Real per-square-foot ranges for a new concrete patio in Los Angeles - broom finish, stamped, and exposed aggregate - plus the 500-square-foot stormwater line, backyard access, and the difference between adding a patio and replacing one.
A new concrete patio in Los Angeles generally runs $10 to $18 per square foot for a standard broom-finish pour, $12 to $22 for exposed aggregate, and $16 to $28 per square foot once you move into stamped and colored work. For a common 400-square-foot backyard patio, that is roughly $4,000 to $7,200 plain and $6,400 to $11,200 stamped. Those are installed numbers for a straightforward job - they move with access, soil, demolition, and whether your patio adds hard surface or merely replaces it.
This surprises people, because a patio slab is usually thinner. A driveway carries vehicles and is typically poured at four inches with heavier reinforcement; a patio carries furniture and people. Yet the per-square-foot price frequently lands higher, and the reason is arithmetic rather than concrete.
Every pour has fixed costs - mobilization, forming, finishing crew, a minimum truck charge - and a smaller job spreads those over fewer square feet. A 600-square-foot driveway and a 300-square-foot patio need much the same setup. Add that most patios sit in a back yard, and the economics get worse before a single yard of concrete is placed: if the mixer cannot back up to the forms, the concrete travels by pump line, buggy, or wheelbarrow, and that is labor you are paying for on both ends. A side gate too narrow for a buggy is one of the single largest swing factors in an LA patio bid. See our Los Angeles driveway cost guide for the vehicle-rated side of this comparison.
This is the LA-specific detail most patio quotes never mention, and it is the one worth understanding before you size the slab.
The City of Los Angeles Low Impact Development ordinance applies to projects that create, add, or replace more than 500 square feet of impervious area. Below that threshold, a small residential project is generally outside the ordinance. Above it, the project is expected to manage stormwater on site - the design standard is built around capturing or infiltrating the runoff rather than sending it straight to the street. Compliance strategies are ordinary landscape hardware: infiltration, permeable paving, planter areas, dry wells, rain storage.
Two practical consequences follow. First, a patio of 450 square feet and a patio of 550 square feet are not simply a hundred feet apart in price - they can be different kinds of project. Second, and less obvious, the threshold counts area that is created, added, or replaced, so the honest answer to "does this apply to me?" depends on what is under the patio today. That is the next section, and it is where most of the confusion lives. Check current thresholds with LA Sanitation's stormwater program before finalizing a layout, because these numbers are revised periodically.
Replacing a cracked patio slab that is already there is, in surface terms, close to a wash - you are removing hard surface and putting hard surface back. Pouring a new patio over what is currently grass or planting bed is different: you are converting soft ground to hard ground, and that added area is what drainage rules care about.
It also changes where water goes on your own property, which matters more in Los Angeles than the modest rainfall totals suggest. Our storms arrive concentrated - a season's water can land in a handful of days - and a new slab that slopes the wrong way will move all of it somewhere. The fix is cheap at design time and expensive later: set the fall away from the house at roughly a quarter-inch per foot, decide deliberately where the water goes, and where the patio meets a planting bed, give it somewhere to soak in rather than a hard edge to pond against.
If you are replacing rather than adding, budget separately for demolition and haul-off. Breaking out and disposing of an existing slab is its own line item, and a thick or heavily reinforced one costs more to remove than to pour.
Broom finish is the baseline: durable, slip-resistant, easy to repair, and the cheapest square foot on the list. Exposed aggregate washes back the surface paste to reveal the stone, giving texture and hiding surface wear well - a sensible middle tier, and grippy underfoot around a pool. Stamped and colored concrete is the top of the range and reads convincingly as flagstone, slate, or plank when it is done well; it also demands more skill, and a bad stamp job is conspicuous in a way a bad broom finish is not.
Colored work has one durable LA advantage worth naming: in a dry, high-UV climate, integral color - pigment mixed through the concrete rather than applied on top - holds up far better than a surface-applied color that can wear through at traffic points. If you are weighing poured concrete against a unit paver, our stamped concrete vs. pavers comparison covers the trade-offs in detail.
For a plain, uncovered, at-grade patio slab, usually not. Concrete flatwork that is not more than 30 inches above grade and does not sit over a basement is generally exempt from a building permit, which covers the great majority of residential patios. What changes the answer is a structure: a patio cover, pergola, or attached roof is a permitted structure in its own right, and its footings are part of that review. Drainage work and significant grading can also pull a project into review.
Verify your specific project with LADBS - or with your own city, since Santa Monica, Pasadena, Burbank, Glendale, and the county's unincorporated areas each run their own counters and their own rules. Our Los Angeles concrete permit guide walks through which jobs need one.
A quote that is only a square-foot number and a total is not enough information to compare. A real bid names the slab thickness, the reinforcement (mesh or rebar, and at what spacing), the base material and its compacted depth, the joint plan, the finish, and who is responsible for demolition and haul-off. Those items are most of the cost and all of the longevity.
Be especially alert to a bid that is materially below the others. In this trade the saving is almost never in the concrete itself, which is a commodity - it is in the base, the reinforcement, or the thickness, and each of those is invisible the day the job finishes and decisive five years on. Ask when you can walk on it and when furniture can go back; curing takes longer than most people expect, and rushing that window is a good way to mark a new slab permanently.
How much does a 400-square-foot patio cost here? Roughly $4,000 to $7,200 broom-finished, and about $6,400 to $11,200 stamped and colored. Access is the biggest swing factor - a back yard the truck cannot reach costs more to pour than the same slab out front.
Is concrete cheaper than pavers? Usually yes on the initial install, particularly for a plain broom finish. Pavers cost more up front, but individual units can be lifted and reset, which is worth something on expansive clay. Stamped concrete and pavers land much closer together.
How thick should a patio be? Four inches is standard for foot traffic and furniture. Thicken and reinforce under a hot tub, outdoor kitchen, or anything heavy - decided before the pour, not after.
How long before we can use it? You can usually walk on it within a day or two, but keep furniture and planters off for about a week and vehicles off entirely. Full strength takes about a month.
Want a real number for your yard? Send us the dimensions and a photo of the access and we will give you an honest range for your specific site, along with what we would do about drainage before anyone pours anything.
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