Back on the subject of price. I guess it depends on how you charge and what you charge for your time.

If you are finishing in place there will be a lot of travel time and unless you are up to speed on taping off each lite separately, the all the time that it takes to cut around said lites, I would be careful on my estimates. I would want to have my finish in mind, too. I have put on too much "fast dry" clear coating that didn't. You will be able to go around the jamb/trim pretty quick, and build multiple coats.

DEPENDING ON THE FINISH CHOSEN, I could see somewhere around $1200. Dust control? Multiple coats? Floor/wall protection? Removing hardware (dead bolt, lockset, peep hole, interior chain/lever, etc.) and reinstalling it later each time? How many coats, how many trips?

For poly/varnish/and the other similar finishes, 8 hours is dry to the touch but will often stay sticky. Closing the door on a jamb coated at the same time will cause fouling of the finish sometimes after 10 hours.

I like to use the polyurethane conversion lacquers, but those are all sprayed. I don't like to hand cut in around door lites, I don't like to screw with hardware coming off and reinstalling, and I hate multiple trips for the same task. If you can block off enough to spray, you could get three coats of one of the poly convertibles on in a day. I have done as many as five..

I would be more involved in trying to figure out my time based on the finish used and job site conditions than I would the actual finishing. You got the finishing. IF the door had a lot of lites, and IF they wanted the inside finished to match, and IF I had to fill nail holes and sand out scuffs, I could see $1200 for a PREMIUM finish. I would probably have trips to the site to do all the prep, remove the hardware, cover the floors/concrete/porch mateiral and apply the finish, and return later to reinstall the hardware and pick up my drop cloths, etc. as long after product application as possible. Three coats? Six trips.

That being said, I spray new metal/fiberglass doors with another specialty product (commercial use fast dry) enamel on occasion with two coats of paint and I only charge $500 and try to sell the client new hardware to bump the price a bit. The enamel I use gets so hard (if properly applied) that you can't scratch it with your fingernail and it holds up great. I wish I could stock up on it; my Sherwin Williams rep told me they are going to quit selling the product to the public, if they haven't already. Too many VOCs.

So just as a talking point, what is your "per pass" side charge on a brushed door with 6 - 8 panels, no windows or lites, pre-primed or already painted? Talking minor prep, painted in place or int the client garage.

Robert