Sounds cheap to me. Removing hardwood to install plywood is foolish.

I was surprised that he said he needed to remove the hardwood. He said that it will flex and cause the tile to crack. Here is a pic of the wood under the layers of vinyl in my kitchen. The hardwood in the rest of the house is immaculate.

If he doesn’t remove the hardwood and install plywood, it will be $700 less, but he won’t “guarantee” it.

Here is a picture of the hardwood in the kitchen and a picture of the rest of the house. Does the kitchen hardwood look like it can be refinished?

You would have to pull up the rest and see what it is all like. I tore out carpet in a bedroom in a 1930s house and found that half the wood floor was in good shape, about a quarter of it was too rough, and the rest had been ripped out completely to do plumbing work and was replaced with plywood instead. But we were able to sew in new pieces of oak to replace the damaged pieces and the plywood. It ended up gorgeous.

IIRC, it was about $1000 to fix the 10x10' master bedroom. $2500 for all that flooring work sounds like a good deal to me. But I imagine it varies a lot by region.

See my comments about asbestos in response to your other question on this matter.

"Does the kitchen hardwood look like it can be refinished?"

Certainly.

In my neck of the wood a FINISHED tile floor = $12-$15/sf. This is JUST for material and labour. It does NOT include a subfloor fix/rebuild like yours. In my area (insanely expensive Canadian West Coast City) a rebuild like yours adds another $5/sf onto the job.

Which is why Joseph said 'Sounds cheap to me.' Your location *could be a low-labour cost area which would mean you *might be seeing fair-market value for labour. The statement about the subfloor flexing and causing tile to crack is BANG ON. Your installer is giving you a 'range' of prices because s/he won't know the FULL cost of the job until the end (that's how these work with older homes).

I would say you have a 'keeper' on your hands. Until we see more of his/her work and are proven wrong, I would say you have found a properly professional tile installer....or at least someone who has a strong grip on reality and wants to ensure you are being offered the best service (a range of prices) depending on what is unearthed.

Keep the installer and keep listening. You can post more questions with us to ensure you are doing everything possible to stay educated about the process. That's fine. So far I like what I'm hearing.

It's not fair to gauge such a small job by the square foot. Instead it should be gauged by the amount of labor required to complete the work desired. If the going rate for labor in your area is $50 per hour, $2500 would cover about 6 full days of work. With what you're doing, that doesn't sound unreasonable to me.

FYI, you have Pine flooring, not hardwood. This was typically done in the days before plywood was made/used, and was often intended to be a subfloor. Considering how that one section looks, it's probably wise to remove it and replace it with a more stable layer of subfloor.