The short answer: professional Christmas light installation in Canada costs about $400 to $800 for a single-storey home and $700 to $1,500 for a two-storey home in 2026, lights, install, and takedown included. Per foot, installers quote roughly $2 to $5 for labour only and $5 to $10 with the lights supplied. The season is short — quotes in September and October, ladders from late October to early December — so the price you set now is the price you live with. Here's the full rate card, and how to turn it into your packages.
Christmas light installation prices in Canada (2026)
Residential work is quoted per home from a measured roofline. These are first-year ranges with lights, installation, and January takedown included unless noted:
| Job | Typical price | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Single-storey home, roofline | $400–$800 | Often 80–120 feet of roofline; one ladder, fast install |
| Two-storey home, roofline | $700–$1,500 | More footage, peaks, and height; the core residential job |
| Large home, complex roofline or trees | $1,500–$3,000+ | Multiple peaks, tree wraps, pathway and shrub lighting |
| Returning client, lights already owned (two-storey) | $350–$800 | Labour only: roughly 45–70% of the first-year price |
| Commercial storefront or building | $1,500–$10,000+ | Quoted per site; lifts, permits, and after-hours work drive it |
Ranges compiled September 2026 from Canadian installers' published guides and rate cards, checked as of September 2026: Set to Shine (GTA: $400–$800 single-storey, $700–$1,500 two-storey, $1,500–$3,000+ large or complex), Care Electrical (Metro Vancouver: $2–$5 per foot install only, $5–$10 with lights), Shine City (Lower Mainland: $650–$1,200 average first year, year two 30–50% less, commercial $1,500–$10,000+), and Shack Shine Toronto (from $1,100 with lights; year two about 45–55% of that). The returning-client row applies those year-two discounts to the two-storey range.
What should you charge?
Two picks and a slider — your range, your projected income.
That's the plan — Biller is how it actually lands in your account.
Quote it, book it, get paidEstimates from this guide's market ranges — your market decides the rest.
Quoting $1,000 rooflines? Get paid before the lights come down.
Biller turns each booking into a scheduled install and takedown, with a one-tap invoice for each — clients pay by e-Transfer or card, and card and Autodeposit payments are recorded as they land.
Start free — no credit cardPer foot, per home, or per package?
Measure per foot, sell per home. Linear footage is how you build the number — a bungalow with 80 feet of roofline and a two-storey with 200 feet plus peaks are different jobs. But clients buy "the house lit up", so present one package price, not a tape-measure invoice.
- Install only ($2–$5 per foot): the client already owns the lights. Lowest ticket, lowest risk for you, and the client's old strands are your mid-season service call waiting to happen. Price any repair or replacement of their lights separately.
- Supply and install ($5–$10 per foot): you buy commercial-grade LEDs and clips, then sell them to the client in year one. Your inventory is paid for on the first invoice, and year two becomes a labour-only job at roughly half the price — easy to renew, still profitable.
- Leased, all-in packages: you own the lights, install them, service them, take them down, and store them. The client pays the full package every year and never deals with a tangled box. Premium Lower Mainland packages start around $8.50 per foot with storage included. This is the model that builds a recurring business — but you need somewhere dry to store labelled, per-client bins.
Roofline vs trees and shrubs
The roofline is your anchor product; everything else is an add-on priced by time and materials. Wrapping a tree trunk and branches is slow, strand-hungry work — a mature tree can take longer than the whole front roofline — so quote it per tree after you've seen it, never per foot of roofline. Shrubs, net lights, pathway stakes, wreaths, and door frames are small add-ons that raise the ticket without another ladder setup.
Commercial work
Storefronts, restaurants, and condo lobbies pay well ($1,500 to $10,000+) but want after-hours installs, lift work, proof of insurance naming them, and invoices that fit their accounts-payable cycle. Quote a site visit first, and get the install date, takedown date, and payment terms in writing.
Permanent lighting — track-mounted LED systems left up all year — is a different product at roughly $15 to $30 per linear foot installed. It's a one-time sale closer to trim and electrical work, not a seasonal service.
Install, takedown, and storage: price all three
New installers price the November ladder day and forget January. Every seasonal job is really three visits of work:
- Installation (late October to early December): the bulk of the labour, and the only visit the client sees.
- Takedown (early to mid January): in the cold, often on icy roofs and ladders, and just as long as the install. Build it into the package price and put the date on the quote — it's a scheduled job, not a favour.
- Storage (February to October): if you keep the lights, you need labelled bins, space, and time to test strands before they go back up. Charge for it inside the package or as a line item.
Add a line for mid-season service calls too — a strand that fails on December 20 is urgent to the client. Include one call in premium packages; charge for extras on the others.
Safety and insurance for ladder and roof work
This is roof work in freezing weather. Before your first job, get commercial general liability insurance that explicitly covers working at height and on roofs — many policies for landscapers and cleaners exclude it — and ask your broker about damage to the client's shingles, eavestroughs, and siding. Use proper fall protection on steep or two-storey roofs, ladder stabilisers that keep the ladder off the eavestrough, and plastic clips rather than nails or staples, which puncture shingles and trim and can cause leaks. If you hire help, check your province's workers' compensation rules before they climb anything.
Price the risk: a steep two-storey roofline should cost noticeably more per foot than a bungalow, and if a roof is beyond your gear, say no or refer it out.
Setting your own rate
The market range tells you what's plausible. Your season tells you what's survivable:
- Count your real install days. Between late October and early December you might get 30 to 35 workable days once rain, wind, and early sunsets are out. If you can do two homes a day, that's roughly 60 to 70 installs — the whole year's revenue for this service.
- Price the full job, not the ladder hour. Add up install and takedown time, travel, lights (or your amortised lease inventory), clips, timers and extension cords, storage, and insurance. Divide by installs. That's your floor.
- Raise prices as the calendar fills. Early-booking prices in September; standard in October; late bookings after mid-November at a premium. Scarcity is real — use it.
Then position: insured, photographed portfolio, a written package that names takedown and storage, and a quote the same day. That's what lets you sit at the top of the local range.
Are you undercharging?
Five quick questions. Be honest — nobody's watching.
Are you booked solid more than two weeks out?
A full calendar is the market telling you your price is too low.
Have you raised your rates in the last 12 months?
Costs went up this year. If your rate didn't, you took a pay cut.
When you quote a price, does anyone ever say no?
If nobody ever pushes back, you're leaving room on the table.
Do you charge for travel time — or build it into your price?
Unpaid driving between installs quietly eats your real hourly rate.
Do you drop your price whenever someone asks for a deal?
Discounting on request trains clients to always ask.
Priced about right
You're showing the classic signs of healthy pricing — price pushback now and then, regular raises, travel accounted for. Your next win isn't the rate, it's the time you lose to admin between installs.
You're leaving money on the table
A couple of undercharging signals showed up. The fix is usually one honest raise for new clients — $5 more per install on a full week is thousands a year you're currently donating.
You're seriously undercharging
Almost every signal fired. Booked solid, never raising, never hearing no — that's not luck, that's a price well below what your market would pay. Raise your rate for every new client starting this week; your regulars can follow later.
Sixty installs, sixty takedowns, one clean season.
Biller books each client from your link, puts the install and the January takedown on your schedule, and sends the invoice in one tap — with reminders for the ones still unpaid in the new year.
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Christmas lights are a six-week product, which is why the installers who do best run them alongside the other exterior work the same client already needs. You're on the ladder at the roofline anyway: eavestrough cleaning in late October — before the clips go on — is the natural pairing, and clean gutters make a better-looking install. After the lights go up, the same driveway needs snow removal, and a lights client is an easy seasonal contract. In spring, window cleaning, pressure washing, and landscaping fill the rest of the year.
When GST/HST starts to apply
Christmas light installation is a taxable service in Canada, but you don't charge GST/HST until your revenue crosses $30,000 over four consecutive calendar quarters — the CRA's small-supplier threshold. A seasonal business can pass it in a single quarter: thirty $1,000 installs in October and November is the whole threshold. Once you're over, you register, add tax to every invoice, and remit it. The full rules are in our plain-English GST/HST guide.
Because the money lands in one burst, keep a running total of every payment as it arrives so the line doesn't catch you mid-season.
Prices are market ranges compiled from the Canadian sources linked above in September 2026 and will vary by city, roofline, and package.
Common questions
How much does Christmas light installation cost in Canada?
Published Canadian price guides put a professionally installed roofline at about $400 to $800 for a single-storey home and $700 to $1,500 for a two-storey home in 2026, with large homes, complex rooflines, and extensive tree lighting running $1,500 to $3,000 or more. First-year prices usually include the lights, the install, and the takedown in January.
How much should I charge per foot for Christmas lights?
Canadian installers commonly quote $2 to $5 per linear foot for installation only (the client owns the lights) and $5 to $10 per foot when you supply the lights too. Premium, all-in packages with maintenance and storage run higher — one Lower Mainland company starts at $8.50 per foot. Measure the roofline, don't guess it.
Should I rent the lights to clients or sell them?
Both models work. Selling the lights in year one (Toronto installers commonly bundle lights, install, and takedown from about $1,100) gets your inventory paid for immediately, and year two drops to labour only — roughly 45 to 70 percent of the first-year price. Leasing keeps ownership with you: the client pays every year, you store and reuse the strands, and the lights only go up on your roofs.
What should a Christmas light package include?
The standard package is design, supply (or lease) of commercial-grade LED lights, installation, mid-season service calls if a strand fails, takedown in January, and off-season storage. Spell each piece out on the quote. Clients compare your all-in price to a cheaper install-only quote, and the takedown and storage are what they forget until January.
How much do permanent Christmas lights cost in Canada?
Permanent track-mounted LED systems typically run $15 to $30 per linear foot installed in Canada, which puts a whole roofline in the thousands of dollars. That is a different product from seasonal installation — closer to an electrical and trim job — and needs different skills, suppliers, and in some cases a licensed electrician.
When should I start booking Christmas light installations?
Start quoting in September and push for bookings by mid-October. Installs run from late October to early December, and your ladder days are capped by daylight and weather. Once the calendar is full, every extra request should cost more, not less.
Do I need to charge GST/HST on Christmas light installation?
Not until your business revenue passes $30,000 over four consecutive calendar quarters, the CRA small-supplier threshold. Twenty two-storey homes at $1,000 each gets you two-thirds of the way in one season, and if you also clean gutters or clear snow, it all counts as one business.
Building a year-round exterior route? See the going rates for gutter and eavestrough cleaning, snow removal, landscaping, lawn mowing, window cleaning, and pressure washing.