Rules
Part of Native landscaping bids: the eight buckets an estimate must cover
Native Landscaping Bids: Read Exclusions First
A native landscaping costs contractor bid should spell out scope, quantities, allowances, plant sources and exclusions so bids are comparable before you sign.
What to take away
- Native landscaping bids are only comparable if you wrote the scope, not the bidders.
- Allowances are placeholders. Every allowance is a future change order.
- Read the exclusions page first; it is where the low number comes from.
- Ask what the contractor would do without your money, not just what it costs.
Give every bidder the same document
One-Page Scope Checklist
- Area in square feet
- Removal method
- Plant list with scientific names and counts
- Mulch depth
- Edging type
- Irrigation intent
- Who waters first two seasons
Without that, three bids describe three different projects and the cheapest one is simply the smallest.
Check quantities, not just totals
Ask for a unit breakdown: plants by species and size, mulch in cubic yards, edging in linear feet, labor in crew hours. Then check the arithmetic against your own measurement.
| Line | What to verify |
|---|
Verify These Bid Quantities
- Plant counts match plan at mature spacing
- Mulch volumearea times depth in cubic yards
- Removal area in square feet, disposal included
- Crew hours plausible for access and site
- Aftercare visitsnumber, month, what happens
What to verify on each line of the bid:
- Plantsmatch species and size to the plan, and confirm the count against your planting plan.
- Mulchconfirm the cubic-yard quantity against your bed area and depth.
- Edgingconfirm the linear-foot quantity against your measured bed edges.
- Laborconfirm the crew hours and the work included.
- Wateringconfirm who waters during establishment, and for how long, since native plantings still need regular water until roots take hold.
Treat allowances as unfinished pricing
An allowance is a number the contractor inserted because a decision has not been made. A sample line, "Plant allowance: $1,500," means the plant list is not settled; it is an illustration, not a market benchmark. Every allowance will be reconciled later, upward more often than downward.
Convert allowances into specifics before signing. Where that is impossible, cap them and agree the markup in writing.
Read the exclusions first
Exclusions are where a low bid lives: rock excavation, unsuitable soil, irrigation repair, permit fees, disposal, hand-watering, replacement of plants that die. Permit fees in particular hide a bigger number, since the drawing a permit demands usually costs more than the fee. A bid with a long exclusions list and a short scope is a starting price, not a price.
On the page itself, exclusions usually sit at the end, after the line items, in wording like this illustration: "Excludes: rock or debris excavation; import of soil; irrigation repairs or modifications; permits, plans and fees; haul-off of existing turf; watering after installation; plant replacement." Read each item against your site. If you have an old irrigation system, a lawn to remove, or a city that wants a plan before work starts, each of those excluded lines is part of your real total.
Permits for landscape work are issued locally, usually by the city or county building or planning department, and some water utilities review plans when a rebate is involved. Ask the bidder which permits they expect for your address and who will apply for them.
Some exclusions are legitimate. No contractor can price buried construction debris they have not seen, and excluding it is honest.
Ask for a named unit rate: a price per hour or per cubic yard for the unknown, agreed now. Then discovery does not become a negotiation while a crew waits in your driveway with the meter running.
Ask what they would do anyway
Useful bid question: which parts of this plan would you recommend even if I cut the budget by a third? The answer separates necessary work from margin.
Ask the contractor to separate essential site preparation and planting from optional enhancements, and explain how each item supports the plan.
The USDA Economic Research Service makes the same point about farm programs. Its 2018 Amber Waves finding by Roger Claassen and David Smith, "The Effect of Conservation Payments on Farmer Adoption Varies Across Conservation Practices," notes in its analysis of conservation payments and adoption that a practice delivers additional benefit only when it would not have been adopted without the payment.
That makes it easier to decide what can be phased without treating every line as equally necessary.
Ask where native plants come from
Sourcing explains much of the price difference. Growers producing regional straight species work within a national supply effort: the National Seed Strategy, written in 2015 by the Plant Conservation Alliance Federal Committee with federal and non-federal partners.
The strategy exists precisely because appropriate native plant material must be deliberately produced, not assumed.
A contractor who can name the grower gives you a source to verify. Ask for the nursery's name on the plant list, ask whether the plants or seed are straight species grown from a regional source rather than cultivars, and ask whether substitutions need your approval. Our five lessons from regional native-plant projects show what goes wrong when they do not.
Before you sign
Line the winning bid up against our breakdown of where the money goes in native landscaping, then check license, insurance, references and experience with native plantings using our guide to vetting a native landscaping contractor.
