More T&M ?

[~Shado~]

Hey Jersey, sounds like you have recently opened up your own shop. If so, Welcome to the world of " I'm trying to figure it out and make it work!"

First and foremost - DON"T get caught up thinking, since it's just me working and I was making $20+ hr at my old work and I can charge $35+ hr and underbid everyone and make a killing. All you will be doing is hurting the industry and forcing everyone else to lower prices just to get work away from you. Instead - think, treat, plan as if you have employees, you will be one of them, and they are doing the work. Figure your real cost of doing work...their labor, bene's, etc...then your overhead....then what you need to live on. This should put you into a reasonable hourly rate. Also, remember, your body is acting twofold...you are employee and boss. You will be charging yourself hours and as boss those hours have to billed and paid by the customer. If you don't bill for the hours your employee charges you for their paycheck, you will be paying the worker and not making anything for yourself or family. This is where single shops get an edge. You will make your employee labor rate and then also the boss's wage. This will help when times are lean because in essence you are making double income, try to save/invest the Boss's share back into the company and live on worker wages.

As far as markup vs profit. I've had a hard time seeing the difference. To me they are one in the same. Labor rates are the cost to do business and profit comes from material, unless you can bring a job in under bid. Bonus!! I myself just markup material and bust to come in under time. Keeps it simple. Making a living, yes...getting rich, no. Still looking for/figuring a better way..... Yes, always! As said numerous times on these forums, no one way is the right way. What works for some won't work for others. Trial and hopefully little error will show you the way.

Good Luck!!

 

[emahler]

Don't worry Jerseydaze I know where your coming from. Don't worry about those pompous jerks. They've got all kinds in here. Those whom you just meet are what i call the "Big Shots" real Tycoons of business. Regular Rockefeller's that would charge their kids full price. But if you look through the "jerks" youll manage to find a few good answers. You just kind of get numb to the "know it alls" and learn to really speed read their comments.

http://www.masterplumbers.com/utilities/costcalc/
Try this site to figure out your hourly rate. And you will have to estimate some of the numbers if you haveent been through a full year. And be realistic when you plug in the numbers.

or...conversely some of these bigshots have seen this scenerio play out over and over...and while the information is available, freely, for guys coming into this industry to avoid the pitfalls....many still blindly, and arguably, go right into the fire...while some of the bigshots are seriously attempting to stop the new guy from making the same mistakes they made.

or maybe they are just a bunch of pompous asses that really want everyone else to fail miserably...

i don't know

btw...the more you want to discount to people, the more you have to charge others to make up for it. it is a pizza pie of money....you need to fill that pie somehow...

 

[George Stolz]

What the lot of you guys don't know is, I have the ultimate secret to success in business, and I'm not sharing. However, you should all thank your lucky stars I haven't opened a business, because I would steal all your customers, from California to Maine.

So, now that I've established that, you all can quit bickering and getting your feelings hurt, and continue the conversation without snipping at each other.

 

[macmikeman]

What the lot of you guys don't know is, I have the ultimate secret to success in business, and I'm not sharing. However, you should all thank your lucky stars I haven't opened a business, because I would steal all your customers, from California to Maine.

Come on George, whats the secret? Is this a new religion your starting up? Pope George the First sounds sorta snappy. :grin:

 

[Minuteman]

George, are you another of those MLM'ers? Like I said, they come out of the woodwork when I'm around.

 

[fidelity electric]

Couldn't have said it better myself

Couldn't have said it better myself

That's a little short sighted.

A LOT of people start their business with jobs like this. Hell, a lot of service companys earn millions of dollars like this. $500 dollars jobs are sweet. You are in and out and get paid in a matter of a couple hours and ljob costing is a breeze.

Sometimes it's CASH even

I have to agree with what was said above. Get in, get out and get paid. The bigger and longer the job the bigger the possible burn factor. My theory is something like this: You pay me this week, I show up next week

 

[bradleyelectric]

in my state, a business is a hobby if you go for 3 yrs without income (at least that was the law the last time I checked)

What my accountant told me 5 years ago is you need to make money in 3 out of 5 years. That means the third year you have to show a profit if you don't either of the first 2. You can go 2 years as a business without showing a profit, than you are a hobby. Therefore Jerzeydaze is a business as long as he fills out tax forms. Not saying he wouldn't be better off as a hobby.