This price sounds more accurate to me for a home with lighting/shades, AV, cameras and network.

I would be very curious, what your average per wire price was on those projects. What it all came up to. Conduit and panels are the items that sort of throw this number off.


$1.25/sq ft, seems very low, but maybe if it's just data/tv/phone (2xCat6+1xRG6).

But honestly, most of these posts are useless without people posting their hourly rate. Because if I'm $50 more per hour than you, than $225 could be the same as $175 in your market.

I'm $125hr, but have been at that rate for 6 years and due for an increase.

Below are the rates I'm currently charging for a 100ft wire run.  The price includes materials and labor.  I don't discount for multiple runs, but have pricing specifically for locations like distributed video which receive multiple wires.  Pricing doesn't include conduit or panels which are added in separately.

$179 - Phone
$188 - Ethernet
$148 - Lutron keypad
$205 - Lutron Shade
$388 - Speaker Pair (14/4 + speaker rings)
$640 - 5.1 Surround Sound
$411 - Distrubuted Video (RG6, 1xCAT5, 2xCAT6)

I have these build up as part number "Groups" in Quickbooks so any changes to material or labor costs will automatically adjust the pricing.

Do this "Groups" include the trim out labor and materials?

The system I'm working on doing is going to included terminating most wires in a panel on DIN blocks or whatever you like, and putting fittings or keystones on the wall plate end. Then test wires and be completed.

This would protect us if something isn't passing after house is completed. But also, the trim out is basically just putting the straps and wall plates on. This would mean we need to make sure the wires are protected of course.

This also is "busy" work that can often been done anything after wiring is completed. So if we have a slow week or something, we can go work on trim out of the lines even if the house isn't ready for wall plates. Of course, getting this one and tested when we could fix something if necessary would be ideal.

Your "distributed video" looks like it needs fiber..... or at least Cat6a.

I've been pulling CAT6 Shielded for the last 3-4 years and using the HDBT certified stuff since it's been available.  I also include conduit to most TV locations which is priced separately.

Yeah but 3-4 years in this industry is ancient!  Besides, we all know what your clientele is like...... They will pay for fiber distribution ;)

We charge by "bundle". For example, a WAP bundle includes 2 cat6 cables; one is terminated at both ends (patch panel on rack side, male or jack on device side) and the other is spare. Parts and labor to provide, pull, inspect (post drywall), label, terminate and test is $250 per bundle.

Several other bundles (i.e. touch screen, camera, door station, etc.) are configured just like this, with one terminated and one spare cat6. They are also $250 each.

This essentially comes out to $6,000 per 24 port patch panel with one spare per port.

For example, let's say a project includes (among other things) 8 touch screens, 8 WAPs and 8 cameras. That's 24 bundles at $250 each, which is $6,000.

A very rough breakdown would look something like this:

LABOR
Rough-in: $1,500
Trim: $1,500
Inspection, project management, overage allowance: $1,500

PARTS
Cable (6,000'): $1,250
Patch panel, trim rings, labels, male ends, etc.: $250

Just looked it up as we are like many of you, we don't typically complete just a prewire on a house. We have it setup so that we can build a customized proposal pretty fast with SmartOffice. When I select a Cat6 port, I get several options for terminations, wallplates exc.

A standard Cat6 (Wirepath cabling) with keystone termination, a single wallplate, and no termination at the head end came to $92.25.

I can see benefits for those that do the exact thing over and over that charge a flat rate, but we complete some very different jobs at times and need to be competitive and flexible. The reality is that the type of work and cost is different for the 5k square foot home versus the 15k home versus the 10k office building vs the 50k square foot apartment building.