A full Poly-B repipe in Calgary runs $3,500 to $7,250 as of September 2026. Most homes land in the middle of that.
That's a wide range because a Poly-B repipe isn't a product, it's a job whose size depends on your house. A bungalow with an unfinished basement and one and a half bathrooms sits at the bottom. A two-storey with a developed basement, three and a half baths and finished ceilings throughout sits at the top.
Below is what actually moves the number, what a quote should include, and the one line most quotes leave out that catches people afterwards.
What decides where you land
How many fixtures you have, not how many square feet. Every sink, toilet, shower, tub, laundry connection and outdoor tap needs a supply run. A 2,000 sq ft home with two bathrooms is a smaller job than a 1,600 sq ft home with three and a half, because the fixture count is what generates the work.
Number of storeys. A two-storey home needs vertical runs between floors, which means more wall access in more places. Bungalows are the cheapest layout to repipe.
Whether the basement is developed. This is the single biggest swing factor. An unfinished basement gives us open joists and a clear route for most of the horizontal distribution — quick, tidy, minimal disruption. A fully finished basement with a drywalled ceiling means opening it up to reach the same pipe, and that is both labour and drywall.
How accessible the runs are. Open mechanical rooms, accessible ceilings and reachable wall cavities keep it fast. Vaulted ceilings, soffits, tiled walls and built-in cabinetry all slow it down.
PEX or copper. PEX is the standard replacement and it is what most of these jobs use — flexible enough to pull through existing cavities with far less demolition, freeze-tolerant, and it carries a real manufacturer warranty. Copper costs more in both material and labour and makes sense for specific situations rather than as a default.
Whether the main water line is included. Some quotes cover distribution only; some include the line from the meter. Worth checking which you're comparing.
Whether you're living there. An occupied home means working around people, staging the work so the house has water each night, and more protection of finished surfaces. A vacant home between owners is faster.
The line most quotes leave out
Drywall repair and paint.
A repipe means opening walls and ceilings to reach pipe. A good crew plans those openings deliberately and keeps them small — but they exist, and someone has to close them, mud them, sand them, prime them and paint them.
Plumbing quotes frequently stop at "make good to patch" — the holes are cut cleanly and left ready for a drywaller. That is normal and it is not a trick, but if you compare two quotes and one is noticeably cheaper, this is the first place to look.
Ask every quote the same question: does this include drywall finishing and paint, or does it stop at the patch? Then you're comparing like with like.
What a proper quote should cover
- Every supply run replaced, not just the accessible ones
- New shutoff valves at fixtures where the old ones are Poly-B era
- The route and location of every planned wall opening, agreed before work starts
- Pressure testing before anything is closed
- Whether the main line is included or excluded, stated explicitly
- Permit and inspection where required
- Written documentation of the work — which your insurer will want
- A clear statement on drywall: patched, finished, or not included
If a quote is a single number with no scope attached, that isn't a quote — it's a guess you'll be renegotiating mid-job.
Is it worth it, or should you wait?
The honest answer is that this is rarely an emergency and rarely optional forever.
Poly-B fails from the inside, most often at the fittings, and there is no inspection that tells you how much life is left. You can't scope it, and two identical homes on the same street can be twenty years apart in when they fail. Anyone who tells you your Poly-B has five good years left is guessing.
So the timeline usually gets set by something other than the pipe:
Insurance. Carriers have tightened steadily. Some surcharge Poly-B, some restrict water-damage coverage, some decline to renew until it's replaced, and some won't write a new policy at all. If you're shopping insurance or switching carriers, your timeline just shortened.
Resale. It shows up on the inspection report and becomes a negotiation. Replacing on your own schedule with a written scope generally goes better than conceding a number under offer pressure.
A failure you've already had. One fitting letting go is the most useful data point you'll get. The rest of the system is the same age, the same material, and has seen the same water.
And the cheapest version of this job: if you're already opening walls for a basement development or a bathroom renovation, the demolition cost is sunk. This is the least expensive repipe you'll ever be offered, and it's the one people most often regret skipping.
There's more on the decision itself in our guide to whether you need to replace Poly-B.
What a failure costs by comparison
Worth putting the repipe number in context.
A repipe is a planned expense with a known scope. A burst Poly-B fitting behind a wall is water running into a cavity, often overnight, and the bill is the plumbing repair plus drywall, flooring, insulation, contents and whatever remediation the moisture requires. Add an insurance deductible, and add the possibility that a Poly-B claim affects your coverage going forward.
That's not a scare tactic — plenty of Poly-B homes never have a significant failure. It's just the honest comparison, and it's why "replace it on your terms" is usually better advice than "replace it now."
Calgary specifics
Poly-B went into Canadian homes from roughly 1978 to the mid-1990s, which covers a large slice of Calgary's housing stock. The communities built inside that window are where we see it most: Tuscany, Edgemont, Hidden Valley, Arbour Lake, Douglasdale, Varsity, and much of the NE and NW built through the 80s and early 90s. Newer communities — Mahogany, Auburn Bay, Cranston, Redstone — are well past it and run PEX.
One community worth calling out: Coventry Hills sits on the boundary. It built from the early 1990s into the mid-2000s, straddling the changeover, so whether a given house has Poly-B genuinely depends on its phase rather than the address.
If you're outside Calgary, the figures above are our local pricing — costs vary by market, but the factors that move them don't.
Financing
A repipe is a planned expense, and it doesn't have to be paid in one go. Financeit monthly payments are available with a soft credit check, which is worth knowing if the timing is being forced by an insurance renewal rather than by your budget.
The short version
$3,500 to $7,250 in Calgary. Bungalow with an unfinished basement and fewer fixtures at the low end; two-storey with a developed basement and three-plus bathrooms at the high end. PEX is the standard material. Always confirm whether drywall finishing is included before comparing quotes.
If you'd like a real number for your house rather than a range, we'll walk it, identify what you actually have, and quote it in writing at no charge. Call 587-834-3668, or see Poly-B replacement in Calgary for what the work involves — and Poly-B in Airdrie if you're north of the city.
