Sounds fairly reasonable.

Not out of line, will take as much time to do the staircase as the rest of the house (I'm exaggerating a bit but not much) Cutting in around spindles is a finicky job. Be prepared to paint after!

The going rate is whatever the contractor you choose charges. Stairs are expensive, for any type of project. Exactly how expensive depends on the contractor and how much he wants to do the job, the location, the type of stairs and the current condition. Having a good contractor is more important than the exact price because going cheap will only save you a few hundred dollars.

There is quite a bit of labor to do stairs and this isn't a task for inexperienced hands. Power sanders will be used for the majority of the work and the more professional equipment can cause damage quickly. Sanding must be even or the stain won't absorb the same at the walking areas as on the edges.

If the guide price is $40/ft of handrail, then $80 per stair sounds relatively cheap. Are these open stairs with spindles to work around, or are the treads boxed in at each end with a board? Is this refinishing existing stairs or finishing newly installed treads and handrail?

Let's compare to cost of reSURFACING the treads = $200 stair/riser combination. Hmmmm. The $40/tread looks pretty good. If you have 10 treads = $400. If you have 20 treads = $800. Hmmmmm...I'm not seeing an issue. The 'average' tread count (just off the top of my head) is around 13. That means $520 for the trread/risers to be refinished. That's one HECK of a deal!

Let's look at the cost of a PROPERLY installed (to code) railing. If you have 10ft the cost of the railing $80/lf = $800. If you have 20ft then it costs $1600.

Shall we assume the railing INCLUDES the spindles, newel posts, AND matching the stain of the treads??? If it does, you are in a SWEET spot!

To save more money, you would have to break code laws and have a dangerous railing...and that costs way more in the end...than if you just do it properly the first time (home owner's insurance does NOT cover damage/injuries with non-code meeting items...like railings and stairs).

Remember: Stairs require knowledge of AND COMPLIANCE WITH 15+ different code requirements. The $80/linear foot = paying for a company to KNOW what those are...AND to do it properly. The materials are relatively easy...it's the KNOWLEDGE that is so expensive.

Stairs are expensive. Our quote doubled with the stairs and trim. That was why we decided not to have them done when we got the downstairs floors refinished.

Really have no clue and without pics of your staircase how would we even begin to guess. It seems fair to me

Yes, pictures.

We have no idea what your staircase looks like. It could be a closed staircase with only a handrail on the wall

Or it could be open on one side. Or open on two sides. And have a lot of spindles, newel posts....

Initial impression is that the price quoted, if anything, is too cheap.

As others said... it totally depends on your stairs. How many flights, how many stairs, how many spindles, are they straight or do they turn? I paid $950 to have 2 flights of rails/spindles sanded, primed & painted. I imagine refinishing the steps is more expensive than carpet (or at least a lot more work) which is what we did... that cost another $3500. Stairs aren't cheap.

How much should it cost to refinish staircase-steps and railing

'Refinish' is a big word and can mean a lot of things.

Do you want 5 coats of paint stripped sanded off of stairs & spindles and then have the raw, sanded wood stained and clear finished?

Is the wood currently stained a dark color and you now want a light natural wood color?

As you should be able to see by now, details matter.

Please, call them treads, not steps or stairs 😋