Two quotes came back for what I thought was close to the same job: a low block retaining wall near the back boundary, maybe fifteen metres long. One came in under $9,000. The other came in past $16,000 for what looked, on paper, like the same wall. I rang the second contractor half expecting to talk him down, and instead spent twenty minutes learning why the first number was almost certainly wrong. My section has no side access wide enough for a machine to reach the back boundary, which meant every bag of metal and every wheelbarrow of spoil for that wall was going in and out by hand, up and down a flight of steps. Ten years of getting outdoor work done on a steep section has taught me that access is very often the real variable in a price, not the work itself.
Whether a machine can actually reach the job
A small 1.7 tonne digger, the kind most contractors reach for on a tight residential section, still needs a clear path of roughly 900 millimetres to a metre in width and enough headroom to get through, with nothing like a low pergola beam, a tight side gate or an overhanging branch in the way. On a lot of steep Wellington sections that path simply does not exist, whether because the side yard is too narrow, the gradient near the boundary is too steep for tracks to grip safely, or the only way in is down a flight of steps at the front. Once a machine cannot reach the work area, everything the machine would have done — digging, carrying, compacting — has to be done by hand instead, and that shift alone can double the labour hours on an otherwise ordinary job.
Whether materials can be tipped or have to be carried
A truck that can back up and tip a load of metal or topsoil straight into place saves an enormous amount of handling compared with a site where every bag has to be carried or wheeled in from wherever the truck can actually stop, which on some sections I have dealt with is out on the street. The same logic runs in reverse for anything coming off the section — old paving, spoil from an excavation, a removed fence — all of which has to go somewhere, and on a site with no vehicle access that means bagging and carrying it out by hand rather than loading a bin on site.
Whose land the job actually has to cross
Getting materials or a small machine to a back corner sometimes means crossing a neighbour’s driveway or using part of the public footpath, both of which need to be arranged properly rather than assumed, and a contractor factoring in the time to organise that access, or the cost of a longer manual route because permission was not available, is pricing something real rather than padding a number.
Manual handling on a slope, priced as its own line
Carrying loaded bags and wheelbarrows up and down a steep, uneven site is genuinely slower and more physically demanding work than moving the same materials across flat, machine-accessible ground, and it carries real manual handling risk that WorkSafe’s guidance on manual handling treats as a hazard to be planned around rather than just endured. A contractor who has priced that risk properly, with enough people and enough time built in, is not the same as one who has quietly assumed the job will go faster than it safely can. When I get quotes now, I ask each one to show access, cartage and manual handling as their own line rather than folded into a single rate per metre, which is close to what a proper breakdown of a landscaping quote should show in the first place — it is the only way to tell whether the cheaper number actually understood the site or just did not ask about it.
Frequently asked questions
Why did one quote for the same wall come in almost double another? The most common reason is site access: a job that a machine can reach costs far less in labour than the same job done entirely by hand because there is no clear path in for equipment.
How wide does a path need to be for a small digger to get through? A typical 1.7 tonne digger needs roughly 900 millimetres to a metre of clear width and enough headroom, with no tight gates, low structures or overhanging branches narrowing that path.
Should site access be its own line item on a quote? Yes; access, cartage and manual handling are real, separately priceable factors, and a quote that shows them separately is easier to compare honestly than one that folds everything into a single rate.