How much does a plumber cost per hour in Denver?

The wage paid to a Denver plumber has a median of $30.72/hr in the 2025 BLS survey, with the 25th percentile at $28.81 and the 75th at $39.11. That is the worker's pay, not your bill. Apply the usual 2x to 3x burden and overhead assumption and the billed labour rate lands between roughly $61 and $92 per hour at the median wage, and between $78 and $117 per hour if the company runs 75th-percentile plumbers. Quoted rates outside $60 to $120 need an explanation on the invoice.

Why is repiping an older Denver home more expensive than a new one?

The wage is identical. The hours are not. A new-build repipe runs open walls; an older home means demolition, patching, and often removing galvanized or cast iron in tight crawl spaces. On our build-up, going from 24 crew-hours to 60 crew-hours at a $30.72 median wage and a 2.5x burden multiplier moves labour from $1,843 to $4,608, a $2,765 swing before a dollar of material. Access difficulty, not location, is what makes old houses cost more.

Are Denver plumbers more expensive than the national average?

Barely, at the median. Denver's median plumber wage is $30.72/hr against $30.67/hr nationally, a gap of $0.05, or 0.2%. The real Denver difference is at the bottom of the market: Denver's 25th percentile is $28.81/hr against $24.13 nationally, 19.4% higher. There is no cheap tier of plumbing labour in Denver the way there is nationally, so budget quotes are less available than in other metros.

How much have plumbing materials gone up in 2026?

Two different answers depending on the pipe. The BLS Producer Price Index for primary nonferrous metals, which covers copper, reached 542.853 in July 2026 against 355.181 twelve months earlier, up 52.8%. Plastic construction products, covering PEX and PVC, went from 339.440 to 356.305, up 5.0%. These are index points, not prices. But a copper repipe quote rising far more than a PEX one this year is consistent with published federal data.

Is my plumbing quote fair?

Ask the contractor to split the number into labour hours, hourly rate, materials, and permit. If they will not separate those four, that is the padding signal. Then check the implied hourly: total minus materials and permit, divided by crew-hours. Under $60/hr against a $30.72 median wage means the burden is under 2x, which usually means an unlicensed or uninsured crew. Over $120/hr needs a stated reason such as emergency call-out or a specialty.

Why Plumbing Costs More in Denver's Older Homes

A plumbing job in an older Denver home costs more than the same job in a newer one for one measurable reason: crew-hours. Using the 2025 BLS median Denver plumber wage of $30.72/hr, a 2.5x burden multiplier and a two-person crew, an open-wall job at 24 crew-hours computes to $1,843 in labour. The same fixture count in a 1920s bungalow at 60 crew-hours computes to $4,608. Same wage, $2,765 more.

Key points

Denver’s median plumber wage is $30.72/hr, essentially identical to the national $30.67/hr, a gap of 5 cents or 0.2%. Denver is not an expensive plumbing labour market at the median.
Denver’s 25th percentile is $28.81/hr against $24.13 nationally, 19.4% higher. The cheap end of the market barely exists here, which is the real local price effect.
Age premium in an older home is hours, not rate. Our build-up shows demolition, patching and confined access roughly 2.5x the crew-hours of an open-wall equivalent.
Copper feedstock, tracked by the BLS Producer Price Index for primary nonferrous metals, ran 542.853 in July 2026 versus 355.181 a year earlier, up 52.8%. Plastic construction products rose 5.0% over the same window.
Everything on this page is arithmetic on published federal wage data. We have not inspected a house, called a contractor, or collected a quote.

Close-up of a gray metal drainpipe attached to a plain exterior wall.

What is the actual wage a Denver plumber is paid?

Straight from the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics for Denver, survey year 2025, occupation code 47-2152. These are wages paid to workers, not prices billed to customers.

Brick wall with red hydrants and yellow piping in an urban alleyway setting.

Percentile	United States	Colorado	Denver, CO	Denver vs US ($)	Denver vs US (%)
25th percentile	$24.13	$25.18	$28.81	+$4.68	+19.4%
Median (50th)	$30.67	$30.40	$30.72	+$0.05	+0.2%
Mean	$34.70	$33.22	$34.57	−$0.13	−0.4%
75th percentile	$40.92	$37.86	$39.11	−$1.81	−4.4%
Employed	465,840	10,080	5,750	—	—

Read that table sideways and the Denver story is not “expensive.” It is compressed. The spread between the 25th and 75th percentile is $10.30/hr in Denver against $16.79/hr nationally. The bottom of the Denver market is pulled up 19.4% and the top is pulled down 4.4%.

Practical consequence: in a metro with a wide spread you can shop for a cheap crew. In Denver you mostly cannot. The floor of the labour market sits near $28.81/hr, so a quote implying a $20/hr wage is either a subcontracted apprentice or someone outside the surveyed workforce.

Crew supervision matters for large jobs. The same survey puts First-Line Supervisors of Construction Trades in Denver at a median $40.10/hr. On a multi-day repipe a supervisor is on site part of the time, and that hour costs 30.5% more than the journeyman hour.

How do you turn a wage into a price?

The wage is what the worker takes home. Your bill is that wage times a burden and overhead multiplier covering payroll taxes, workers’ compensation, liability insurance, the truck, fuel, tools, office and dispatch time, warranty reserve and profit.

Close-up view of a modern, shiny stainless steel faucet on a ceramic sink.

The multiplier is an assumption, not a measured figure. No federal series publishes it. The working range for small residential contractors is 2x to 3x the wage. We use 2.5x as a midpoint throughout, and show 2.0x and 3.0x alongside so you can move the answer yourself.

Here is the arithmetic, one line at a time, for a single fixture replacement:

Step	Calculation	Result
1. Base wage (Denver median)	from BLS	$30.72/hr
2. Burden multiplier (assumption)	×2.5	$76.80/hr billed
3. Crew size	1 plumber	×1
4. On-site hours	3.0 hr	×3.0
5. Labour subtotal	$76.80 × 1 × 3.0	$230.40
6. Material allowance (assumption)	stated separately	$180
7. Total before permit/disposal	$230.40 + $180	$410.40

Every one of those lines is arguable. That is the point. If a contractor tells you 5 hours instead of 3, the labour line moves to $384 and you can see exactly why.

What does each job size cost in Denver? (full range)

Every row uses Denver median wage $30.72/hr × 2.5 burden = $76.80/hr billed, two-person crew where noted. Material allowances are stated assumptions, not quoted prices.

Job	Crew	On-site hours	Crew-hours	Labour	Material allow.	Total
Replace a single faucet	1	2	2	$154	$150	$304
Clear a main line blockage	1	3	3	$230	$40	$270
Replace a toilet	1	3	3	$230	$280	$510
Replace a water heater (tank)	2	4	8	$614	$900	$1,514
Replace a sewer clean-out	2	6	12	$922	$350	$1,272
Kitchen rough-in, open wall	2	8	16	$1,229	$600	$1,829
Bath rough-in, open wall	2	10	20	$1,536	$850	$2,386
Repipe, 1 bath, open wall	2	12	24	$1,843	$1,200	$3,043
Repipe, 2 bath, open wall	2	18	36	$2,765	$1,900	$4,665
Repipe, 2 bath, finished walls, 1920s	2	30	60	$4,608	$1,900	$6,508
Repipe, 3 bath, finished walls, 1920s	2	42	84	$6,451	$2,700	$9,151
Full repipe + sewer lateral, older home	3	40	120	$9,216	$5,200	$14,416

Find your row. Then argue with the hours column, because that is where almost all of the variance lives.

Note the two repipe rows that differ only in house age. Open wall, 2 bath: $4,665. Finished walls, 1920s: $6,508. The material allowance is identical at $1,900. The entire $1,843 difference is 24 extra crew-hours of demolition, snaking pipe through balloon framing, and patching.

How much does the burden multiplier change the answer?

Two axes: job size and burden assumption. Labour only, no materials, at the Denver median wage of $30.72/hr.

Crew-hours	2.0x ($61.44/hr)	2.5x ($76.80/hr)	3.0x ($92.16/hr)	Spread 2.0→3.0
3	$184	$230	$276	$92
8	$492	$614	$737	$246
16	$983	$1,229	$1,475	$492
24	$1,475	$1,843	$2,212	$737
36	$2,212	$2,765	$3,318	$1,106
60	$3,686	$4,608	$5,530	$1,843
84	$5,161	$6,451	$7,741	$2,580
120	$7,373	$9,216	$11,059	$3,686

The multiplier alone swings a large old-home repipe by $3,686. That is why two honest, licensed Denver contractors can quote the same job $3,000 apart without either one padding. One carries more insurance, a bigger warranty reserve, and a dispatcher.

Now vary wage percentile against crew-hours, at a fixed 2.5x burden. This tells you what happens when a company staffs with senior plumbers.

Crew-hours	25th pct ($28.81 → $72.03/hr)	Median ($30.72 → $76.80/hr)	75th pct ($39.11 → $97.78/hr)	Supervisor ($40.10 → $100.25/hr)
8	$576	$614	$782	$802
24	$1,729	$1,843	$2,347	$2,406
60	$4,322	$4,608	$5,867	$6,015
120	$8,644	$9,216	$11,733	$12,030

A 120-crew-hour job staffed at the 75th percentile costs $2,517 more than the same job at the median. Older homes tend to pull senior plumbers, because a 1920s Denver bungalow with galvanized supply and cast iron waste is not an apprentice job. That is a second, quieter age premium on top of the hours.

What did materials do this year?

Index levels from the BLS Producer Price Index, base 1982 = 100. These are index points. They cannot be converted into a dollar price and we do not try.

PPI series	July 2025	July 2026	12-month change	What it covers
Primary nonferrous metals (WPU1022)	355.181	542.853	+52.8%	Copper and other nonferrous feedstock
Plastic construction products (WPU0721)	339.440	356.305	+5.0%	PEX, PVC, ABS
Gap between the two	—	—	47.8 points	—

A 52.8% move in nonferrous metals against 5.0% in plastics is a 10.6x ratio. If your Denver quote uses copper supply lines and last year’s quote for a neighbour’s identical job used copper too, a materially higher material line this year is consistent with published federal data. If the quote uses PEX and the material line jumped 40%, ask what changed, because the index behind PEX moved 5.0%.

Reverse the calculation. Take the 2-bath older-home repipe at $6,508 total, of which $1,900 is material. For the total to rise 10% ($651) on materials alone, the material line has to rise 34.3%. Plastics moved 5.0%, which supports a $95 increase, not $651. So a contractor blaming a 10% total increase on “material costs” is only credible for a copper job.

Two things homeowners get wrong

Misconception 1: “Denver plumbers charge more than the rest of the country.”

At the median they do not. $30.72 against $30.67 is a 0.2% gap, 5 cents an hour, $6 across a 120-crew-hour job. What is genuinely higher is the floor: $28.81 against $24.13, up 19.4%. Over 120 crew-hours at 2.5x burden, that floor difference is worth $1,404. Denver is not an expensive place to hire a good plumber. It is an expensive place to hire a cheap one.

Misconception 2: “The hourly rate on my quote is the plumber’s pay.”

A $77/hr line item does not mean someone is pocketing $77. On our 2.5x assumption, $30.72 is wage and $46.08 is payroll tax, workers’ comp, liability, truck, fuel, tools, dispatch, warranty reserve and profit. Push a contractor below roughly $61/hr (2.0x) and something in that list is being skipped. Usually insurance.

Where does this estimate fall apart?

This is arithmetic on wage data. It cannot see any of the following, and every one of them is real money.

Permits. Denver requires plumbing permits for most repipe and sewer work. Not in any BLS series. Ask for it as a separate pass-through line.
Disposal. Cast iron and galvanized pipe out of an older home is heavy scrap plus dump fees. On the 120-crew-hour job that is a real line, and it is not in the $5,200 material allowance.
Code upgrades triggered by opening a wall. An older Denver home may need venting, backflow prevention, or expansion tank work that was legal when built and is not now. This is the single largest source of quote-versus-final overrun in old houses.
Access. A crawl space you enter on your stomach can double the hours column with no change to scope. Our tables assume a plumber can stand up.
Asbestos or lead. Pre-1980 pipe insulation stops the job. Abatement is a separate licensed trade, not a plumbing line.
Season. Denver freeze events concentrate demand into days. Nothing in the OEWS annual survey captures a January surge.
Emergency call-out. After-hours effectively raises the burden multiplier, often past 3.0x. A $230 daytime drain clear at 3 hours is not the same number at 11pm.
Slab, foundation and re-routing. If the answer involves concrete, this page does not model your job.
The multiplier itself. 2.5x is our stated assumption, not a measurement. If your contractor’s true overhead is 2.9x, every total on this page is low.

How do you read a real quote against these numbers?

Ask for four separated line items. That is the whole test.

Crew-hours — number of people and hours each, not “labour.”
Hourly rate billed — a single number.
Materials — listed by type, with copper versus PEX named.
Permit and disposal — pass-through, at cost.

Then do this division:

(Quote total − materials − permit − disposal) ÷ crew-hours = implied hourly rate

Compare it to the table. Under $61/hr implies a burden below 2.0x on the Denver median wage, which usually means thin or absent insurance. Between $61 and $92 is the 2.0x-3.0x band on the median wage. Between $92 and $118 is consistent with a 75th-percentile crew or a supervisor-heavy job, and should come with a reason. Above $118 needs a stated cause: emergency, specialty, or hazardous material.

The one question that exposes padding: “If this takes six hours instead of ten, what do I pay?”

An honest fixed-price bid says “the same, that risk is mine, and here is what happens if it takes fourteen.” An honest hourly bid says “four hours less times the rate.” A padded bid gets vague, because the hours were inflated and the contractor does not want them checked against the clock.

Second question, for older homes specifically: “What is the change-order rate if you open the wall and find galvanized?” An old-home specialist has a number ready. Someone who mostly does new construction does not.

What to check before you sign

The quote separates labour hours, hourly rate, materials, and permit. Four lines, minimum.
Implied hourly, computed by the division above, lands between $61 and $118. Anything outside has a written reason.
Material line names the pipe. Copper feedstock is up 52.8% on the PPI and PEX is up 5.0%. Which one you are buying changes what a price increase means.
Colorado plumbing licence number is on the document, and you have checked it against the state board.
Certificate of insurance names you, with liability and workers’ comp both listed. This is what the burden multiplier is buying.
Change-order procedure is in writing, with an hourly rate for discovered work.
Permit is pulled by the contractor, not by you. A contractor asking the homeowner to pull the permit is shifting liability.
Disposal of old galvanized or cast iron is named and priced.
Warranty covers labour separately from parts, with a stated term.

Everything above is arithmetic on the 2025 BLS wage survey for Denver and the July 2026 Producer Price Index. We did not inspect a home, call a contractor, or gather quotes. The BLS Occupational Outlook Handbook describes what the trade involves and what it takes to enter it. Where a number on this page is an assumption rather than published data, it is labelled as one, and you can change it and rerun the row yourself.