More often than not they will have to rent some tools for different jobs. It's impossible to have every tool you can have. Things like 1 or 2 man auger if needing to build a fence or something. At least $80 a day to rent. Ditch which to fix a main sewar line/run electrical line etc no telling how much that cost. It's not uncommon for any company to rent tools, if you don't believe me drive by your nearest Sunbelt tools at 7am tomorrow and take a look for yourself......it all depends on what level of handyman the OP was describing to figure cost. Some jerkoff that has tools provided for him by the guy hiring him might work for $12 an hour. But it's guaranteed he isn't legit and prob doesnt know much or he wouldn't be working for $12 an hour.
I would imagine any legit handyman isn't getting paid by the hour at all. If he has a good reputation and stays busy with business it's because he knows what he is doing so the jobs don't take him long..... and more importantly, he knows how to bid jobs
Closer... Now come back to this old thread so I can watch your brains explode when you find out what a handyman actually makes and changes.
I'll just start at the top. A (professional) e.g 365 skilled, tooled handymen well pays his taxes and has insurance changes. One who is average priced charges between $100-hr $125-hr I'm quite cheap and have a problem charging money largely because I was one of you people and raised by more of the same. So I only told my last client that I was charging her $695 for the day 8 hours 7 working. Implied that I wasn't real enthusiastic as her husband 3/4ths finished a bathroom renovation and she wants me to finish. So I told her that if it runs over I'll explain why and put it on a $90-hr Wich is very fair of me as I . licensed, insured, kitted out in about $15k in tools and do mid grade professional finishes.
Anyways as I was saying I've been in business for a little over a year now starting my handyman service from scratch. My first client I told $35 and built him a custom ramp. Thought I ran away with money though it was hard long days. He told me how about $50 and you come work on my rentals. So I did and did everything from replace a window to gut a 6 bedroom and prep it for sale. Well, turns out handicapped guys can be really darn abusive and so after I got the $14k he owed me I walked. Awhile later I started my goodness for real charging $50 as a newbie with some tools a a strong will to work and the support of utube. Now that's what you get for $50 some guy fresh out of the gate trying to start a business with some skills? Maybe.
Anyways fast forward and I'm not really a handyman the last 6 months. That shit is hard, it sucks, it pays poorly and people like you treat me like a thief while complimenting my work and trying an the while I drove a beater, couldn't afford taxes and rent both. Health insurance? Don't kid with me.
Here's what I have realized no one without braces experience will ever understand. You think a business hourly is the same thing as an employee hourly. Cowboy tried to explain it to you but even he got it quite wrong. This last year I made about a $100k sounds great. I know I thought it did too a year ago. Now kiddos gather round and welcome to business. Where we learn the difference between gross income and the money you actually get net income.
I grossed $100k now...
-$2400 a month business expenses $28800 for the year.
Now you have 71k still quite good right? All this risk back breaking work. Hundreds of hours self training. Working jobs cheap. Getting cheated and learning the ropes. Risking my neck on a dangerous roof without insurance because no one insured that for under 16k a year while my girl friend got attacked and needed me for a fee hundred measly bucks at 10 at night. All worth it right? I took riskes I learned skills, I did everything I needed including hundreds and hundreds of hours of reach on business, SEO website building, customer relations, taxes, insurance and so on.
I earned 27k more than my father makes for punching a clock in maintenance.
-30% taxes personal and business
Oh... Fuck I'm down to 49k despite working so many hours I got in an accident on the highway from sleep deprivation. Oh need a new van or I'm fucked... No savings no job to fall back on. -$5k for a beater off Craigslist 44k 1k less than my father and every other painter in town who works a normal 9-5 and has a 401k... Benefits... He even gets PTO
So you tell me is it that handyman are expensive or that you simply can't afford a true business with business expenses?
I never even mentioned the big one. You think handymen get paid 40? You want free bids right? Unpaid. Drive time? Unpaid. Shopping unpaid. Everything unpaid not directly. So no my client isn't paying $90 per hour she's paying about $65 and that's before I make all the deductions.
Insurance, health insurance, tools, gas, auto repairs, more tools more tools more tools. I do 8 trades remember? The plumber is shocked when he sees my van. A pro has an the right tools. I've got more in storage. So put the storage unit in there. I can't afford a garage I love in a studio to save money to put back in the business because this isn't counting things like that 15k in tools or so the weeks I have to spend on education and advertising time I can't work. I've tried I've done the 18 hr days that's how you end up pulling the guy the guy you hit on the highway out of his car and traffic. Disposal for bulk trash and the list goes on and on. You know construction Garbage bags are $36 a box? You think about my work uniform when you thought about paying me $50? My website costs? My internet and phone? Not options now you need good ones. My marketing fees? Pro handyman do work every week we market in order to do it. You can expect between $40-$180 per week. Leads start at $13 but you won't get them all so you may as well say $30-50 yes I have tax software. Invoicing software, estimate software, booking software. I do call backs unpaid, rarely but they happen. Free of course unless I have to pay for materials as well.
Clients, the cheap ones want free estimates. You do right? I saw some guy posting about getting multiple bids for a $180 job. That's insane in person I bet... Each bid costs me $100 often for people who were never going to hire anyone. I don't do them for work under $1000 anymore. Actually I don't do much work under $1000 anymore
See that's the thing. I'm good at what I do. I'm a real professional with the tools, skills and results to prove it and like the few other real handyman I haven't stayed one for long. For the last 6 months it's been 80% bathroom and kitchen renovation. $2500-$25000 range. Honestly anything under $5000 is hard for me to make profitable. That is the reality of business. To be effective over the long term you and not kill civilians on the highway, you must work 40-50s so you have at best 30 billable hours. Not 40 and often much less. These last two weeks I stayed home and worked on my new business a remodeling company that has no mention of handyman and a $5000 minimum per project. As the realtors say a good handyman is like a unicorn. I've heard of them but never seen one.
There are plenty of good handyman, you get what you pay for and pay far far less than you realize. There are very few professional handyman because it's a brutally challenging way to make a living full of part timer pretending to be you while lowering everyone's standards on what a handyman actually is working off the books to supplement their real job. Handyman has always been a gig economy, part time filler. They will all tell you they have been doing it 15+ years. Well I did it full time for 18 months and now I make $700 a day and have almost double the billable hours. I could raise my kids to equal $110 an hour and the jobs will get better because I will as I have always been pricing my way out of the reach of the people who can't afford to pay a real business. Which is fine. Most of us can't. I can't. But this is reality and you are painfully naive from where I'm standing. Ultimately it's my job to tell clients what things cost and their job to find the handyman that's right for them. Wether that's $35 or $135 Less than 30 is just day labor...
Most people probably stopped listening at "I'm a good deal at $90" for those people. The cost to operate a powerwashing company and pay yourself $66k a year is $110- per billable. If I could make that (and I would have had I known this 2 years ago) by not learning and buying the tools and taking on the responsibility and planning for projects that can fail and cost me thousands. Why the fuck would I? Know what a HVAC contractor needs to make off each van and man per year to turn a profit? $285k that's 23k in business per month and a $148 per billable. Thave support staff so they can work 40s
Harsh truth is from my own estimates about 49/50 handyman wash out before reaching the point I'm at. It's shockingly hard. Everyone who told you going into business for yourself was multiple times harder than a day job was reimbursement the truth. More than I believed haha.
Next year I will aim for $200k in gross and $300 the third. To qualify to sit at the table for a remodeler get together the minimum is $1,000,000 yearly review. To sit at the table as the new guy. So maybe you have some idea of where I'm at and how cheap $90 an hour is in the scheme of things. Probably not. As I said no one who isn't in business that I've ever talked to has truly got it. My past self included.
Well thanks for letting a grumpy remodeler vent on an old thread. Peace
