I have three pool bids and they are all different. How do I compare them?
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You cannot compare them as written, and that is usually not an accident. Get all three onto the same scope first: decking square footage, equipment makes and models, what soil assumption the price carries, whether the barrier is included and at what height, and what is an allowance rather than a price. Then compare.
Three bids on the same yard routinely arrive spread wide, and the spread is mostly not about the pool. It is about what each one quietly left out. Here is how to get them onto the same footing, in the order that finds the biggest differences fastest.
ONE. DECKING SQUARE FOOTAGE. Usually the largest square-foot item on the job and the easiest to shrink without anyone noticing. Ask each bidder for the deck area in square feet as a number. If one says 600 and another says 900, you are not looking at the same project and nothing else you compare matters until that is fixed.
TWO. WHAT IS AN ALLOWANCE. An allowance is a placeholder, not a price. Tile, coping, interior finish, decking material and water features are the common ones. A bid with low allowances beats a bid with realistic ones on paper and loses on the final invoice. Ask for the allowance amount AND what product that amount actually buys today. That second question is the one that separates a real number from a placeholder.
THREE. THE EQUIPMENT, BY MAKE AND MODEL. Not ‘variable speed pump’. The make, the model and the horsepower, plus filter type and square footage, plus heater BTU if there is one. Pump sizing is a permanent operating cost: an oversized pump on a long pipe run costs the homeowner every month for the life of the pool. Two bids can both say variable speed and be several hundred dollars a year apart in running cost.
FOUR. THE SOIL ASSUMPTION. Ask what soil condition the price assumes and what happens if the dig finds something else. Nearly every contract in Arizona assigns subsurface investigation to the owner, so every bid you are holding is priced on an assumption. The question is whether the bidder will tell you which one. A bid that has thought about it will answer in a sentence. A bid that has not will change order.
FIVE. THE BARRIER. Is it in the price, and at what height. Confirm the height matches the authority that will issue your permit, not the neighbouring one. A minority of the thirty authorities in Southern Arizona enforce 48 inches and the rest enforce 60, and twelve inches around an entire yard is real money. The jurisdiction record has the current split.
SIX. THE STEEL AND THE SHELL. Bar size, spacing, and gunite thickness, in writing, plus what soil class the structural design assumes. Arizona codifies no minimum, so two bids can specify materially different steel and both be legal. If a builder will not put those three numbers on paper, that is an answer to a different question.
SEVEN. WHAT IS EXCLUDED. Read the exclusions list before the inclusions list. Fencing, gates, electrical panel upgrades, gas line extension, hauling spoil, landscape restoration and permit fees are the usual ones. The bid with the shortest exclusions list is often the most expensive bid, correctly priced.
EIGHT. THE PAYMENT SCHEDULE. Arizona limits what a residential contractor may collect before work begins and ties draws to progress. A schedule that front-loads is a risk signal independent of price.
WHAT NOT TO DO. Do not pick on price alone once the scopes differ, and do not assume the low bid is hiding something or the high bid is padded. Both happen. The point of putting all three on the same scope is that afterwards the number means something.
WHY WE PUBLISH THIS. Omni bids against other builders and this list will be used on Omni’s own proposals. That is intended. A buyer who can ask these eight questions gets a better job from whoever they hire, and the builders who lose to this list are the ones who were winning on an incomplete scope.
Scope. These are cost and schedule RELATIONSHIPS, not a price list and not a quote. No dollar figure here is a price, an offer, or a promise about any project. Ranges are typical for Southern Arizona as of the verified date and move with materials, labour and the jurisdiction. Get a written proposal for a number.
Correction. The assumption that three pool bids on the same yard are comparable as written.
Authority: Omni Pool Builders & Design. Barrier figures from the verified per-authority records; payment limits from the Arizona contract record.. Verified 2026-09-13. Evidence grade: RECOMMENDED.
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