Pave Your Own Driveway?

[Creamer]

Just had a quote done for my 10,000 sq ft of driveway and parking area and it was right at $70k. That is $7/sq ft for concrete poured with almost no grade work. They just have to remove 2500 sq ft of asphalt and regrade the area for drainage and then grade the driveway area, set the forms and pour. All I asked for is a lightly brushed finish so they wouldn't have to trowel the surface. That seems a little high - about the same price - $7/sq ft as the 6" insulated floor and foundation for my steel building that I put up in 2016. Seems like a driveway should be a lot lower cost than an insulated floor and foundation which included large chunks of concrete for each of the metal support pillars.

 

[scootr]

Putting concrete through an asphalt paving machine sounds like a plan for a disaster.
The costs of concrete and labor have both gone way up since 2016. $7 sq ft does not surprise me.

 

[dodge man]

Just had a quote done for my 10,000 sq ft of driveway and parking area and it was right at $70k. That is $7/sq ft for concrete poured with almost no grade work. They just have to remove 2500 sq ft of asphalt and regrade the area for drainage and then grade the driveway area, set the forms and pour. All I asked for is a lightly brushed finish so they wouldn't have to trowel the surface. That seems a little high - about the same price - $7/sq ft as the 6" insulated floor and foundation for my steel building that I put up in 2016. Seems like a driveway should be a lot lower cost than an insulated floor and foundation which included large chunks of concrete for each of the metal support pillars.

Not trying to be difficult but you say no grade work and then explain how they need to remove some asphalt a grade the entire thing. I get what you are saying though, you probably just mean no major grading. They don’t have to trowel it but still have to probably bull float it.

$70,000 sounds like a lot but if your driveway is 10 feet wide that makes it 1000 feet long. I realize it’s probably not a straight run. My drive is about 7500 sq. ft., and it was about $20,000 to add 2” of asphalt on top of the previous asphalt.

I should add that was pre pandemic.

 

[ponytug]

I think that asphalt costs aren't really comparable to concrete costs; both in terms of local raw material costs and in terms of preparation work needed. More broadly, paving is generally a local business to keep transport costs on equipment low and again for where and how materials are sourced. So what might be reasonable here, probably would not be reasonable ten miles in any direction from here, more and less expensive.

@Creamer If you think that the number isn't right, my suggestion would be to get some more quotes locally. I would also recommend that you check out the prior work of any contractors that you are considering, and I would ask to see jobs from five years ago, when they have had time to "settle in". If they don't have five years of work, I would deeply consider why they might be, or not be, competent to do the job.

One of my neighbors had their driveway repaired by a crew, and it didn't last a year (six months?), before the cracking started and the material began flaking off. To my mind the crew cut corners on the preparation work, but I wasn't asked.

All the best,

Peter