Ballpark costs for steel deck

Hi folks,

I’m in the process of adding a deck to my townhome. Nothing too crazy — a deck off the back of the parlor level with stairs that lead to the garden level. Roughly 185 square feet.

My contractor is telling me that it’s going to be ~$30k just for the steel alone! I’m having a really hard time believing that. Anyone have ideas for how accurate this is? I’ve tried calling vendors, but they’re asking me for things like a material list, which I can’t really parse just from the plans.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

chris.beresford-hill

in General Discussion 2 years and 4 months ago

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cambellara | 2 years and 4 months ago

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This price doesn’t sound crazy. We got a wood deck, with composite board (Trex) and paid $25,000. Similar size. We got many quotes, and Vandeck Builders was by far the best price and service.

cambellara | 2 years and 4 months ago

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This price doesn’t sound crazy. We got a wood deck, with composite board (Trex) and paid $25,000. Similar size. We got many quotes, and Vandeck Builders was by far the best price and service.

mozeeatupu | 2 years and 4 months ago

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Got a 24.4×8 steel deck with I-beams and 6 columns and footings in 2017, was roughly $16k and didn’t include concrete, shop drawings, plans and permits.

Lurker | 2 years and 4 months ago

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sorry I included pricing that was for material fabrication and installation. labor in our case was minor as it was one day for 2 guys. a larger deck would be more substantial. And Amister has a great point both on pricing and scaling. This was in 2015 so we presumably benefited from that dip.

southsloppy | 2 years and 4 months ago

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We just finished our steel deck as part of a larger reno, about same surface and scope as yours. 30k (assuming it’s Steel + Fabrication) doesn’t seem too too far off. Granted we also had a LOT of back and forth between our contractor and the structural engineer on footing size, column sizing. Learned quite a few lessons in the process, happy to share, please feel free to msg me.

funbunch1 | 2 years and 4 months ago

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Two observations:
1) Lurker’s estimate probably shouldn’t be scaled linearly.
2) If Lurkers timeline of “almost 10 years ago” fell in the 2014-2016 period it would have coincided with a historic fall in steel prices.
see this article for example:
https://www.cnbc.com/2015/10/28/steel-demand-evaporating-at-unprecedented-speed.html

Given the higher commodity price and the insane explosion in labor costs, it’s not impossible to see how you could go from $5k a decade ago to $30k price for OP’s admittedly larger job.

chris.beresford-hill | 2 years and 4 months ago

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FWIW, I just spoke to a different contractor who suggested they could do the entire job (including finished materials) for $40k. So unless they’re doing the work for free, it seems like 35-40k would be on the higher side.

Still, would love to know what numbers others have seen from building a comparable deck

Lurker | 2 years and 4 months ago

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that seems normal or cheap. as reference, a barebones 25 sqf deck from a known company on this site, with 2 columns and footings, 8 stairs, a concrete pad, primed not painted was like $5k almost 10 years ago. yours is more than 7x as large which would be 35-40k.

Lurker | 2 years and 4 months ago

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https://www.metalsdepot.com/steel-products/steel-beams