What a Labrador Retriever really costs in ACT
Bought · as a puppy · female · under 1 year · desexed
Lifetime
$31,032
About $180 a month after the first year.
Where the money goes
$4,896.45
First year. The blue card rounds to the nearest dollar.
Not in this total: boarding and transport ($96), dog walking ($119), pet insurance (Canstar average, or the $145 survey spend), daycare, puppy school ($129).
Lifespan used: 13.1 years. Age now: under 1 year.
Notes
These national lines are average spend per dog-owning household (1.4 dogs on average), including owners who spent nothing on a line, from Pets in Australia 2025 (year to March 2025). A one-dog household may spend less on some lines and more on others. National ongoing lines in this result: $2,160 per household, about $1,543 per dog if split evenly. Spend does not scale evenly, so the split is a guide only.
- This first year assumes desexing, microchipping and puppy vaccines were not already in the purchase price. Tick that box if they were. Moneysmart's first-year figure of around $4,000 is lower partly because many purchases already include some of these, and because 25% of dogs were free.
- Year-one vet work is added on top of the national vet average, which may already include some of it for some owners.
- These national lines are average spend per dog-owning household (1.4 dogs on average), including owners who spent nothing on a line, from Pets in Australia 2025 (year to March 2025). A one-dog household may spend less on some lines and more on others.
- Lifespans are UK medians from McMillan et al. 2024 (Scientific Reports; 584,734 dogs). No Australian breed-by-breed lifespan table has been published. VetCompass Australia has published single-breed studies (for example Bullmastiff 8.5 years, Pug 10 years) that are broadly consistent with UK figures. Other UK studies put Labradors at 12.0–12.5 years, so treat 13.1 as a typical figure, not a promise.
- RSPCA NSW cites an Australian Veterinary Association figure of more than $25,000 per dog over a lifetime. That is a sanity check, not a line in this total.
- Lifetime cost is the first year plus 12.1 further years of ongoing costs, in today's dollars. Age now is 0 years, and the median lifespan is 13.1 years, so the ongoing years are lifespan minus age minus 1. No inflation is applied. The 95% confidence interval is 13.0–13.1. The 2025 Pet Parking dog cost guide uses a Labrador lifespan of about 12 years and a lifetime range of $20,000–$45,000. This calculator uses the McMillan median. The two are different methods, not a correction of each other.