National rank
8 of 30
7 towns model higher than this one.
£206 in Milton Keynes, and Bristol lands on the same figure.
South East pay of £775.80 a week on £318,000 housing gets there.
Bristol gets there on South West pay of £728.70 and £354,000.
Modelled from two published statistics, South East median weekly pay of £775.80 and Milton Keynes housing at £318,000, both sourced 5 July 2026 and cross checked further down this page.
How Milton Keynes compares with the other 29
30 towns, one axis. Milton Keynes is the marked tick, at £206 on a rail running from £160 in Sunderland up to £235 in Guildford, which puts it £6 above the drawn £200 benchmark.
Milton Keynes £206
£200 benchmark
Milton Keynes sits £29 under Guildford at the top and £46 over Sunderland at the bottom.
One other town shares that mark: Bristol, also £206.
Milton Keynes's marker is the decorator rate.
It is the trade the model anchors on, and the other 16 move with the same multiplier, from £144 for general labourer work to £288 for electrician work.
Regional rank
5 of 7
Against the 7 towns we model in the South East.
Versus benchmark
£6 up
3.0 percent above the £200 national decorator benchmark.
What 17 trades charge in Milton Keynes
17 trades, one town. A Milton Keynes day runs from £144 for general labourer up to £288 for electrician, which is a £144 span on what is otherwise the same working day, priced through South East earnings.
Every one of the 17 is the same 3 percent up on Milton Keynes geography, because one multiplier built from the South East pay and Milton Keynes house prices moves all of them together.
| Trade | Day rate | Modelled range |
|---|---|---|
| Electrician£8 above the £280 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £288 | |
| Plumber£8 above the £270 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £278 | |
| Bricklayer£7 above the £260 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £267 | |
| Gas and Heating Engineer£7 above the £259 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £266 | |
| General Builder£7 above the £253 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £260 | |
| Carpenter and joiner£7 above the £240 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £247 | |
| Roofer£7 above the £239 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £246 | |
| Plasterer£6 above the £230 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £236 | |
| Tiler£6 above the £229 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £235 | |
| Drainage Engineer£6 above the £225 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £231 | |
| Decorative Plasterer£6 above the £225 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £231 | |
| GroundworkerModelled only£6 above the £213 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £219 | |
| Painter and decorator£6 above the £200 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £206 | |
| Handyman£5 above the £188 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £193 | |
| Cladding Installer£5 above the £175 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £180 | |
| Suspended Ceiling Installer£5 above the £175 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £180 | |
| General Labourer£4 above the £140 benchmark on Milton Keynes geography. | £144 |
Heads upEvery benchmark is a modelled estimate published beside the spread the price guides themselves publish, and is never the median of a directory.Each row above says what Milton Keynes does to that trade.The day rate ranges the price guides publish are national, so they sit on each trade's own page rather than being reprinted on all 30 town pages.Follow any Milton Keynes row to read them.
Scale every bar drawn on £110 to £440Bar the modelled range, the rate x 0.75 and x 1.30No spread 1 of the 17 rows, marked MODELLED ONLY, where no UK price guide publishes a comparable day rate
Your next step
You have what 17 trades charge in Milton Keynes, so the next step is pricing one of your own jobs there.
The Rate Sorted calculator opens already set to Milton Keynes, so your own costs go in and a Milton Keynes rate you can quote with comes out.
How long the work takes in Milton Keynes
A rate prices a day and a job takes several of them. This site publishes a length for 3 of the 17 trades above, so those 3 Milton Keynes rates can be multiplied out.
A decorating job in Milton Keynes comes to £412 to £824, on the 8th dearest day rate of the 30 towns on this site.
decorating in Milton Keynes
£412 to £824
A painter and decorator day in Milton Keynes models at £206, and decorating a living room takes 2 to 4 days.Source: Robin Gofton, Decorator's Forum UK, job reports.How long does decorating take?
plastering in Milton Keynes
£260 to £401
A plasterer day in Milton Keynes models at £236, and skimming 35 square metres of wall and a 16 square metre ceiling takes 1.1 to 1.7 days.Source: Methvin plastering production rates, updated 1 August 2026, fast to slow.How long does plastering take?
tiling in Milton Keynes
£588 to £752
A tiler day in Milton Keynes models at £235, and fixing and grouting 20 square metres of bathroom wall takes 2.5 to 3.2 days.Source: Methvin tiling production rates, updated 1 August 2026, fast to slow.How long does tiling take?
Read the sumEach figure above is a Milton Keynes day rate multiplied by a job length, and Day rate or price per job? is where that sum is worked in full.It is our arithmetic rather than a price anybody quoted, and none of the 3 lengths is a Milton Keynes measurement.The same 3 jobs come to the same money in Bristol, which reaches £206 a decorator day on £354,000 housing and South West pay of £728.70.
Why Milton Keynes prices as it does
Milton Keynes reaches £206 by a different route to Bristol.
£318,000
The average house price, against £291,000 across the UK.
£775.80
The South East median weekly pay Milton Keynes is modelled on, 1.2 percent above the UK median of £766.60.
1.09x
Property against the UK average, 9 percent above it.
ONS local housing prices, April 2026 provisional, UK House Price Index.
Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE) April 2025 regional medians.
Registers sourced 5 July 2026.
How Milton Keynes stands on the two cross checks
Both are published statistics. Neither sets a rate on this page, and neither is a survey of what anyone in Milton Keynes charged for a day of work; what they show is why Milton Keynes lands where it does.
South East WEEKLY PAY
£775.80
Milton Keynes is modelled on the South East median for full time work, according to ONS ASHE April 2025.It is 1.2 percent above the UK median of £766.60 a week, and Milton Keynes models at £206 a decorator day on it.South East ranks 2 of the 11 regions on the register, and Milton Keynes is 5 of the 7 South East towns we model on it.
Milton Keynes HOUSE PRICES
£318,000
The Milton Keynes average, data from the ONS local housing price pages, April 2026 provisional.That is 1.09 times the UK average of £291,000, per the UK House Price Index.8 of the 30 towns we cover have more expensive housing.
Milton Keynes questions
The same answers the structured data on this page gives a search engine, word for word, and every figure in them is a Milton Keynes figure printed above.
What is a typical day rate in Milton Keynes?
A decorator day in Milton Keynes models at £206.
That is number 8 of the 30 towns on this site.
Across the 17 trades a Milton Keynes day runs from £144 for general labourer work up to £288 for electrician work, every one of them modelled on South East earnings and Milton Keynes house prices.
Which trade charges the most per day in Milton Keynes?
Electrician, at £288 a day.
General Labourer work is the cheapest of the 17, at £144.
That leaves a £144 span for the same working day in the same town, and it happens because every trade carries its own national benchmark before any Milton Keynes geography is applied to it.
Why do Milton Keynes and Bristol have the same day rate?
Both model at £206 for a decorator day.
They arrive there from different places: Milton Keynes on South East weekly pay of £775.80 against an average house price of £318,000, Bristol on South West pay of £728.70 against £354,000.
Housing is the wider of the two gaps, with Milton Keynes at 1.09 times the UK average house price and Bristol at 1.22 times.
The earnings side of the model closes most of that gap back up, which is how both land on £206.
Is Milton Keynes dearer than Reading?
Reading is the dearer of the two: £206 in Milton Keynes against £210 in Reading, a £4 gap on a decorator day.
Milton Keynes and Reading both sit in the South East.
Milton Keynes ranks 5 of the 7 towns we model there.
Why are Milton Keynes rates above the national benchmark?
Two published statistics move the Milton Keynes figure: South East median weekly pay of £775.80, 2 of the 11 regions on the register, and a local average house price of £318,000, 9 of the 30 towns.
Together they put Milton Keynes £6 over the £200 national decorator benchmark.
That is 3.0 percent up.
Can I use these Milton Keynes figures as a quote?
No. £206 is a modelled town figure, and the modelled range beside it, £155 to £268, is arithmetic on that figure rather than a measurement of Milton Keynes jobs.
16 of the 17 Milton Keynes rows carry a spread that UK price guides publish nationally, on the trade's own page, and 1 are modelled with none.
Take the data
17 Milton Keynes rows, £144 to £288. Each row carries its own provenance, so a modelled Milton Keynes figure can never be read as a sourced one.
Download · CSVmilton-keynes.csvOne row per trade, with the rate, the modelled range and the published spread.
Cite this pageThe Day Rate Report, Milton Keynes day rates, 30 September 2026, https://thedayrate.co.uk/day-rates/milton-keynes/
Embed this figure
The Milton Keynes card carries the decorator rate and the date it was sourced, and the link goes to this page.
<a href="https://thedayrate.co.uk/day-rates/milton-keynes/"><img src="https://thedayrate.co.uk/og/day-rates-milton-keynes.png" alt="Day rates for 17 trades in Milton Keynes, from The Day Rate Report" width="1200" height="630"></a>
The Milton Keynes figures are free to use in an article, a fact check or a local story, and a credit with a link back is all we ask, under CC BY 4.0.