can you make $100,000 a year as a concrete finisher

Can you make 100000 a year as a concrete finisherWatch the video

how much do concrete workers make?


Hey guys, in today's video we're going to talk about is this a $100,000 a year skill?

And when I'm talking about that, I'm talking about a concrete finishers skill, the types of skills that a concrete finisher needs in order to make really good money doing concrete.

Now again, I'm going to be talking about what my knowledge is, what my experience is, you know, being a concrete business owner.

Being from Maine, I realize that all over the country there's going to be different wages. You're gonna pay a concrete finisher much differently, say, like in New York than we would pay here in Maine, and that's me just assuming that.

Then, you know, if you're a union worker, your wages are gonna be much different than if you're a non union worker. Now I don't have any experience with union wages, so if some of you guys that are watching this are in the union, you wanna share what maybe a concrete finisher's wage would be versus a concrete laborer down in the comments.

I mean, that would be fantastic if you could do that. Maybe, you know, share how that it might be a little bit different than being a non union worker. So in Maine, the concrete finishers like I consider Darren and Luke concrete finishers, they are very highly skilled.

They can literally do everything from doing a laborer's job. Like this is what I consider a laborer's job right here, pulling the concrete around, kind of getting it leveled out. Very basic skills needed for this, very basic knowledge needed to be able to do something like this. This is typically what a concrete laborer would do. And we have laborers that just work for us.

Usually, it's in the summer season. But as far as Luke and Darren and me, you know, we're full fledged concrete finishers. So we can go from, prepping a job, setting a job up, shooting grades with a laser, making sure all the slopes are correct, to pouring the concrete, to floating out edges, to screeding, to power troweling, doing broom finishes, doing stamp concrete.

I mean, there's a ton of skills required in order to be a very good concrete finisher. And those skills make you very, very valuable, especially across the country.

There's a big need for concrete finishers. So if there's a way that you can learn the skills it takes to be a concrete finisher then you are going to make yourself very valuable no matter where you live.

Now what we are doing today is we are pouring a 30 by 28 garage floor. And this garage floor slopes. So the skills needed as far as a concrete finisher goes for something like this is, They're raking out the concrete, getting it as level as they can to grade.

We snapped a chalk line around the outside perimeter to go by. The floor slopes two inches from the back of the wall to the front where the garage doors are. We use a laser level to set the middle grades.

There's all kinds of ways you can set middle grades on this. You could use a pin if you want. We're just going to wet shoot a grade. You can see me do that here in a second.

You're gonna see I really highlighted the screeding on this there's a bunch of different ways you can screed concrete. We were taught a couple ways and we're gonna do it the old fashioned way here you're gonna see just how fast that is But that is a highly, sought after concrete finisher skill in my opinion.

Let me know what you guys think.

But being able to screed concrete is one thing, being able to screed it really accurately and doing it fast is a whole different ball game. And you're gonna see just how smoothly that goes here in a second.

And that right there, that one skill itself, being really accurate, being really fast, knowing exactly what to look for if something just doesn't look right, and getting it down so you can get this concrete down as quick as you can. That one skill, knowing how to screed concrete, could be super valuable to you if you can learn that.

I do teach that stuff in the concrete underground, all my training videos are in there. If you wanna start to learn how to be a concrete finisher, that's probably your best place to start right there.

And then your second best place is maybe coming to work for somebody like me and just, you know, someone that's willing to teach you the ropes, is gonna help make you even more valuable because hands on is really the best way to learn how to do concrete. So Darren's running the chute, we have a lot of rear dump trucks here.

We have a few front dumps, but not many so a lot of trucks are rear dump being able to know how fast to get that concrete to come out of the chute, how fast or slow to move the chute, along without getting it too high or too low, that all takes experience and when I'm talking about experience and again a concrete finishers type of experience and then raking the concrete behind the chute and getting it almost perfect.

Now, not everybody can do that, that's a skill that's learned over time. Like I could hand that concrete rake to anybody, just anybody off the street and they can come in here and they can move that concrete around but they have no idea what they're doing.

They have no idea how high or low it's going to take. They have no idea that Luke's making that look 10 times easier than it really is. And they don't know what to look for.

So yes, anybody could rake concrete but knowing how to rake it properly is a whole different ballgame. And that takes, you know, a few weeks of experience working with someone like, Luke or Darren or myself to know the ins and outs of just how to rake it around, how to move it around without hurting yourself, without wasting time, and doing it as quickly as possible so you can get this concrete floor poured.

Alright, so here's what I consider kind of between an experienced laborer and a finisher skill is mag floating the edges to grade. I mean, that's the level of the floor. (watch in the video)

You cannot screw that up. So that's really important to be able to mag float the edges right to the chalk line and get them perfect.

We're very fussy about that when we do that. So when we're teaching somebody that and somebody new, you can tell there's a big difference between somebody that's new that's doing it or somebody that's very experienced. Now here's your hundred thousand dollar a year skill right here.

Being able to to screed concrete. (watch in the video) That's a 14 foot screed. A lot of guys do that by themselves. A lot of guys do it standing up. We do it this way with two guys on the screed.

You can see how smooth that goes so there's an area of about 14 by 14 that Luke and Darren just screeded in about twenty or thirty seconds now I don't think it can really get much faster than that whether using a vibrating screed a stand up screed or your screed it like we are it just doesn't really get any faster. 

It's not just about speed either it's really about accuracy right, this floor is sloped so where they started on the back wall to where they finish up here in the middle of the floor slopes an inch and you can't have a dip you can't have a hump it's got to be a nice even slope on that floor so when they do get water in the garage, it's gonna run towards the garage doors.

It's just not gonna puddle up. So again, super highly rated skill there as far as I'm concerned. If you can learn how to screed concrete like that, I mean, you can work for me any day. Now, what I might do a little differently than others is, like my two top guys there, Darren and Luke, I pay them a salary.

So, they make a really, really high wage for a salary. And again, we're living in Maine, so I mean, their wages, although we consider them really high here in Maine, probably double the national average as far as wages go for a salary.

But then on top of that, we'll have other jobs that they'll make bonuses on. So whether we do a stamp concrete job or maybe an epoxy floor coating, something that requires a little more skill or decorative stuff, they'll make bonuses on top of their salary.

So, not only do they make a really high salary, but depending on the type of work we do, they can make some big bonuses on some decorative jobs that we might do. And they do. They both do. For me now, they've learned so much about concrete that they can do estimates now. They can go out and look at jobs and check them out.

And then they can decide how much to charge for that job based on what it's gonna take, whether it's a concrete slab or, simple garage floors when they're inside frost walls like this. The prep work. But mostly, you know, they're pricing stuff like stamp concrete, like epoxy coatings on floors, barn slabs, you know, basic stuff that people call us to do from all over the state.

And then, we have what we call a regular contractor here. We're actually working for the foundation contractor.

So, the foundation contractor on a job like this, he bids the job with the builder or the general whoever the general contractor is. It just happens to be the builder on this job. So the foundation contractor sends him the estimate. The builder hires the foundation guy. The foundation guy includes the concrete floors in his bid.

And when they win the job, they just sub the floors out to us. We have a set price, a square foot price that we work for when we have these regular contractors that we work for all the time. So that makes things pretty simple.

And then, they just get all these jobs like this and they just send us the jobs. They don't even have to ask us for prices anymore because they already know what we charge.

We'll do a couple hundred jobs like this a year based on that. So that makes, that that gives us a pretty good idea just how much work we're gonna do for regular contractors every single year.

On top of that, we can kind of pick and choose the jobs where people might call us individually or contact us on the crete quote form, and we can kind of pick and choose jobs that way just the kind of jobs we wanna do above and beyond these types of jobs right here.

So again, you know, if you wanna earn a very high wage, you've got to be able to learn how to be a concrete finisher, in my opinion. Learn the skills it takes.

Learn how to be able to screed concrete no matter who you're working for, however they screed, take on the responsibility of learning how to do that, learn how to be able to set grades, what it means to be able to set grades, how to set them right, things to look for that might look out of place, that might not look quite right as far as the sub grade goes.

And then, you know, in our cases, like finishing, we're gonna have some power like, we're actually pouring two floors here today, two garage floors, although I only have one on this video. Learn how to finish concrete by hand. Learn how to mag float concrete. Learn how to steel trowel concrete.

Learn the timing of when to finish concrete. The timing is a big big deal. It's different every single day depending on just what you're doing, what the weather is, if the wind's blowing, if it's 50 degrees or if it's 90 degrees, it's always a little different.

Those skills in itself are very valuable and then power troweling, I mean, we power trowel most our stuff with walk behind power trowels because we don't do the big commercial stuff anymore. I was brought up on commercial stuff.

I did that for years and years. I didn't even have ride on power trowels when I was doing commercial stuff, so we would finish 20,000 square feet of concrete floors with all walk behinds and always shorthanded.

But, I learn how to finish concrete. And again, I have those trainings, how to power trowel concrete trainings in the concrete underground if you want to learn that.

This right here is a what I consider a very basic finisher skill, knowing how to bull float, but it is very important getting the floor bull floated and doing it correctly is going to help make the finishing process a heck of a lot easier in my opinion.

There's a way to bull float concrete based on how you screed, usually you want to bullfloat at a 90 degree angle to what you screeded the concrete at, sometimes you can't do that because you don't have access to that, but if you screed the concrete right, if you get it down, if you get it nice and level and get it flat then you can bull float just about any way you want.

So again, let me know what you guys think about concrete finishers wages, Maybe you could chime in about what state you live in, just give me a rough average about what a concrete finisher might make in your state.

Again, I live in Maine, and you know, finishers wages probably start at $30 an hour, they might go to $40 ish, maybe maybe even up to $50 depending on if that concrete finisher is a foreman or superintendent or something like that.

But I would say, yeah, in between $30 and $50 here for concrete finishers in the state of Maine would be something you'd be looking at. And then, you know, we have company vehicles, so you don't have to take your vehicle to the job.

I didn't want the guys driving their personal vehicles to the job site if they didn't have to because a lot of job sites we work on like this, like this one has all kinds of room, but a lot of job sites we work on have very little room. So, again, here's the other floor we're pouring here today. Concrete's all, showing up, ready to go.

Luke's over here. He's getting it started. So a hundred thousand dollar concrete skill guy. Learn how to screed concrete and be a concrete finisher. Let me know what you guys think.

Thanks a lot.

how much do concrete workers make per day in central north dakota

From some of the comments in the video:

@laftch1 (from the comments)

I'm 72 y.o. and still finishing concrete after more than 45 years. Started out as a laborer with a landscaping company and moved on to new home foundation construction during the building boom in Central CA. coast of the late 70's, 80's, 90's, 2000's. Now in central N.D. Still doing it all from chute, rake, screed, bull float, knee board, to machine. Although I've never been on a rider. I work for several contractors on a per day basis during the season.. Usually $200-250 per. Not bad for 4-5 hrs mostly floating and machine.

how much do concrete workers make in nebraska

@jacobs-uo6si1

Nebraska -  Good laborer $20 - $23 an hour, and a Finisher $24 - $28 per hour

Crew leader / Forman who can also finish concrete $30 - $35 per hour

how much do non union concrete workers make per day in kentucky

@Albrights1

I worked in the Carpenters Union in Louisville Kentucky and some companies will let carpenters union carpenters finish concrete but for the most part all the finishing in the Union in Kentucky is done by the laborers union but I was making $27.59 an hour in the Carpenters Union as a journeyman but got more experience I have over 20 years experience in finishing but average $350 to $450 a day on non-union work.

what does a union concrete finisher make in michigan

@Jv956921

My brother is making over $50 per hour as a union concrete finisher in Michigan, with around 4 seasons of finishing experience. He mostly does commercial curbs and sidewalks (civil work), but I think he kind of lucked out with how much the bosses like him. I'll be starting as a residential flatwork labor soon myself so I appreciate this channel.

how much do concrete finishers make in washington state

@carstenbuilds20

We’re making $40/hr here in Washington state

how much do concrete workers make in PA (pennsylvania)

@edhlavaty

Prevailing wages are over $43 hour in PA. That depends on County. That's All benefits included in your pay. The company will not deduct anything from the rate. Most prevailing wage concrete finishers are over $200k per year.

SUBSCRIBE to my You Tube Channel

To Home Page

One more way to share everything-about-concrete.com

Would you prefer to share this page with others by linking to it?

  1. Click on the HTML link code below.
  2. Copy and paste it, adding a note of your own, into your blog, a Web page, forums, a blog comment, your Facebook account, or anywhere that someone would find this page valuable.