Cost to build a house in Romania in 2026: price per m² calculator, from shell to turnkey

House build cost in Romania per m², 2026

The price per m² built of an ordinary house, with VAT, for the national average, AAC, single storey. The middle is the calculator’s value; the ends, the range of the 2026 sources.

Shell house price in Romania, 2026

A shell ("la roșu") is the house standing, without services or finishes: excavation, foundation, walls, columns, ring beams, slabs, stairs and roof structure. The sources give €350–€600 per m² built, with the middle at €450. Windows and the roof covering vary between offers: ask whether they are included.

What a grey house includes

The grey stage ("la gri") adds to the shell the windows and front door, the runs for power, water, sewer and heating, internal and external plaster and the screed. It does not include the decorative render, tiles, flooring, sanitary ware or the boiler. The sources give €600–€950 per m².

Turnkey house price in Romania, 2026

Turnkey ("la cheie") is the house ready to live in: skim and paint, tiles, flooring, complete bathrooms, internal doors, the boiler, radiators, sockets and switches. The sources give €1,000–€1,500 per m², with the middle at €1,200. Above about €1,600 per m² you are into premium finishes.

Cost per m² of a turnkey house

With VAT, €1,200 per m² built for the national average, from €1,308 in Bucharest-Ilfov to €1,128 in Moldavia (single storey, AAC). Watch for offers "per useful m²": the useful area is about 17–22 % smaller than the total built area, so the same total looks 20–28 % dearer per m².

What a house of 100, 120 or 150 m² costs

The totals for a few ordinary houses, with VAT, AAC, national average, at the mid value. Without land, design, approvals or connections.

Cost of a 120 m² shell house

A single-storey house of 120 m² built costs about €54,000 as a shell (€42,000–€72,000); a two-storey one of the same area, about €50,760, because the foundation and the roof are half the size.

How much it costs to build a 100 m² house

A single-storey house of 100 m² built: about €120,000 turnkey (€100,000–€150,000), €75,000 grey, €45,000 as a shell. If the 100 m² are useful area, count about 120–130 m² built: a single-storey house of 125 m² costs about €150,000 turnkey.

What changes the price per m²

The calculator multiplies the base price by three factors. Each comes from a single source, and the sources do not always agree.

Single storey, loft or two floors

On two floors the foundation and the roof are shared by two levels: a 120 m² AAC shell costs 1,230–2,116 lei/m² on two floors against 1,300–2,273 lei/m² on one, about 6 % less (ghidamenajari.ro). For a loft we found no source: the calculator takes 3 %, halfway, as an estimate.

AAC or brick

A brick house comes out about 2 % dearer per m² than an AAC one: 1,420–2,348 against 1,345–2,356 lei/m² for the shell of a 100 m² single storey. Porotherm 25 clay block cost about 620–630 lei/m³ in 2026 (Hornbach).

The region

Bucharest-Ilfov +9 %, Transylvania +1 %, Oltenia-Muntenia −3 %, Moldavia −6 % against the national average (mid values from sigromid-construct.ro). Another source puts Bucharest and Cluj-Napoca "about a third" above the rest of the country: the differences between sources are larger than those between regions.

Difficult ground, slope, access

A foundation on weak ground can cost up to 30 % more, and a sloping site adds 15–30 % to the cost. The calculator leaves them out: the soil survey and the design show them.

m² built or m² useful

The calculator starts from the footprint (Ac, the ground-floor area on the outside of the walls) and multiplies it by the floors: × 1 for one storey, × 2 for two, × 1.65 with a loft (the loft counts 0.65, the part with standing height). The price is per m² of total built area. The useful area (the rooms, without the walls) is about 78–83 % of the total. Ask the offer to state which m² the price is per, and whether it includes VAT.

Costs outside the house

The price per m² does not include the land, the design, the permit, the utility connections, the fence, the paths or the unforeseen. The sources give:

VAT 21 %

Since 1 August 2025 VAT is 21 % (Law 141/2025); the reduced 9 % rate for new dwellings is gone, with transitional cases only (ANAF, via StartupCafe). The prices on this page include VAT; many offers do not, so ask for it in writing.

A firm with a warranty or an unlicensed crew

People who built with a firm under contract and with a warranty paid on average about 20 % more than with an unlicensed crew. The difference pays for the invoices, the warranty and the liability for defects.

Why materials cost more in 2026

The EU carbon border levy (CBAM) on imports from outside the Union pushes up the price of cement, steel and aluminium. Rebar cost 4.5–5.2 lei/kg at the start of 2026, B250 concrete 450–500 lei/m³ without transport and pumping.

A real shell estimate, 2026

A builder broke down for playtech.ro, in February 2026, a single-storey house of 135 m² built (110 m² useful), as a shell (lei converted to € at 5.3495):

What the estimate leaves out

About €400 per m² built, close to the middle of the range on this page (€450). Not included: the design (about €3,000), taxes and approvals (about €2,000), site organisation and losses (about 30,000 lei, €5,610), the fence, connections, paths and yard. The labour is the lowest of the 100,000–130,000 lei range the builder gave.

* Roof timber

In the source, 15 m³ × 1,550 lei gives 23,250 lei, but the line and the materials subtotal (144,760 lei) count 22,500 lei. The table keeps the source’s figures.

Ordinary house, nZEB or Passive House

The calculator prices the house the market usually builds. Here is what that means and what the law asks.

What "ordinary" means here

25 cm walls of clay block or AAC with 10 cm of white polystyrene, 15 cm of wool in the roof, the ground slab without insulation, windows with U 1.4, airing through the windows, a gas boiler with radiators and split air conditioning. It is the same house as the first column of the Passive House, nZEB or ordinary house cost calculator.

The law asks for nZEB since 2021

Law 372/2005 on the energy performance of buildings, Art. 5: new buildings received on the basis of a building permit issued from 31 December 2020 must have nearly zero energy use (nZEB). The text: legislatie.just.ro. In practice many new houses are built and priced to the standard above, and the builders’ guides of 2026 count them that way.

What nZEB or a Passive House costs on top

For the same house, the Passive House, nZEB or ordinary house cost calculator shows the difference: insulation, windows, airtightness, heat recovery ventilation and a heat pump, with the yearly bill and the payback. The Passive House cost guide explains where the difference comes from.