Hillside lots, lake views and rock a foot under the lawn. We build boulder and rock retaining walls across Kootenai County with our own crew, and you will see the price before we ever come out.
Search for a retaining wall in Coeur d'Alene and a lot of what comes up is directories and referral sites. You fill out a form, your number gets passed to whoever is paying for leads that month, and you find out who is actually building your wall when they call you back.
We are not that. Spokane Retaining Wall Co. is a wall contractor. The people who look at your slope, measure it and write the price are the people who set the stone. We publish what we charge, we stand behind the drainage under every wall, and our Idaho contractor registration is in the footer of every page.
Coeur d'Alene is a city built up the sides of hills. The neighborhoods climb away from the lake toward Canfield Mountain, Fernan and Cherry Hill, and a lot of the usable yard on those lots exists only because someone built a wall. That brings three things we plan around on almost every Idaho job:
On a hillside lot, the water that hits the walls is not just the rain on your yard. It is everything uphill of you. Spring melt off a steep lot moves a lot of water in a short window, so drainage behind the wall and a pipe that actually outlets somewhere is not optional here.
The hillsides above the lake are rocky. It is common to hit stone within a foot or two of the surface, which makes the base trench slower to dig but gives a boulder wall something solid to bear on. We look for it on the site visit so it is in the price.
Head west to Post Falls and north to Rathdrum and the ground flattens into prairie gravel. Walls there are less about holding a hillside and more about leveling a yard, cutting in a driveway or building raised beds. Same build method, different reasons.
The natural-stone wall that suits North Idaho best. Set by excavator, two or three courses high, drained behind.
Boulder walls in CDA →Two or three short walls stepping up a slope instead of one tall one, with planting shelves between.
Tiered walls in CDA →Rotting railroad ties, leaning block and slumped rockeries on older Coeur d'Alene lots, pulled out and rebuilt on a proper base.
Replacement in CDA →We also build stacked rock walls, block walls and drainage fixes behind existing walls.
Same as Spokane. We do not charge an Idaho premium.
| Wall type | Per square foot of wall face |
|---|---|
| Boulder retaining wall | $50 to $65 |
| Stacked rock wall | $45 to $60 |
| Block retaining wall | $40 to $55 |
| Removing an old wall | $10 to $20 extra |
$4,500 project minimum. Drain rock, fabric, perforated pipe and cleanup are included. A 3 by 40 foot boulder wall on a Coeur d'Alene hillside runs about $6,000 to $7,800. A two-tier terrace with two 3-foot walls, 50 feet each, runs about $15,000 to $19,500. The full breakdown is on our Coeur d'Alene cost page.
Idaho cities, including Coeur d'Alene, build from the International Building Code, which exempts a retaining wall 4 feet or shorter, measured from the bottom of the footing to the top of the wall, unless it holds up a surcharge such as a driveway, a building or a steep slope above it. Over that, the wall needs an engineered design and a permit.
We only build walls under that line, and we terrace anything that needs more height. Lots on steep ground inside the city can carry extra hillside rules, and land outside city limits falls under Kootenai County's own grading rules. We check what applies to your address before we quote, and if a project needs a permit or an engineer, we tell you up front.
More in our guide to retaining wall permits in Coeur d'Alene and Kootenai County.
Working on the Washington side too? See our Spokane retaining wall pages.
We build from April through October. North Idaho hillsides are often still wet into May, so early-season Idaho jobs get scheduled once the ground has drained enough to compact a base properly. The calendar fills from the front, so if you want a wall in before summer, winter is the time to send photos.
No. We are a retaining wall contractor. The crew that measures and prices your wall builds it. We do not sell your request to anyone.
We hold Idaho contractor registration before taking any Kootenai County job, and the number is shown in the footer of every page. Ask any wall builder for theirs before work starts.
No. Same per-square-foot prices on both sides of the state line.
Walls 4 feet and under, measured from the bottom of the footing, are generally exempt under the building code Idaho cities use, unless the wall supports a driveway, a building or a slope above it. Steep lots and land outside city limits can carry extra rules. We check your address before we quote.
We build upland walls on lake properties all the time. Work at or below the shoreline is regulated separately in Idaho, so we keep our walls back from the water and will tell you if a project gets close.
We book the season starting in April. Send photos now and we can get you a price and a slot on the calendar.
Send a few photos and rough measurements. We reply with a price range, usually within one business day.