Oak stairs $3,500? sanity check

Well, things are starting to come together, painting the family room, kitchen, hall, & stairway. Floors are here, but are going to have to wait a little.

We had a guy out to quote an Oak staircase. It is a straight staircase, with the bottom 5-6 treads exposed on one side. Currently it is carpet.

Oak treads, pine? toekick, new sideboards, bannister & railing. Also nosing trim at the top. Total $3,500 +/- (he is working on the formal quote). Is this in the ballpark? 2-4 day job. It seems awfully expensive. I'm thinking of doing it myself, am I insane?

Yet another hazmat project!! You are keeping us all busy and interested.

[disclaimer] I've never built a staircase on site, but I have milled many, many stair parts, and there are lots of them, and I can see how there would be some considerable labor to install them all. This price seems like it would be in the ball park.

Since this is a straight staircase, you might want to check out a factory pre-built unit that you can set into place, then you would have to install the ballusters, newels, railing, skirting boards, etc. I am not sure what the current market offers for pre-built stuff.

Take Hank's advice and check out a prefabricated staircase.

I put one in my last house and it looked great and it was much nicer than anything I would have built myself. Installation was easier than expected. After tearing out the old stairs, I nailed a pair of runners onto the studs on each side and with my father slid the new stair up the runners and into position. It was a 2 person job and only took an hour or so to get the stairs in position and functional. Trimming and finishing of the stairs was done over several weeks of evenings and weekends.

Go to a real lumberyard, not a Home Depot type of place, to have the stairs quoted. If they are a good yard, they will be working with a local shop which will fabricate the stairs for you. My stairs were non-standard, but it only took about two weeks to have the stairs made up and delivered. It would have been quicker, but I specified Ash rather than their standard Red Oak or Poplar.

If you do go this route make sure your measurements are very accurate because once the stairs are made up there isn't much you can do to adjust for a mistake in total rise or the fact that your walls aren't perfectly plumb.

Hazemat,

Afraid that sounds in the ballpark to me. Stair parts are expensive (How do you think Hank built that great place in Az. [img]/forums/images/icons/wink.gif[/img] ) and it takes a good carpenter to put them in right.

MarkV

Hazmat

Price sounds about right. Stairs are the hardest part of house building and even many contractors can't do the job right. (That's why they have factory prebuilts.) As far as components, Depot has oak and pine treads, rails, spindles, etc. If I recall correctly 48" oak treads 10" deep were in the $25.00 each range while pine was about half that much. Most of your cost would be in labor.

Steve

Have you peaked under the carpet yet to see what the stairs are made of? You might be surprised and find that you have a staircase that with little elbow grease and some trim can be made to look real good.

<font color="purple"> it takes a good carpenter to put them in right.
</font color>

Mark, you have obviously been exposed to some good carpenters, as I have. These guys amaze me; their skills are far different than my shop skills:

-Install a "Gone With the Wind" circular staircase, I've seen them do that with my millwork, no sweat.

-Frame a roof on the ground, and send up hip, valley, jack, cripple-jack, etc rafters cut to a precise compound cut on the ground, and sent up to be nailed in place with no further trimming.

Blows my mind.

<font color="blue">Stairs are the hardest part of house building
</font color>

How do you figure??? Not totally true..I can make you a set of steps in 1/2 a day,how do you want them cut,the angle cut out of the stair stringer,or do you want them routed,where the step slides back into the stringer. A spiral staircase is involved,but a regular stair design is not that complicated.

I would have to agree that stairs are one of the hardest parts of home construction. Not a simple, enclosed stairway but an open staircase with exposed tread ends, railing, spindles and newells. Our total stair budget in our house was around $3500 but that really only covered four exposed steps, a landing and a horizontal railing at the top. Money very well spent in my opinion as it is a real focal point in the foyer. Looks great all decked out for the holidays too [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

It can be for sure...it all depends on the type of stairs.

There is a house not far from me that had the carpenters in the area buzzing. Two stairways cost $60,000 dollars to install. I got in to see them and they were beautiful. All open from the top story to the lower level. The workmanship was topnotch and the finish was too pretty to walk on.

Tim, one of the favorite things I did in my millwork career was to make railings for circular staircases (ÃÂÂ* la Gone With the Wind). I've made a half dozen or so of these, there is just not that much call for them, but stairs can be a beautiful addition to a house. $60,000 does not surprise me, esp for floating staircases. From the carpenters I worked with, I learned just how much I was ignorant about their skills.

Ever watch a good carpenter frame up a roof from the ground, marking and cutting all the compound cuts for the special rafters with just a framing square, and then sending the boards up? Amazing (to me, at least).

Here's a picture of our stairs. This is the only "ornamental" section and it's only four risers. All the rest are captured on both sides by walls and are carpetted. The total cost for stair parts in our house was $3698. That included the stairs in this picture, the handrailings bolted to the walls, a section of horizontal railing and spindles on the second floor and all the treads and risers from the basement to the attic (49 steps!). Also included the labor to install. I'm very impressed with the quality, it's furniture quality construction in the exposed areas [img]/forums/images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

An nice look to the ballusters, Rob, I like them; a bit more detail than usual. From what I've seen in the various forums, here and there, you've got quite the house-full of traditional millwork. But what else would you expect in a Victorian house? [img]/forums/images/icons/cool.gif[/img]

Thanks everybody for the sanity check. I got a couple books out of the library. The stairs don't fit the budget (if we have them done) or the timeframe (If I do them myself) right now. So they'll have to wait. Might be a good project for next year's holiday break.

I'll definitely look into a prefab'd unit at the local lumberstores. A google search on prefab staircase didn't generate any usefull results. There are two good lumberyard/bldg supply stores nearby.

Prefabricated staircases are going to be nice. I suggest you to check online for providers and choose one with highest quality and affordable pricing.