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wanj_gw

Plumbing Budget - Replacing Galvanized Pipe

wanj
10 years ago

Hi everyone,
Bought this house in California and found the galvanized pipes needs to be replaced. Crawl space inspection found two leaks and few other leaks are developing.

So far we have done some work with a plumbing friend about costing and have had some quotes from contractors.

The house is a two stories 2000sf traditional home with two full bath upstairs and one half bath down stairs. Fortunately, three bathrooms share a common plumbing wall and all other pipes are accessible from the crawl space. We are planning to replace the entire galvanized water system from the water meter.

Here is the information and the quotes.

Material cost for IN-Wall plubming

3/4" type M 160 ft for about $300
1/2" type M 60 ft for about $70
flex 3/4" type L (water main) 60 ft for about $240
fittings, flux, solder, propane etc $300+-
Angle stops etc $100

Total material cost $900~1000

The Master bathroom will be demolished to gain access to the plumbing closet upstairs. There are 4 pieces of 4'x8' dry walls will be removed from the demolished bathrooms, including the linoleum floor, shower, toilet and vanity, other than that some part of the drywalls in the half bath and under the kitchen sink will be removed as well.

Estimate labor which is around 200 hours, that should include, dig out the water main and replace it with type L, replace all the pipes inside, rebuild the demolished bathroom with tile on the floor and choice of shower, vanity and all the other fixtures. All dry walls will be patched or re-installed, taped, mudded, textured, primed and painted.

To save labor, we are not going to remove the old pipes in places that require more demolition than necessary, we are going to run the new pipe along the old or take a different route to get there.

Out of the wall material cost is NOT included because price could vary widely depends on the fixtures.

There are two quotes:

Quote 1 $4500 includes LABOR and IN Wall material, but NOT include the rebuild of the bathroom or patching the holes. In other words, just the plumbing rough-ins. Contractor responsible to hauling away and disposition of demolition debris.

Quote 2 $5000 Labor ONLY, but include the rebuilding the bathroom and patching holes as described in the 200 hours above. owner pays debris dumping fee, contractor responsible hauling. Bathroom fixtures are NOT included but installation labor will be included.

To me, two quotes are identical cost. What do you think?
Any experiences of using PEX? Would that save overall money or just a wash?

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