It's hard to say definitively without actually seeing the situation but IMO, that is overpriced.

Renting a core aerator for an entire day is less than $100 and it would only take a couple of hours at most for a homeowner to do all on their own. And another couple of hours to apply compost in low spots and to overseed. So being very generous about the cost of supplies and materials (aerator, compost, etc.), let's round down to $1000. At a half day's worth of work at most, you have paid them approximately $167/hour for their services!!

I agree with GG. If someone bid more than $250 to do that job, I would get more estimates. At least you have the name of someone you don't ever want to call again.

Furthermore, I would have advised you not to do the core aeration anyway. GG and I can bicker on this topic for days, and I'd rather not. I realize I'm a maverick on this topic, at least on this forum, but I did core aeration only one time in 60 years of lawn care (SoCal, Dayton, and San Antonio area), and that one time seemed to not help anything at all. She will argue that I'm only one person, an anecdote. But I've had 60, or even 120, opportunities to do core aeration and my grass does just fine without it. Standing by for rebuttal.

I am in the business and aerating a 3800 sq ft lawn takes about 20 minutes for one guy. Spreading dirt on low spots is tough to say, but I think dchall is about right that anything over $250 sounds too high.

What was the point of overseeding? Generally, overseeding into an existing lawn is a waste of time and money. If you had specific dead areas more than 6-8 inches in diameter, then seed those, but not the whole lawn. Fertilizer alone is sufficient to make northern lawns spread into small dead or bare areas.

As far as aerating, I have to disagree with dchall. Research at Michigan State University has shown that regular aerating helps to minimize the build up of excessive thatch which can ultimately lead to the deterioration of the lawn with higher incidence of insect and disease problems.

No rebuttals. Core aeration is a lawn care choice. My experience is that it is a beneficial practice under certain conditions....not always a requirement or even necessary but it sure can't hurt anything.

I am just not a big fan of dogma when it comes to anything related to horticulture.....or lawn care specifically.

Hi Greg. Other research, there and elsewhere, likely indicates other reasons for core aeration. To home in on your reason, proper lawn care (proper grass selection, deep and infrequent watering, proper mowing height, and proper fertilizer (late spring, early fall, late fall)) will practically eliminate thatch. And if it doesn't you can usually scalp it away by lowering the mower deck height for one mow. And if you don't want to do that, run a dethatcher over it. Use of organic fertilizer, at least once annually, seems to help keep the thatch-eating microbes happy for many of us.

dchall, Thatch is a by-product of grass variety and growth rate. Kentucky Bluegrass is very susceptible to thatch build-up due to its vigorous rhizome growth. The spreading by rhizomes is also why Kentucky Bluegrass makes good sod. If you don't have a Kentucky Bluegrass lawn, then you probably don't need aeration. I have almost zero knowledge about southern grasses, so I don't know about your situation in San Antonio.

If you fertilize, water, and cut properly, you will have thatch build-up in a Kentucky Bluegrass lawn. Of course if you do not fertilize it, water it, or generally mistreat it, then not so much.

Thatch cannot be scalped away, or even removed with a dethatcher. A power rake, or dethatcher, will remove lots of organic matter, and look like it is doing a lot. But all it is doing is scratching the surface. It is removing dead grass blades. Dead grass blades decay relatively quickly because of their succulent nature. The roots of the grass are growing in the thatch so for the dethatcher to actually remove the thatch, it would literally have to rip out the entire lawn.

Thatch is primarily made up of dead roots and stems. These are the more woody parts of the plant, and do not decay quickly. That is why they build up as thatch while grass clippings do not contribute to thatch.

The problem is that the roots of the grass start to grow in the layer of dead roots and stems in the thatch layer. The thatch layer does not hold water and nutrients as well as soil, so it puts added stress on the grass plants. Aerating brings up some soil to the surface which, when done repeatedly over a period of years, modifies the thatch layer to include both thatch and soil. The micro-organisms in the soil help to break down the thatch layer quicker, and the mixture of thatch and soil create a better growing medium for the grass.

The holes created by the aeration also penetrate the thatch layer which helps to encourage better rooting below the thatch layer because it allows water, fertilizer, and air to more easily reach the soil level. Aeration is a long term maintenance task with most of the benefits coming after many years with lowered likelihood of disease and insect problems. Most of what I have learned about aeration I learned from Dr Joe Vargas, plant pathologist at Michigan State University.

Greg, I think I found the reason you have a thatch problem. In another topic you suggested someone water their lawn every day in the summer. That is not proper watering. The only way roots will grow into thatch is if the thatch is wetter than the soil. If you are watering once a week, the thatch, if there is any, will only be wet for the hours it is getting sprinkled, and the soil will be the only place you find roots. If you water every day for a few minutes, the surface soil may only get a surface dampness while the thatch soaks up all the water.

Besides you're making assumptions about where the OP lives and what kind of grass they have. I'm trying not to do that.

dchall, I posted a reply earlier but now I don't see it so here is another attempt. The watering advice I gave is based on research by Dr Joe Vargas. plant pathologist at the Turfgrass Research Center at Michigan State University. It applies especially to Kentucky Bluegrass lawns, but works well on any northern lawns. It has also been tested and validated by my own experience as a professional in the business since 1975. I have experience with thousands of lawns and currently have about 1500 customers. We have been advising people to water on a daily basis for about the last 20 years.

The specific advice is to water daily in the heat of the day for about 20 minutes. It works because watering at that time cools off the grass and lowers the stress level on the plants. The idea is to prevent the lawn from going into drought stress. A stressed lawn is one that is more prone to diseases, and also more vulnerable to insects like Chinch bugs, which like a dry lawn. It is possible for a lawn to go into dormancy and come out fine in the fall, but we see lawns every year where serious damage occurs in the summertime and large areas of the lawn never come back.

At the same time, many weeds can thrive on less water than the grass so when the grass becomes dormant, weeds are more likely to fill in the the thin areas where grass is no longer actively crowding them out.

A lawn dries from the top down, so when watering every day, soil moisture is maintained. Thatch does not soak up water. One of the primary problems with thatch is that it does not hold water as well as soil. As the thatch layer gets thicker, the roots have nowhere else to grow but in the thatch. To say that roots will only grow into the thatch if it is wetter than the soil is simply false. If there is a 1 inch layer of thatch, the roots cannot avoid the thatch. Watering schedule has little or nothing to do with thatch buildup. As noted above, thatch is a by-product of grass variety and growth. Anything that encourages growth will increase thatch buildup. Aeration is the only viable method of controlling and modifying the thatch layer.

If someone wants to have a nice looking lawn in the heat of the summer, frequent, light watering is the surest way to accomplish it. We see that result every summer. There is no substitute for adequate, frequent water. Often, the only lawns that look good are those with automatic sprinkler systems that come on every day. The people who water infrequently are the ones who call with problems and complaints.

1. We don't know where the OP lives. If he/she lives outside your purview, would you have the same advice? I try to be as generic as possible until I know where the OP lives.
2. We don't know whether the OP has KBG turf. Again, I try to stay generic. By far and away, your advice to water daily is 180 degrees out of phase with the rest of the world.

The specific advice is to water daily in the heat of the day for about 20 minutes. It works because watering at that time cools off the grass and lowers the stress level on the plants. This is similar to what the rest of the world calls syringing except syringing only takes a minute or two. You must realize there are high flow sprinkler systems which can put out a full inch of water in 20 minutes. Watering an inch of water a day is nuts even if you live in Las Vegas. How can you make the blanket statement about 20 minutes per day? That's a rhetorical question, as I don't really care; you're going to invoke a doctor from your local area. The one thing I've learned about university research is that it only applies locally. If you go to UMASS you'll get advice for their area and theirs alone. You have to respect the work they do, but take it for what it is - local advice.

The advice to water 20 minutes a day is admittedly generic and is geared towards the average homeowner using typical home lawn watering equipment. Vargas probably has more specific advice for golf greenskeepers and others who have the means and motivation to measure output and dial in more exacting requirements. I seem to remember an inch a week but I don't know for sure. That would mean absolutely nothing to my customers so I never bothered to remember that detail. The bottom line is that you want to prevent the lawn from going into drought stress. On a Kentucky Bluegrass lawn, the first sign is a purplish cast to the lawn. I try to water the least amount possible while keeping the grass out of dormancy.

I have said repeatedly that my knowledge is limited to northern lawns. Dr Vargas is at MSU, but his advice certainly is not limited to Michigan lawns. It would be interesting to see if his research has been duplicated on southern grasses. I have a textbook here somewhere, "Turfgrass, Science and Culture," by Beard. If I have a chance I will dig it out and see what it says about watering.