Pricing by neighborhood — Landscaper · Fort Worth, TX
| Neighborhood | Low | High | Why the price moves |
|---|---|---|---|
| Westover Hills / Rivercrest / Westcliff | $55 | $95 | Estate design + irrigation, mature live oaks, full installs $50K-$200K, Tree Preservation review common |
| Cultural District / TCU / West 7th | $42 | $70 | Premium maintenance, irrigation tune-ups, mature canopy pruning, university-area density |
| Fairmount / Ryan Place / Mistletoe Heights | $36 | $58 | 1920s cottage gardens, narrow lots, hand-detail work on small beds and front yards |
| Arlington Heights / Crestwood / Monticello | $32 | $52 | Mid-tier residential, mix of 1940s-1960s ranch + cottage stock, standard maintenance |
| Keller / Southlake / Trophy Club | $38 | $65 | HOA-driven mowing standards, large suburban lots, irrigation audits, master-planned aesthetics |
| Stockyards / North Side / Diamond Hill | $26 | $42 | Basic maintenance market, smaller lots, fewer formal beds, budget-conscious |
| Southside / Near Southside / Magnolia | $30 | $50 | Gentrifying corridors, 1920s-1940s bungalows, refresh and bed-install work growing |
| Burleson / Crowley / Forest Hill | $28 | $44 | South-side budget tier, large lots with simpler maintenance, mostly mowing + edging contracts |
Landscaper hourly rate by neighborhood in Fort Worth, TX. Ranges reflect typical contractor pricing including travel time, building-type access, and local labor density.
How much does a landscaper cost in Fort Worth?
Fort Worth landscapers charge $26-$44 per hour for scheduled crew work, with an average of $35/hr. Storm cleanup, post-hail debris removal, and after-hours calls run $50-$75/hr plus a $75-$150 trip charge. Neighborhood matters: Westover Hills, Rivercrest, and Westcliff estate properties sit at the top of the range because of mature live-oak canopies, multi-zone irrigation, and Tree Preservation Ordinance review on heritage specimens. Stockyards, North Side, and Burleson lots sit at the bottom on simpler mow-and-edge contracts.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics reports the mean hourly wage for grounds maintenance workers in the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metro at $17.60. The gap between that and the $35/hr you actually pay is real and explainable, and the rest of this article walks through where every dollar goes, what permits you actually need, and what to ask when comparing quotes.
Fort Worth Landscaper Rates by Neighborhood
Tarrant County is not one landscape market. A Rivercrest estate with mature live oaks, a Hunter-controlled irrigation clock, and a heritage-tree mitigation file is a different job than a Diamond Hill 6,000 sq ft lot with St. Augustine and a chain-link fence, and the price reflects that. The full per-neighborhood breakdown sits at the top of this page; this section explains the why behind the numbers.
The premium for Westover Hills, Rivercrest, Westcliff, and the inner Cultural District is not arbitrary. A typical estate visit includes 4-6 hours of crew time across mowing, hand-edging, blowing, bed maintenance, and irrigation checks, plus arborist consultation on the live-oak canopy and Tree Preservation review when pruning structural limbs. Stockyards, North Side, and Burleson work compresses to a 30-45 minute mow-and-blow on smaller lots with simpler beds.
Comparable Texas cities for cross-reference:
- Dallas landscaper costs — $29-$48/hr
- Austin landscaper costs — $39-$64/hr
- Houston landscaper costs — $28-$46/hr
- San Antonio landscaper costs — $26-$42/hr
Fort Worth sits at the lower end of the major Texas metros, roughly 8-12% below Dallas on comparable work and 30-35% below Austin, mostly because Tarrant County has a lower median household income than Travis or Collin counties and the labor pool is deeper than Austin’s tight construction market.
Fort Worth Landscape Pricing by Property Type
Neighborhood is one axis. Property type and lot character are the other, and they often matter more than the zip code. A Westover Hills 2-acre estate with a Hunter ICC2 controller and 18 irrigation zones costs noticeably more to maintain than a Trophy Club master-planned 0.25-acre lot on a shared HOA mowing contract, even when the per-hour rate is similar.
| Property type | Hourly rate | Why the price moves |
|---|---|---|
| Estate (1-3 acres, Westover Hills, Rivercrest, Westcliff) | $55-$95 | Mature live-oak canopy, multi-zone irrigation, formal beds, arborist consultation, weekly senior-crew visits |
| Cultural District / TCU mature lot (8,000-15,000 sq ft) | $42-$70 | Established Bermuda or zoysia, irrigation tune-ups, narrow-access tree pruning, university-area parking constraints |
| Fairmount / Ryan Place 1920s cottage (5,000-7,500 sq ft) | $36-$58 | Hand-detail cottage-garden work, alley access, smaller mowers required, more bed-edging time |
| Suburban HOA (Keller, Southlake, Trophy Club, 8,000-15,000 sq ft) | $38-$65 | HOA mowing standards, irrigation-audit requirements, route-density discounts on weekly contracts |
| Standard residential (Arlington Heights, Crestwood, Southside, 6,000-10,000 sq ft) | $32-$52 | Bermuda or St. Augustine, basic irrigation, standard mow + edge + blow, biweekly during dormancy |
| Budget tier (Stockyards, North Side, Burleson, Crowley) | $26-$44 | Smaller lots or larger simpler ones, fewer formal beds, mow-and-blow tier, less hand detail |
The estate premium is real and not arbitrary. Live oaks, post oaks, and pecans over a defined diameter trigger Tree Preservation Ordinance review for structural pruning, and the contractor either holds an arborist on staff or subs in a Fort Worth tree service for canopy work — both add cost. Multi-zone irrigation systems on Hunter or Rain Bird controllers require seasonal programming adjustments tied to Tarrant Regional Water District watering restrictions, which is professional time, not crew time.
What Your Billed Hour Actually Covers
The $17.60 BLS wage is take-home pay for the crew member, not what the customer pays. The customer rate of $26-$44/hr covers everything the business needs to legally operate in Tarrant County.
Roughly: 50% crew labor, 12% commercial general liability and inland-marine equipment insurance ($4,000-$8,000/yr per crew in DFW, with inland-marine specifically covering the mowers and trailers against theft from job-site staging), 11% vehicle and equipment (commercial truck with trailer, zero-turn mowers, blowers, edgers, line trimmers, and the fuel to run them in 100-degree summers), 10% licensing and overhead (TDA pesticide-applicator license for crews that spray, TCEQ irrigator license for irrigation work, Tarrant County commercial vehicle registration, dispatch, billing), and 17% contractor profit margin. Strip any of those out and the business cannot stay open through a Fort Worth summer.
This is why the cheapest quote is not always the right one. A crew bidding $15/hr is either operating without insurance (your homeowner’s policy will not cover damage if their mower throws a rock through your front window), without TDA licensing for the herbicide they are applying, or losing money and about to disappear mid-season.
Fort Worth Landscaping Permits and Licenses
Most Fort Worth landscape work does not require a city permit, but the regulatory layer matters and the wrong assumption can void your insurance or trigger a code violation. Below is the practical map of what triggers what.
| Work | Permit or license | Typical cost | Who files |
|---|---|---|---|
| Basic mowing, edging, mulching | None | — | No filing required |
| Pesticide or herbicide application | TX Department of Agriculture applicator license (contractor-held) | License $60-$140/yr for the company | Contractor must hold license; no per-job filing |
| Irrigation install or repair | TCEQ Licensed Irrigator (contractor-held) | License held by company | Contractor; backflow test filed with City Water Department |
| Tree removal — heritage tree on commercial site | City Tree Preservation review (Section 10.7) | $0-$2,500 in mitigation if tree is removed | Property owner, often with arborist letter |
| Landscape architect design (commercial / large residential) | TX Board of Architectural Examiners landscape architect license | Held by designer | Designer files plans; not a permit per se |
| HOA-controlled neighborhoods (Keller, Southlake, Trophy Club, Walsh, Heritage) | HOA Architectural Review | $0-$200 application fee | Homeowner submits before any visible change |
The two most-skipped requirements are the TDA pesticide-applicator license and the HOA architectural review. The TDA license is contractor-side and easy to verify; the homeowner does not file anything but is on the hook if the contractor sprays unlicensed and damages a neighboring property. HOA architectural review failures in Southlake and Trophy Club routinely trigger $500-$2,500 fines and orders to revert the landscape.
For larger renovations involving grading, drainage, or hardscape over 200 sq ft, expect to involve a Fort Worth landscape architect or general contractor — Tarrant County clay soil drains poorly, and drainage onto a neighbor’s lot is a frequent small-claims filing.
Common Landscape Job Pricing in Fort Worth
These are typical all-in prices, including labor, basic materials, fuel, and disposal. Westover Hills, Rivercrest, and Cultural District estate work sits at the high end of each range; Stockyards, North Side, and budget-tier south-side work at the low end.
| Job | Total cost | Crew hours | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| Weekly mowing (typical 8,000 sq ft Bermuda lot) | $45-$80 per visit | 0.5-1 | Lower with seasonal contract; +$10-$20 for St. Augustine |
| Biweekly winter dormant mow (Nov-Feb) | $30-$55 per visit | 0.5 | Many crews drop to monthly Dec-Feb |
| Spring cleanup + bed refresh + mulch (typical lot) | $450-$950 | 6-12 | Includes mulch delivery, bed edging, pre-emergent |
| Lawn aeration + overseed (Bermuda/zoysia core aeration) | $180-$380 | 1.5-3 | Spring or early fall; +$80-$150 for compost topdressing |
| Sprinkler system tune-up (8-12 zones) | $150-$320 | 1.5-3 | Includes head adjustments, controller programming, backflow check |
| Sprinkler system install (8-12 zones, typical lot) | $3,800-$7,500 | 20-35 | Permit + backflow test filed with City Water Department |
| Xeriscape conversion (1,500-2,500 sq ft front yard) | $5,000-$15,000 | 25-60 | Native plants, decomposed granite, Texas limestone, sod removal |
| Artificial turf install (typical 1,000 sq ft yard) | $9,000-$16,000 | 30-50 | Per-sq-ft installed $9-$16; popular in 76107 and 76109 |
| Tree pruning (mature live oak, structural) | $450-$1,400 per tree | 3-8 | Heritage tree review may apply on commercial; arborist sub-out common |
| Storm cleanup / debris haul (post-hail or wind) | $300-$1,200 | 4-10 | Emergency surcharge; weekend rates +25-50% |
Live oak structural pruning deserves a callout. Fort Worth’s mature live-oak canopy concentrates in Rivercrest, Westover Hills, the Cultural District, and the older sections of the Park Hill / Berkeley neighborhoods. Oak wilt is endemic to North Texas, and pruning between February and June is discouraged because the open wounds attract the nitidulid beetles that vector the pathogen. Reputable crews schedule structural pruning in the July-January window and seal cuts immediately, even on small branches.
How to Get and Compare Fort Worth Landscaper Quotes
Three things separate a useful quote from a useless one in Tarrant County, and they all come down to specificity.
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Tell the landscaper the lot size, grass type, and bed footprint. “Arlington Heights 1947 ranch, 9,200 sq ft lot, mostly Bermuda with one St. Augustine shaded area along the east side, three mature pecans, two bermuda-grass parking strips” gets a different number than “I have a medium yard.” Crews price weekly maintenance partly off route density and partly off cut height and bed-edge linear feet, so the more specific the brief, the firmer the quote.
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Ask for an itemized written estimate that breaks out weekly maintenance items, seasonal extras (aeration, mulch, pre-emergent), and any irrigation or pesticide work, with the materials cost separated from labor. Reputable Fort Worth landscape companies email itemized PDFs within 24-48 hours of the property walk. Verbal estimates are not enforceable and tend to grow.
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Verify the licensing and insurance before you book. For any pesticide or herbicide work, look up the TDA pesticide-applicator license number through the Texas Department of Agriculture license search. For irrigation work, verify the TCEQ irrigator license. Request a current Certificate of Insurance showing $1M general liability minimum plus inland-marine coverage. Three checks, fifteen minutes, rules out 90% of the contractors who later become problems.
How We Calculated These Prices
The Fort Worth landscaper hourly rate of $26-$44 starts with the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics mean hourly wage for landscaping and grounds maintenance workers in the Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington metropolitan statistical area: $17.60 as of May 2024. We apply a 1.5x-2.5x consumer multiplier covering business overhead, commercial general liability and inland-marine equipment insurance, vehicle and fuel costs, employer-paid taxes, TDA and TCEQ licensing where applicable, and contractor profit margin, calibrated against current market quotes from Tarrant County landscape companies.
Neighborhood-level adjustments reflect lot size, irrigation complexity, mature-tree density, HOA-driven service standards, and crew route density. The full formula and source list lives on our methodology page.
Other Fort Worth Service Costs You Might Need
Landscape work rarely happens in isolation. A full backyard refresh typically pulls in 2-3 trades, and getting quotes from all of them at the same time is faster than serial calls.
- Fort Worth lawn care costs — for weekly mowing and treatment-only contracts (fertilization, weed control, grub control) without bed or design work
- Fort Worth tree service costs — required for structural pruning of mature live oaks, post oaks, and pecans, plus oak-wilt-aware scheduling
- Fort Worth pressure washing costs — for driveway, patio, and stone-walkway cleanup after a mulch refresh
- Fort Worth handyman costs — for fence repair, raised-bed builds, and gate adjustments that often pair with landscape work
- Fort Worth pest control costs — for fire-ant treatment, scorpion control, and termite inspection on properties with significant wood mulch