What a $6,000 vs. $12,000 Christmas Light Job Includes (Worked Quote Examples)

Your phone buzzes at 4:40 on a Tuesday. The homeowner has two kids home from school, a husband who "doesn't do heights," and a house that every neighbor on the cul-de-sac will see on the way to the school pickup line. She wants to know what it costs, and she has no idea whether the answer should be $2,000 or $20,000.

I have installed Christmas lights professionally since 2014 and run a community of more than 43,000 installers. The question I hear most is not "how do I price a foot of roofline." It is "why does one house quote at $6,000 and the next at $12,000, and how do I get more of the second kind?"

Everything below uses the same price points I teach installers: roofline and peaks at $8 to $12 per linear foot, trees at $30 to $60 per foot of tree height, bushes at $40 to $75 per strand, and wreaths by size. Packages start at $1,200, so both of these jobs are what happens when a homeowner says yes to the whole picture instead of the starter version. The homes are illustrative composites of the jobs I see most, not two specific customers.

What does a $6,000 Christmas light job actually include?

Picture a two-story home with a clean roofline, a front walkway, and a family that hosts Christmas Eve. The $6,000 job is the "pulls into the driveway and smiles" install: roofline and peaks drawn in clean C9 lines, three trees by the front door, bushes along the porch, and two wreaths with bows.

Notice the last line. Every quote I send ends in 7, so $5,790 becomes $5,797. It looks calculated rather than rounded, and homeowners treat it that way. Takedown is included in the per-foot price, so it never shows up as a line item.

What does a $12,000 Christmas light job include?

Now picture the house with a circular drive, a four-car garage, a front gable big enough to hold a 60-inch wreath, and a landscape bed that wraps both sides of the entry. This is the home where the family hosts the neighborhood and wants to be the best house on the block.

Watch the video below for two real jobs in this range and how they came together.

Why does the $12,000 quote cost twice as much when the house is not twice as big?

This is the part that changes how you quote. Put the two jobs side by side and the roofline barely moves as a share of the total.

Footage grows 1.8x. The quote grows 2.1x. The gap is trees and the jumbo wreath. Trees are priced by height, so a bigger property with taller, more numerous trees compounds fast: see the full method in our guide to quoting tree wrapping. The bushes follow the same logic, and the mini-string method is covered in bidding bushes and shrubs.

A 60-inch wreath on an open gable is the single biggest visual upsell after trees, and it is $400 to $800 installed. The pricing logic is in pricing wreaths and garland, and the placement thinking behind the whole-house look is in peak stars and gable accents.

How do you move a customer from a $6,000 quote to a $12,000 quote?

You do not push. You sell what the house feels like on Christmas Eve, and the line items follow. The sequence that works for me:

1. Qualify on the phone. Open with: "Hi, I'm Jason with [Company]. How can we help you with this amazing, magical Christmas season? We want to make this magical." Then ask what they are looking for, and whether they have had lights professionally installed before. If yes, ask what they liked and did not like about the last company.
2. Walk beside the homeowner, not ahead of them. Talk about who is coming for the holidays, not about bulbs. Drop visual ideas out loud: "we'd wrap those two evergreens, and a big 60-inch wreath up there would be incredible." Count feet, peaks and trees in your head as you walk. The walkthrough questions guide has the questions I use.
3. Step out to the truck. Say: "I'm going to step out to my truck and put together your quote. I'd love to come back inside and go over it at the kitchen table with you." Never quote in the driveway and never email the proposal before the close. The kitchen table close explains why.
4. Quote the whole picture. Show the full vision, then offer the phased option. The homeowner has already pictured the finished house, so subtracting a layer feels like a loss and adding one feels like a gift.
5. Secure the date with a deposit. Offer a 30% to 50% deposit and give options. On the $12,157 quote that is about $3,647 to $6,079. It secures their install date; it is never "to buy materials." See our deposit policy guide.

Most leads today want an online quote instead of a walkthrough, so do not force one. Send the same-day proposal with a payment link and an AI mock-up of their house lit up, ideally within 5 to 20 minutes and never more than an hour. Mock-ups dramatically lift close rates, and the prompts are in our AI mock-up guide and the speed benchmarks in quoting in under 20 minutes.

What do $6,000 and $12,000 customers have in common?

Neither is buying lights. They are buying the moment their kids see the house from the back seat, the first neighbor who slows down, and the grandkids who ask to go outside "just one more time." That is why the magical version of the job is worth selling: when the feeling comes first, the price becomes a line underneath it.

The customers who say yes to the bigger version tend to share a profile: they value time, they host, and they compare you to the experience, not to the cheapest bid. Why premium clients pay premium prices breaks down how to attract them, and how to charge $8 a foot covers the mindset shift that makes these quotes feel normal to send.

How do you avoid leaving money on the table?

Three habits separate the crews that average $1,500 to $2,000 from the ones that regularly write $6,000 and up. First, they always pitch trees and the gable wreath. Second, they never discount peaks, because peaks are visible work and priced the same as the roofline. Third, they include takedown in the price, so there is nothing to haggle over later; the takedown pricing guide shows how to plan the January and February cash gap around it.

The add-on menu that supports all three is in upselling premium add-ons, and the overall estimating method is in our full bidding breakdown. Equipment-wise, a job like the $12,157 example runs on C9 LED strands and enclosed Tuff Clips; browse the pro light kits, C9 LED lights, and Tuff Clips.

Ready to price your own jobs? Run your next house through the Christmas light calculator before you step out to the truck. For bush counts, the bush lighting calculator does the strand math for you. If you want the full sales system behind these numbers, the online training and the IVR phone system cover it end to end.

Related Guides

• How to Bid Christmas Light Jobs
• How to Quote Christmas Light Tree Wrapping
• The Kitchen Table Close
• How to Upsell Premium Add-Ons

Frequently Asked Questions

Is a $12,000 Christmas light job realistic for a one-crew company?

Yes. A $12,157 job like the one above is roughly 540 feet of roofline and peaks, six wrapped trees, a dozen bushes and a few wreaths. A two-person crew with pre-bulbed, pre-clipped strands can usually install a home like that in one to two days, and takedown is included in the per-foot price.

How much of a typical Christmas light quote should be trees?

In the two worked examples, trees were about 25% of the $5,797 quote and about 31% of the $12,157 quote. Wrapped trees are priced by height, at $30 to $60 per foot of tree, so they scale quickly on larger properties.

Should I quote the $6,000 option and the $12,000 option at the same visit?

Present one complete vision at the kitchen table, then show which layers can be phased or removed. Starting from the full picture and subtracting works better than starting small and adding, because the homeowner has already pictured the finished driveway.

What deposit should I collect on a $12,000 Christmas light job?

A 30% to 50% deposit is standard, which on a $12,157 quote is about $3,647 to $6,079. Frame it as the payment that secures their install date, never as money for materials, and offer two or three options.

What is the fastest way to raise my average ticket from $1,500 to $3,000 or more?

Pitch the layers that sit between the roofline and the street: wrapped trees, a 60-inch wreath on every open gable, and bushes on mini strings. Those three add the most visual impact per dollar, and they move a quote without discounting the roofline.