Terms of use

Agreement

Using Cost Home Book means accepting these terms. If you do not accept them, the site is not for you and nothing here obliges you to stay. We may change the terms; the date above is when they last changed, and continuing to use the site after that is acceptance of the change.

The figures are estimates, not quotes

Every cost on this site is a national estimate compiled for orientation before you are quoted. It is not an offer, a quote, a bid, a valuation or a guarantee of price, and nobody on this site is offering to do the work.

A real price depends on your house, its access, its condition, your local labor market, your permit office and what the contractor already has booked. None of those are knowable from here. A quote that differs from a figure on this site is not evidence that the quote is wrong.

Where a figure is carried forward by a published index rather than typed by a person, the page says so and names the release. How we calculate costs sets out the method, and the editorial policy is explicit about which numbers are derived and which are our own estimates.

Not professional advice

Nothing here is legal, financial, structural, insurance or building-code advice, and reading it does not create a professional relationship of any kind. We are not contractors, estimators, engineers, inspectors or a licensing body.

Work on a building is regulated where you live and not where we are. Permit requirements, licensing and code all vary by state and by municipality, and some of the work described on this site may not lawfully be done by a homeowner at all. Check with a licensed professional in your own jurisdiction before you act on anything you read here.

What we are liable for

We publish in good faith and correct what we get wrong — see the corrections policy. Beyond that, the site is provided as it is, without warranty of accuracy, completeness or fitness for a particular purpose.

To the fullest extent the law allows, we are not liable for any loss arising from a decision you made using this site: money paid, money not paid, work commissioned, work declined, or a contract signed. If a limit of liability cannot lawfully be excluded, it is limited to the amount you paid us, which is nothing.

Nothing in these terms limits liability for fraud.

Acceptable use

You may read, print and quote this site, including in a conversation with a contractor — that is what it is for. You may not:

• scrape, bulk-download or systematically copy the content, whether by hand or by machine, including to train a model;
• republish a cost guide in substance, with or without attribution, as your own or as another site's;
• present our figures as a quote, an appraisal or an endorsement of any contractor;
• interfere with the site, its security, or anyone else's use of it.

Quoting a figure with a link back to the page it came from is fine and always will be. If you want to reproduce more than that, ask: hello@costhomebook.com.

Intellectual property

The text, the cost models, the calculators, the layout and the name are ours. Photographs are licensed from their suppliers for use on this site and that license does not pass to you with the page.

Data published by the Bureau of Labor Statistics is in the public domain and we claim nothing over it. What we claim is the work of selecting, mapping and combining it, and the writing around it.

Links to other sites

We link to government and standards bodies — the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the EPA, ENERGY STAR, your state's 811 service — because a reader should be able to check a claim at its source. We do not control those sites, we are not responsible for what they say or do, and a link is not an endorsement. The same goes for any site that links here.

Advertising

This site is funded by display advertising, and advertising has no bearing on any published figure. What advertising collects, and how to refuse it, is in the privacy policy and the cookie policy.

Governing law and contact

These terms are governed by the laws of the Republic of Türkiye, where the site is operated from, without affecting any consumer right you hold under the law of the place you live.

Questions about these terms go to hello@costhomebook.com. Ways to reach us about anything else are on the contact page.