How to compare
custom closet
quotes fairly.

Comparing closet company quotes is harder than it looks, because three bids for the same room are rarely bids for the same closet. One assumes a thinner box with no back, another includes lighting and removal of the old shelving, a third leaves installation as a separate line. Before the totals can be compared, the scope underneath them has to be made equal.

The short answer: put every bid on one sheet with the same rows — box construction, hardware, finish, lighting, delivery, installation, removal, guarantee and payment schedule — and ask each company to fill in what its price actually covers. Compare totals only once those rows match. Ignore price per linear foot and online ranges until there is a written quote for a drawn design.

We write quotes as well as read them, so this is the method seen from the workshop side. It applies whether you are comparing a national franchise, a local cabinetmaker and us, or three makers who all sound alike on the phone.

Why closet quotes for the same room are so far apart.

A closet quote is the sum of decisions, and most of them are invisible on a one-page estimate. Each company fills the gaps in your brief with its own defaults: its standard board, its standard slide, its standard finish, its standard idea of what installation includes. Two honest companies can be thousands of dollars apart simply because one assumed full-height cabinetry with drawers and doors and the other assumed open shelving to seven feet.

Some of the spread is also real difference in how the work is done — a shop that makes its own boxes versus one that assembles bought-in components, an in-house installer versus a subcontractor, a finish sprayed in a booth versus a pre-finished board. None of that is wrong in itself. It just has to be visible before the prices can be read. For the price bands themselves, our guide to what a custom closet costs in New York goes through them room by room.

Comparing closet company quotes: build one sheet first.

Before you look at any total, make a simple grid: one column per company, one row per item below. Wherever a quote is silent, write “not stated” and ask. A blank cell is the most expensive line on any estimate, because it is where the later surprise lives.

Construction: what the box is actually made of.

The box is the part you stop seeing after the first week and live with for the next twenty years, so it is where cheaper bids most often save money. Ask for the core material — particleboard, MDF, plywood or solid timber — and the panel thickness. Closet carcasses are commonly built from boards around five-eighths or three-quarters of an inch thick; the thinner panel is lighter and cheaper, the thicker one holds screws better and lets a long shelf span further before it sags. Neither is a scandal; they are simply different products at different prices. Our honest guide to solid wood, MDF and veneer sets out where each belongs.

Then ask about the back. A full back panel squares the box, stops it racking and gives a clean surface against an uneven plaster wall. Some systems use no back at all, hanging the sides from a rail. Ask how the cabinetry is fixed and whether it is scribed to the walls or finished with filler strips. Finally, edges: thin paper or plastic banding chips sooner on a drawer front than a thicker band or a solid-wood edge.

Hardware and finish, by name.

“Soft-close drawers” describes a feature, not a product. A good quote names the slide and hinge maker and the type: full-extension or three-quarter, undermount or side-mount, with the load rating where it matters for a jewellery or shoe drawer. The same goes for rods, valet pulls and pull-out accessories, which some companies price into the base and others list one by one. Our page on doors, drawers and hardware shows the details we consider worth paying for.

Finish matters as much. A thermally fused laminate, a high-pressure laminate, a stained veneer and a sprayed paint finish are four different processes with different costs, lead times and repair stories. Ask whether the interiors are finished to the same standard as the fronts, and whether the colour you saw on a sample is the one in the price.

The scope lines that quietly differ.

This is where most of the gap between bids usually sits, and where the lowest number tends to grow after signing.

• Lighting: are fixtures included, and is the wiring? Integrated lighting often needs an electrician, and some companies leave that to you.
• Delivery and access: stair carries, elevator bookings and building work hours all take time. In New York this is a real cost line, not a formality.
• Installation: by whom — the company’s own crew or a subcontractor — and how many days are assumed.
• Removal: taking out the old rod, shelves or wire system, and disposing of it.
• Making good: patching the wall behind the old system, and whether painting is anyone’s job.
• Building paperwork: certificates of insurance and any alteration requirements in a co-op or condo, which our co-op and condo installation guide covers in full.

Why price per linear foot misleads.

A per-foot price is tempting because it looks like a unit you can divide. It rarely is. Companies measure linear feet differently — some count every wall that receives cabinetry, some count corners twice, some measure only the run of hanging rod. The base rate may cover a seven-foot unit with a rod and a shelf, with drawers, doors, height and lighting all added on top. And a foot of eight-foot cabinetry with a drawer bank and doors is simply a different object from a foot of open shelving. Two bids at the same per-foot rate can end at very different totals; a low rate with a long list of extras can end above a higher, all-in one. Compare total prices for the same drawn scope, and treat any per-foot figure as a rough planning number only.

An online range is not a written quote.

Online ranges and calculators are useful for one thing: deciding whether a project is in the right territory before anyone visits. Our own closet cost estimator works that way — it places a room in our published bands, from about $3,500 for a reach-in and about $18,000 for a walk-in dressing room, and says plainly that a band is not a quote. A fixed price can only follow a measured survey and a design. Don’t set a range from one company beside a written, itemized quote from another; level the field by asking each for a written price against drawings.

Guarantee and payment schedule.

Two quotes with the same price and different terms are not the same price. Ask how long the guarantee runs, whether it covers the cabinetry, the hardware, the finish and the labour to fix them, who honours it, and whether it is in writing. Ours is a 25-year guarantee on cabinetry, set out on the care and guarantee page, alongside how to look after each finish.

For payment, a staged schedule is normal in custom millwork: a deposit when the design is approved and materials are ordered, and the balance tied to delivery and completion. Read where the money falls against the work. A schedule that asks for nearly everything before anything has been made puts the risk on you; one that ties payments to milestones you can see keeps both sides honest. Ask, too, how changes after approval are priced and confirmed.

How to ask for a level re-quote.

1. Choose the design you like best, and ask the others to price that layout, at the same height, with the same drawers and doors.
2. Send everyone the same list of rows from the table above and ask them to answer each one in writing.
3. Ask each company to list its exclusions — what you or another trade will need to provide.
4. Put the answers in the grid, add a cost for anything one bid excludes and another includes, and only then compare totals.

If a company will not say what is in its price, that is an answer too. For the questions worth asking beyond the quote itself — who designs, who builds, who installs — see our questions to ask before hiring a closet company.