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Pricing
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How to Price a Bathroom Renovation in 2026 (A Builder's Step-by-Step Method)
The Smallest Room With the Biggest Risk
A bathroom is three square metres of floor and about a dozen trades. Clients look at the size and expect a small price. Builders sometimes fall for it too, quote off a per square metre rate, and find out four weeks later that the room being small did not save them a single trade.
Bathrooms get underpriced more than any other renovation. The work is sequential, the space is tight, the compliance is real, and what is behind the wall is anyone's guess until the tiles come off.
Pricing one properly is not about charging more. It is about building the number from the ground up so nothing gets missed.
TL;DR
Price by trade and stage, never by square metre. Trade count drives the cost, not floor area
Your overheads are a real cost. If they are not in the number, you are funding the job yourself
Markup and margin are different numbers. Confusing them is the fastest way to underprice
Use allowances for undecided selections and exclusions for what is behind the wall
Renovation Builder
I quoted bathrooms off a per square metre rate for years and lost money on the small ones every time. The room being smaller does not save you a single trade. Now I price by stage and the small ones make sense again.
Step 1: Define the Scope First
You cannot price a job you have not defined. Before pricing, answer four things: are fixtures moving from their current positions, is the layout changing, who is supplying what, and does the client have a second bathroom to use while you work.
"Renovate bathroom" is a guess. A proper scope of work is a pricing tool, not paperwork.
Step 2: Price Every Trade, Not the Room
Break the job into trades and price each one. This is how you catch the stages that quietly vanish from a lump sum.
Trade or stage | Commonly missed |
|---|---|
Demolition and strip-out | Protection and daily cleanup in an occupied house |
Waste removal | Tile weight, extra bin swaps, tip fees |
Carpentry and framing | Noggins for rails and screens, packing out walls |
Plumbing rough-in | Connecting new work to old pipework |
Electrical rough-in | Compliance upgrades on old wiring |
Sheeting and linings | Ceiling sheeting, sealing penetrations |
Screed and floor prep | Building falls, levelling out-of-square floors |
Waterproofing | Certification, cure time in the program |
Tiling | Niches, mitred edges, feature tile labour |
Plumbing fit-off | Client-supplied fixture problems, second visits |
Electrical fit-off | Certificate of compliance, ducting the fan outside |
Shower screen | Lead time between measure and install |
Painting | Number of coats, touch-ups after fit-off |
Clean and handover | Final clean, returning for defects |
Your coordination time | The most under-priced item on the list |
Nearly every one of these exists whether the bathroom is three square metres or eight. That is why area-based pricing fails on small rooms.
Step 3: Cost Labour for the Real Conditions
Small spaces are slow. One or two people can work at once, everything gets cut to fit, and materials are carried in and out. Add the occupied-house overhead of protecting hallways and cleaning daily. Use your true labour cost, including on-costs, insurances and downtime waiting on other trades.
Step 4: Price Materials and Set Allowances
Use current supplier pricing, not last year's, and add generous wastage because you cut a lot in a small tiled room.
Where the client has not chosen tiles, vanity, tapware or screen, put a written dollar allowance on each. Without one, they pick premium tiles and expect your price to hold. With one, it is simple arithmetic and a variation.
Step 5: Get Current Trade Prices
Get written quotes for the exact scope you are selling the client. The gap that hurts is a scope mismatch: if you promised the shower niche and your tiler quoted without it, you fund the difference.
Never price waterproofing to a budget. It is the highest-consequence item in the room. Failed waterproofing means the whole bathroom comes out again at your cost.
Step 6: Add Your Overheads
Overheads are what you pay whether or not you are on site: vehicle, tools, insurance, phone, software, accounting, licensing, marketing, admin time.
Work out what percentage of your annual turnover they represent, then add that percentage to every job. If your overheads run at fifteen percent and you are not adding it, you are recovering costs, not making profit.
Step 7: Apply Margin, Not Markup
Markup is what you add to your cost. Margin is what you keep from the sale price. They are not the same number.
Your cost | Markup applied | Sale price | Actual margin |
|---|---|---|---|
$20,000 | 10% | $22,000 | 9.1% |
$20,000 | 20% | $24,000 | 16.7% |
$20,000 | 25% | $25,000 | 20.0% |
$20,000 | 30% | $26,000 | 23.1% |
Adding 20 percent markup gets you a 16.7 percent margin, not 20. The formula: divide your cost by (1 minus your target margin). For a 20 percent margin on $20,000 of cost, that is $25,000.
Get this right and it is worth real money on every bathroom you quote from here on.
Step 8: Price the Unknown
Once the tiles come off you commonly find rotten framing, failed old waterproofing, corroded pipework, wiring that will not pass, asbestos in old sheeting, and floors nowhere near level.
Carry a contingency for the small surprises. Then exclude the big ones in writing: structural repairs found once opened up, asbestos, pipework or wiring outside the quoted scope, and levelling beyond a stated tolerance. Say clearly they will be quoted as variations if they appear.
The Bottom Line
Bathrooms are easy to underprice because the room is small and the work is not. Price by trade rather than by area, cost labour for the real conditions, get current trade prices for the exact scope, add your overheads, apply true margin instead of markup, and protect yourself with allowances and exclusions. Do that consistently and bathrooms become one of the most reliable earners you have.
Price It Properly, Then Present It Properly
The number is half the job. The document carrying it is the other half. Jobdocs turns your pricing into a clear, professional quote with scope, allowances, exclusions and terms already built in. Fewer arguments, fewer write-offs, more jobs won at the price you wanted.
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