 for a newer house with a full basement.

What pushes the price up:

• A basement. Fixr and Bob Vila both put breaking up and filling a basement at $5,000 to $25,000.
• The foundation. HomeAdvisor and Bob Vila put foundation removal at $1,000 to $5,000. Some lenders and towns want it out before a new build; sometimes a new house can reuse it.
• Hazardous materials. Asbestos in siding, flooring, pipe wrap or ceilings has to come out before the building does. Both HomeAdvisor and Bob Vila put the average abatement at about $2,000, but a large house with a lot of it costs far more.
• Masonry. Brick, block and concrete weigh more and cost more to haul than wood framing.
• Deconstruction. Taking a house apart by hand to salvage lumber and fixtures costs much more, $10,000 to $50,000 for 1,500 sq ft according to Fixr, but some of it can come back as a tax deduction if the materials are donated.

Smaller demolition is mostly hand work: pry bars, hammers, reciprocating saws and a lot of trips to the dumpster. It costs less in total but often more per square foot than a machine teardown, because people are slower than an excavator.

An attached garage costs more than a detached one because the wall it shares with the house has to be kept, closed up and weatherproofed. Fixr puts brick garages at $4,500 to $7,000 against $1,500 to $3,500 for wood. For sheds, Bob Vila notes many crews simply bill $50 to $100 an hour.

Interior demolition before a remodel is where homeowners save the most by doing some of it themselves, if the materials are safe. Pulling carpet and old cabinets is honest work. Cutting into walls is not, until you know what is inside them.

• Haul-away and dump fees. Bob Vila puts cleanup and disposal at $300 to $1,800, with extra truckloads at $400 to $600 each. Fixr puts a dumpster rental at $200 to $550. The calculator averages them as one allowance; a whole house can need several containers.
• Permit. HomeAdvisor says $100 to $500 and that most demolitions need one. Bob Vila says $50 to $100 a permit, and some jobs need more than one.
• Equipment. HomeAdvisor puts machinery at $100 to $250 an hour, which is built into the per-square-foot rates above.
• Site work after. Filling, grading and seeding the lot, or preparing it for a new foundation, is usually a separate price.

Read quotes carefully for what is in and what is out. A low price that leaves the debris on site, or that assumes you pull the permit and arrange the utility shutoffs, is not the same job as a higher one that includes all of it.

Ways to bring a demolition bill down without cutting corners:

• Clear it out first. Furniture, appliances, boxes and yard junk left in a building ride to the dump at demolition rates. Empty it yourself, or have a junk removal crew clear it the week before.
• Salvage what has value. Cabinets, doors, windows, hardwood, fixtures and copper can be sold or donated. Fixr notes that deconstruction and donation can bring a tax break, though deconstruction itself costs more.
• Separate the waste. Clean concrete, brick and metal often cost less to dump, or nothing, at a recycler. Ask whether the crew does this.
• Bundle the work. If a garage, a shed and a driveway are all coming out, one crew and one mobilization for all three costs less than three separate jobs.
• Keep the slab if the plans allow. A sound slab or foundation that the new build can reuse saves the removal line entirely. Ask your builder before you ask the demolition crew.
• Get the survey early. An asbestos survey before quotes means every contractor prices the same job, and nobody finds a surprise halfway through.

An owner is clearing a lot with a 1,500 sq ft wood-frame house on a slab. No basement and no asbestos found in the survey. The quote should include haul-away and the permit.

• Demolition. 1,500 sq ft × $4 / $9.50 / $17 = $6,000 / $14,250 / $25,500.
• Haul-away and dumping. $250 / $713 / $1,175.
• Permit. $75 / $188 / $300.
• Total. $6,325 to $26,975, with about $15,150 typical at the US average.

Add a full basement and the foundation, and the typical price climbs by $18,000. If the asbestos survey had found material to remove, add about $2,000 more as a starting allowance, and expect the abatement contractor's own quote to set the real figure. On a lot this size, the demolition line is most of the bill, so the crew's day rate and how fast their machine can load trucks matter more than anything else. Enter a ZIP in the calculator to scale the labor share to your state's construction wages.

Demolition makes dust out of whatever a building is made of, and older buildings were made of some bad things.

• Asbestos. Common in buildings from before about 1980: vinyl floor tiles, popcorn ceilings, pipe and duct wrap, cement siding and roofing. Test before any demolition. If it is there, a licensed abatement contractor removes it first. Do not sand, cut or break it yourself.
• Lead paint. Common in homes built before 1978. Contractors working on those homes must follow the EPA lead-safe work rules.
• Load-bearing walls. Interior walls can carry the floor or roof above. A contractor or engineer should confirm a wall is not load-bearing before it comes out, or design the beam that replaces it.
• Hidden services. Walls hold wiring, plumbing and ducts. Shut off and cap them before cutting.

If you run demolition or junk removal, the ranges above are what customers read before they call. Price from your own costs.

• Crew and machine time. Estimate the days on site for the crew and the excavator or skid steer, at what each really costs you.
• Disposal by weight. Count the loads and the tipping fees. Concrete and brick are heavy; separating metal for scrap and clean concrete for recycling can bring the dump bill down.
• Permits and shutoffs. Say who pulls the permit and who arranges the utility disconnects, and price your time for it.
• Hazards as separate lines. Asbestos and lead change the job. Make the survey a condition and price abatement as its own line or a subcontract.
• Margin. Our profit margin calculator shows the price that keeps it after all of that.

The "Save as an estimate" button above turns each part into a line. Send it from Koira for the customer to sign and pay a deposit on their phone.