Rochester Dirt Work does excavation and dirt work in Chatfield, MN — digging, grading, gravel driveways, and site prep for acreage lots, farm places, and in-town yards, with a free written estimate on every job.
Chatfield is hill-and-valley country at the edge of the Root River valley, and lot work there means building on slopes — pads cut into hillsides, drives that have to shed water without washing, and foundations dug where the ground drops away.
Most lots here need the same order of work: dig it first, grade it so the water behaves, then put the surface on — the driveway, the pad, the finished yard. We run the whole order with our own machines and one crew.
Sloping ground is good ground if it's shaped right. Around Chatfield we spend as much time on where the water goes after the dig as on the dig itself.
Below is the full menu as it runs in Chatfield, how a job goes from the first call to the final walk-through, and a recent job nearby. When you're ready, call (612) 260-8779 — the look and the written estimate are free.
Foundations, basements, ponds, and trenches in Chatfield price by the cubic yard — $50–$150 a yard, $1,500 floor — with the spoil spread on your lot or hauled off at $300–$600 a load. Footings get dug below frost depth, and the yardage math goes in your written estimate.
Finish grading at $0.50–$1.25 per sq ft leaves a Chatfield yard lawn-ready; rough grading at $1.00–$2.25 per sq ft reshapes slope and drainage. Swales and driveway culverts move the water off once the grade sends it there.
New gravel driveways run $1.75–$4.50 per sq ft on a deep frost-ready base; top-up refreshes run $0.75–$1.50. Building pads price by size — $1,500–$3,500 for a garage or shed pad, $2,500–$5,600 for a house pad — cut, filled, and compacted in lifts.
You call (612) 260-8779 or send the form and tell us about the lot in Chatfield — what you're building, fixing, or draining, and any date you're working against.
We come out and walk the lot in person. Dirt work can't be priced honest off a photo — soil, access, and where the water sits decide the job.
You get the scope and the price in writing, with the unit math shown. The price we write is the price you pay unless the scope changes — and if it does, we talk first.
Machines show up on the day we set. We dig, grade, and haul in the order we talked through, and keep the site passable while we work.
When the last pass is done, we walk the lot with you and check the grades together before we call it finished.
We also serve the towns around Chatfield — see excavation in Stewartville and excavation in Rochester.
Dug the foundation and basement for a new home build outside Chatfield — about 190 cu yd out, footings dug below frost depth, spoil spread and rough-graded on the lot.
"Our builder gave us the names of two excavators and we called both. These folks walked the lot, showed us the yardage math, and wrote the price down. The hole was dug to the lines, the footings were below frost, and the builder never had to wait on them." — Nathan, Chatfield
In Chatfield and ready to move some dirt? Call (612) 260-8779 — we'll come look and put it in writing.