In Melbourne, private dog behaviour training costs between $150 and $400 a session, a veterinary behaviourist $600 to $900 for the first consultation, and group classes $30 to $60 a week. My own PACE Program is $2,000 over five weeks. Those figures look like prices for the same thing. They aren't, and the difference is the whole point of this post.
I'll show you the full landscape, including the options that aren't me, because the honest comparison makes the right choice obvious for most people. It's the hourly rate that leads people astray.
What dog behaviour training costs in Melbourne
| Option | What you pay | What you're buying |
|---|---|---|
| Group obedience class | $30 to $60 a week, six to eight weeks | Commands in a hall. Good for a steady puppy. Useless for a dog that lunges at the door. |
| Private trainer, by the session | $150 to $250 an hour | One visit at a time. Momentum is up to you. |
| Behaviour program with a specialist | $1,500 to $2,500 as a package over several weeks | Sessions plus the work between them. This is my category. |
| Veterinary behaviourist | $600 to $900 first consult, $200 to $300 a review, medication $40 to $80 a month | Diagnosis and medication where it's needed. Not handling. |
| Board and train | $2,000 to $5,000 for two to three weeks away | The dog learns with the trainer. You don't, and the dog comes home to you. |
These are rough 2026 figures, mostly from what my clients tell me they paid before they found me, and they move. Take them as a map, not a quote.
Why the hourly rate is the wrong number to compare
Ask "what do you charge an hour" and every trainer in Melbourne lines up on a scale from $120 to $400, and the cheapest looks like the smart buy. But the hour is the least important part of what changes a dog. A dog that lunges at other dogs has been practising it for months or years. An hour with me interrupts the pattern. The six days after decide whether it comes back.
So the question I'd put to any trainer is not what an hour costs. It's what happens between the hours. Do they watch your videos? Do they change the plan mid-week when your dog does something on Tuesday that wasn't in the plan? Do they expect you to do the work, or do they expect you to book another hour? A dog trained by the hour usually needs another hour next year. That's not a criticism of the trainer. It's the format.
"You're not paying me to train your dog each week. You're paying to learn to read and run your own dog."
What it costs to leave it
The number nobody puts next to the training quote is what an unmanageable dog costs every year, for the life of the dog. Roughly:
- A dog walker because walks are unbearable: about $35 a walk, three a week, close to $5,000 a year.
- Boarding a reactive dog, if anyone will take it: $80 to $150 a night. One ten-night trip is $1,000 to $1,500. Every trip.
- Daycare that won't have your dog back. The deposit, and then the search starts again.
- A veterinary behaviourist and medication: $1,500 or more in the first year, then rechecks and repeat scripts for as long as the dog is on it. Some dogs genuinely need this alongside training, and if yours does I'll say so. It doesn't teach anyone to handle the dog.
- The one nobody prices. A client wrote in her review that she lost four years of experiences and memories with her dog before finding something that worked. Nobody sends an invoice for that.
Training is paid once. Every line above is paid again next year.
The other side of the ledger
A dog you can manage is a dog your sister will actually say yes to having for the weekend. It goes to the cafe instead of staying home. It sleeps through the night because it isn't rehearsing the window all day. Walks stop being something you brace for on the way out the door. None of that carries a dollar figure, and it's most of the reason people ring me.
What I charge, and why it's shaped this way
The PACE Program is $2,000 over five weeks. The first $400 of that is a 90-minute consultation, where I assess your dog and tell you honestly whether the program is right for you. Sometimes it isn't, and $400 is all you've spent. If it is, the four-week program is $1,600: four weekly sessions and roughly 20 days of me reviewing your videos in between. Paid as a package, because the package is the point. I don't sell one-off follow-ups.
If my fees don't fit, the same program runs with one of my Hachi Way associates, trainers I trained myself, at $1,000 to $1,400 for the four weeks, with the consultation still with me. Payment plans exist. All of it is on the FAQ, including the cancellation policy, because I'd rather you read it than be surprised.
Two lines from my Google reviews, both from people who sat with the number for a while first: "I was hesitant at first because of her high prices but in hindsight, she was worth every cent." And: "I would have paid three times the amount for the knowledge and outcome we got." I'm not quoting them to tell you it's cheap. It isn't. I'm quoting them because the number only makes sense once you know what it buys, and by the end you shouldn't need me. That's the whole design.