Most sprinkler repair calls fall into a handful of failure types: leaking valves, broken heads, cracked lateral lines, controller faults, and bad wiring. Each has a typical repair cost band and a different price driver, and knowing the band lets you give the homeowner a confident number on the phone before you roll a truck.
Valve repairs are the cheapest common call. A single stuck or leaking valve usually runs in the Read our irrigation controller buyer's guide range for parts, plus 30 to 60 minutes of labor. Heads are similar: a single popped rotor or spray is fast, but a full-zone rebuild starts to add up fast once you are replacing more than a few heads at once.
The expensive calls are lateral line breaks and mainline cracks. Those are the ones where trench work, dirt compaction, and matching sod back together drive the price. If the yard has been re-graded since the original install, expect the repair to take longer because the line is rarely where the as-built says it is.
A good rule of thumb: if a repair is going to cost more than roughly half the price of a partial-zone renovation, tell the homeowner that on the call. They will almost always pick the repair when you give them an honest number and the option.
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