Where Our Cost Numbers Come From
Most cost tools hand you one confident number and no way to check it. This page shows you the sources behind ours, how we grade the evidence, and where the number stops being reliable.
What Sits Behind an Estimate Today
Counts as of 24 September 2026.
877
Published cost-guide rows, reproduced as printed
31
Metro areas across the US and Canada
2
Named publishers, cited on every figure
53
Building types covered by a published range
0
Figures we adjust, uplift or average ourselves
309
Priced furniture and finish SKUs (RoomVision)
How an Estimate Is Built
- 1
Locate the cell
Your project is resolved to a cell defined by country, metro, occupancy (what the building is for), scope of work (new build, remodel, addition) and finish tier. Not a single square-foot rate.
- 2
Look for a printed range
We search our library of published cost guides for a row that prints a range for exactly that cell. If none exists, the answer is 'not covered' and no number is shown.
- 3
Reproduce it as printed
The low and the high are the publisher's own. We apply no regional multiplier, no inflation uplift and no midpoint of our own invention.
- 4
Cite it
Every figure carries the publisher, source name, edition, page reference, licence note, the caveats the guide states, and its floor-area definition.
- 5
Say when sources disagree
Where two guides cover the same cell, both are shown side by side and the page states whether their ranges overlap or differ.
Every Number Names Its Source
The label tells you how many published guides stand behind the range you are looking at, and whether they agree.
One published guide prints a range for this city and building type.
You see that range exactly as printed, under the publisher's name, edition and page.
Two published guides cover the cell and their ranges overlap.
Two independent publishers land in the same territory. Both are shown, neither is averaged.
Two published guides cover the cell and their ranges do not overlap.
We print both, each under its own name, and say they disagree — rather than merge them into a range neither published.
Our Sources
We quote published cost guides and nothing else. Statistical series are held separately as context and never touch a figure you see.
Published cost guides — the only thing we quote
Altus Group 2026 Canadian Cost Guide
Printed per-square-foot ranges for 9 Canadian metros. Hard construction costs only, CIQS floor-area definition. Reproduced as printed, with page reference.
RLB (Rider Levett Bucknall) Quarterly Construction Cost Report — North America, Q2 2026
Printed per-square-foot ranges across 14 US and Canadian metros. Reproduced as printed, with page reference.
Context series — never quoted as a price
BLS Producer Price Index, Census Building Permits and Survey of Construction
US activity and price-movement context, held separately. These do not adjust, uplift or age any figure we show you.
Statistics Canada BCPI (18-10-0289), wage table 14-10-0417, housing starts (34-10-0143)
Canadian activity and price-movement context, held on the same terms.
A row is only ingested if it can carry a source name, an edition or year, a URL and a licence note. Anything that cannot is not inserted, and publishers whose terms forbid redistribution are excluded entirely.
What We Don't Claim
- We do not claim an estimate replaces a contractor bid, an appraisal, or a stamped set of drawings.
- We do not apply regional multipliers, inflation uplifts, or any adjustment of our own to a published figure.
- We do not publish a midpoint the publisher did not print.
- We do not average two publishers who disagree into one range.
- We do not blend building-permit counts into prices — activity is context, not cost.
- We do not show a number for a city or building type no published guide covers. We say it is not covered.
- We do not publish accuracy percentages we have not measured on held-out data.
See it on a real project
Run a cost check and every figure comes back with the guide, edition and page it was printed in.