Why quotes on the same parcel diverge

Who this is for

• Anyone holding quotes that differ by more than they can account for
• Landowners who suspect the high bid is opportunistic
• People trying to work out which bid to trust rather than which to accept

The short answer

The largest cause is scope interpretation. "Clear this" is a sentence that describes at least four different jobs, and each contractor prices the one their business performs.

The second cause is equipment. A contractor prices the work their machine can do, so the same parcel is a straightforward day for one and a marginal, slow job for another.

The third is risk. A contractor who has been caught by buried fencing prices for it; one who has not, does not. On an unassessable site that difference alone can be substantial.

The fourth is capacity. A business with a full schedule prices work it does not need; one with a gap prices work it wants. Neither is dishonest, and neither has anything to do with your parcel.

What changes the answer

• How specifically you described the outcome you want
• What equipment each bidder owns
• How much of the ground was visible when they quoted
• What the property was previously used for
• How busy each business currently is
• Whether the bidders are even in the same trade

The four causes, and how to tell them apart

Each leaves a different fingerprint on a quote. Once you can identify which cause is operating, the spread stops being mysterious.

What the contractor is actually doing when they walk your site

Understanding the estimating process demystifies most of the spread, because you can see where two people would legitimately differ.

They are estimating machine hours, then adding what is not machine hours. Hours come from fibre volume — density multiplied by stem size — divided by the production rate their equipment achieves in those conditions. Two contractors with different machines get different hours from identical growth.

Then they add mobilisation, material handling if any, disposal if any, below-grade work if any, and a risk allowance sized by how much of the ground they could not see.

Almost every step involves a judgement about your specific parcel. The wonder is not that the numbers differ but that they ever land close together.

The disposal gap, which explains most large spreads

If one bid is dramatically lower and you can only investigate one thing, investigate this.

On a full-removal job, gathering, loading, hauling, and tipping the cut material is frequently the largest single component — often larger than the cutting itself. A bid that leaves material on site simply does not contain it.

That is a legitimate difference in scope rather than a discount, and whether it matters depends entirely on whether a residue layer is acceptable where the material would sit. For pasture, trails, and habitat it usually is. For a building footprint it is not.

So the question that resolves most spreads is one sentence: where does the material end up? Ask it of every bidder and the gap frequently explains itself in a minute.

Risk pricing, and why it is not padding

The allowance for what cannot be seen is real, rational, and reducible — which makes it the most productive part of a spread to attack.

A contractor pricing a heavily overgrown parcel carries the possibility of buried woven wire, rock, concealed waste, old foundations, a well, or stems substantially larger than they look. Any of those stops work and some damage equipment.

They include an allowance sized by their uncertainty. On a clean, visible, uniform site it is small; on an unassessable one it is large, and you pay it whether or not the risk materialises.

The way to reduce it is information rather than negotiation. Tell them what the property was used for, where fences ran, what is buried that you know about. Better still, have a small area opened first — that converts contingency into knowledge, and it usually saves more than any amount of haggling.

When a spread is a genuine warning

Most divergence is benign. These patterns are the exceptions worth taking seriously.

• A bid far below the others whose scope genuinely matches the others. Something is being left out that nobody has named.
• A firm total for a site nobody could see into, offered without hesitation. That is either a padded number or one that will not survive contact with the ground.
• A bid that omits exclusions entirely. Not a broad scope — an undefined one.
• A price that drops sharply when you mention another quote. It was not a price, it was an opening position.
• A large deposit requested before anything exists on site.
• Unwillingness to say where material goes, particularly on a lot that will be built on.

How to collapse the spread yourself

Most of the divergence is created by the brief rather than by the bidders, which means you can remove much of it.

Write one sentence stating what the ground has to be capable of afterwards, and give the identical sentence to everyone. Provide the same measurements to each — access width, overhead clearance, largest trunk diameter. Ask each the same four questions.

Then, where the site is genuinely unassessable, consider a staged approach: a priced first pass to open enough ground to see it, and the real scope written afterwards against a site both parties have walked.

Do not share the other bids’ numbers. Share their scope descriptions instead, and ask each contractor to explain their difference. That produces information; sharing numbers produces matching.

What drives the cost

Common mistakes

• Reading a wide spread as evidence of dishonesty
• Comparing totals before confirming the scopes match
• Briefing each bidder differently and then comparing the answers
• Attacking the risk allowance by negotiating rather than by supplying information
• Collecting bids from more than one trade category and treating them as competing

Questions to ask a contractor

• Where does the material end up under your price?
• Is below-grade removal included, and over what area?
• How much of this price is allowance for what you could not see?
• What could I tell you that would reduce that allowance?
• When could you actually start?

What to do next

1. Write the one-sentence end-use statement and give it to every bidder
2. Provide identical measurements to each
3. Work the four-decision check across the bids you hold
4. On an unassessable site, ask for a staged proposal instead of a fixed total

Questions people actually ask