Construction Costs
Order-of-magnitude construction cost benchmarks for architects and building designers — cost per square foot by building type and city, plus location cost factors.
Construction Costs
Early-stage cost benchmarks help architects and building designers sanity-check feasibility, brief clients, and scope schematic design before a quantity surveyor is engaged. The figures below are order-of-magnitude ranges for programming and schematic design only — never a substitute for a detailed estimate. Costs are driven by building type, quality tier, and location; use the location cost factor pages to adjust a national baseline to a specific metro.
Pages
- Construction Cost per Square Foot by Building Type (2026)
2026 construction cost per square foot by building type — single-family homes, multifamily, offices, retail, warehouses, schools and hospitals — as order-of-magnitude ranges for early design.
- Cost to Build an Office Building in New York, NY (2026)
What it costs to build an office building in New York City in 2026 — order-of-magnitude cost per square foot for Class A core-and-shell, adjusted by NYC location cost factors.
- New York, NY Construction Location Cost Factor
New York City construction location cost factor — how to scale national cost-per-square-foot benchmarks to NYC, with the material vs. installation (labor) breakdown that drives it.