I get a lot of e-mails from readers who are interested in starting a handyman business, but have a few roadblocks holding them back. Those roadblocks are usually unanswered questions or assumptions based on bad information.
There is a lot of bogus information out on the Internet today. In this article I’m going to address 3 Myths that I believe hold a lot of people back from the the freedom and fulfillment of owning a handyman business. I’ll show you why these myths just aren’t true and how I’ve proven it with my own business.
If you are thinking about starting a handyman business but still aren’t sure, keep reading. Or, just watch the video below.
Myth #1: You need to know how to do everything.
Many people believe that in order to start a handyman service, they need to know how to do everything: plumbing, electrical, HVAC, door repairs, appliance repairs, you name it.
The Truth
This is simply not true! Nobody knows how to do everything. Every handyman runs into issues that he can’t fix. Every handyman has customers ask for work that he or she is uncomfortable doing. It happened to me all the time.
The truth is that you can be very profitable by offering limited services. Take a trash removal service for example. All they do is drive to a home, fill up their truck with trash, and haul it to the dump. Another example is a garage door repair specialist. All they do is fix and install garage doors and make quite a bit of money doing it. Some handyman businesses out there only do simple maintenance and take care of To-Do lists. Stuff like changing out light bulbs, replacing faucets, patching up paint, and hanging pictures.
If lack of skill is something that is holding you back, I recommend going through the short exercise in this post to determine which service you can start offering right away.
I got started with very little experience and just learned as much as I could along the way. Each time I was faced with a new type of job, I would get online and do a few minutes of research. I’d watch a few videos on YouTube, read some forums, and get an overall feel for how to approach a project. I’d then apply my own common sense to the job. Sure, there were challenging times, but that just made it that much more fulfilling when I finished a job.
Sometimes a customer would ask me to do work that I had no idea how to do. In those cases, I would simply state that I don’t have a lot of experience with that type of work and I’d recommend that they go with a specialist. This actually gained a lot of trust with my customers. They loved my honesty.
The benefits of not knowing everything
Being faced with challenges everyday forces you to learn, which is good for your brain. Your brain is a muscle that needs to be exercised.
Not only is it good for your brain, but solving problems is a huge confidence booster. It feels great to solve a customers problem and then get paid for it.
Being faced with unique challenges also keeps the job interesting. You’ll never be doing the same mundane task all day as with most desk jobs.
Myth #2: Small jobs aren’t profitable
I’ve had several people come to me with concerns of job size and If I wish I could do larger jobs. Here are my thoughts. You can make more money on larger jobs simply because you are working for eight hours at a time instead of for shorter periods of one to three hours. However, larger jobs usually require more work and are more stressful than doing several small jobs each day.
If you believe small jobs aren’t profitable, then you either aren’t charging enough or your service area is too large.
My interview with Steve, a handyman that has been in the business for 20 years is a valid example. In fact, he actually prefers small jobs like replacing a garbage disposal or changing out a kitchen faucet. He can go knock out 3 or 4 quick $75-$100 jobs by driving a few blocks down the road and then spend the rest of the day doing something fun.
One thing to consider is that Steve limits his service area to only a few miles and has a minimum charge of $75 – 2 critical decisions that make, instead of break, his business model.
Benefits of small jobs
Small jobs are less stressful than larger construction jobs. For one, you don’t need any help so you don’t have to deal with hiring employees. Secondly, they usually aren’t very complex. This is a good thing when trying to estimate how long something will take. Thirdly, they don’t drag on for weeks while customers pressure you to work faster.
Small jobs are great for all those people that think they have ADD. If you get bored easy, you probably won’t be doing a small job long enough to actually get bored. Additionally, if you offer a wide range of services, you are always changing it up with unique jobs and a variety of customers. This helps keep things interesting and challenging.
Myth #3: Charging by the job is the ONLY way to charge.
I’m sure you’ve heard this before. Any handyman that you talk to that has been doing this for more than 5 years will tell you that charging by the job is the only way to go. They’ll also explain that they started charging hourly and lost a lot of money because of it.
I have to agree. You can make more money charging by the job because as you get more efficient you can do jobs faster and increase your hourly rate significantly without having to tell your customer that you charge more.
BUT, and this is important, these same handyman don’t remember what it’s like getting started. They’ve been doing it for so long that they know how long things take, how much materials cost, and consequently, how much to charge. They don’t seem to remember that they charged hourly for a reason, and that was because they lacked experience.
Since I started my handyman business, I have been experimenting with both charging methods and believe that charging hourly can be better for someone that is new to this business.
In fact, you’ll probably make more money charging hourly in the beginning because it eliminates the inevitable tendency to underbid jobs. I’ve bid on several jobs that ended up taking me twice as long as expected and I lost a lot of money because of it.
Benefits of charging by the hour (or some other measurement of time)
Working by the hour, for example, saves time by eliminated the need to provide quotes. You don’t have to sit and think about everything that goes into the job before getting started. You can just get right to work. It also eliminates a lot of stress of determining what to charge and allows you to focus on promoting yourself and growing your business.
By setting a solid hourly rate right away, you can confidently tell anybody that you talk to exactly how much you charge. This eliminates one of the barriers customers have to get over in order to hire you. If they know how much you charge before they call, they are pretty much ready to hire you. If they don’t know how much you charge, that is one more thing the customer has to figure out before they make their decision. Depending on your hourly rate, you’ll likely eliminate working with many waste-your-time customers as well.
Now, there is an even better way to charge that has all of the benefits of charging by the hour without the downsides. I’m not going to go into detail on that in this article, but I share this strategy and a whole lot more in my complete pricing training which you can find right here.
This is so insightful and the structure of this post is clear and helpful, thank you and keep it coming!
Thank you so much for the insight. It has been a blessing to me.
My first job this year in ct took about 50% longer then I thought it would. Just asked the customer for an ext 20% and they were fine with that, but I don’t think that is the best business model for the future. Hourly is tough to fugure out.
Fred,
I wrote a post dedicated to figuring out an hourly rate. I highly recommend that you read it if you are struggling with this.
https://www.handymanstartup.com/figure-hourly-rate/
Big D
Very insightful. I loved the part about ADD. I swear that I thrive on the smaller jobs and having different things constantly thrown at me.
I have been doing this for 5 years and rarely do jobs take the estimated time. It seems there are always little things that make them take longer. I’d imagine that this would be less of an issue with new construction. Either way I only charge hourly if the customer requests it…which is rarely the case. I would probably make a little more charging by the hour but I think it is ALWAYS bad when you have to come back to the customer with bad news and extra costs. I would rather tell them what complications I ran into and how I fixed it without raising costs(if possible) because my customers appreciate that and are more likely to trust me and will continue to be repeat customers.
I also feel more rushed when charging by the hour. If something takes me a few extra minutes to do it right, I don’t want the customer looking over my shoulder wondering if I am milking the clock.
Wade,
You have some good points about charging hourly. But, I believe with a little communication with a customer hourly is actually quite nice.
The thing about charging hourly is that there is no agreed upon price, so you never have to break bad news of extra costs. When you enter into the deal, you just say it will be $X/hour plus materials. If I run into a problem, I explain it to them and what I’m going to do about it.
I don’t worry about rushing or not doing a good job, either. If I had to answer the phone several times or took a few breaks, I take some time off the clock and explain it to the customer. Haven’t had a problem yet.
I still provide quotes that I stick to on bigger jobs. But on those jobs where they want you to do a hundred different tasks, Hourly is my favorite.
I don’t charge hourly to all of my customers, but the ones that I do seem to hire me back more often. They see how long something took me and understand that I need a certain rate for my time. They also get to see that I’m not ripping them off.
Not for everybody, but it works for me.
Big D
Unfortunately I had an all day job that only ended up being a 20$ an hour job yesterday, I thought would have taken 2-3 hours. Never Know….
I have a garage door opener to install tommorow, I need to shoot for 50$ an hour or handyman business is not going to work out for me
Hi Fred,
Don’t let a couple of jobs discourage you. Just take them as a lesson of how to bid better the next time. It happens to all of us!
If you are bidding on a job that you have never done before, add some padding in. If you think it will take 2 hours, quote it like it would take 4. Things ALWAYS take longer than you expect.
Big D
Hi Big D
Thanks for the great posts. I just sat down today with my web designer and hesays he will have my site up and eunning in about 2-3 so im looking forword to that. I used your hourly rate calculations and figured a $60 hourly rate. My local competition ranges from 55 -85 hourly. Im still kind of worried about telling someone i charge $60 although after crunching the number i found it to be very resonable. Do you ever drop your price from your top hourly rate if your customer trys to haggle you or do you stay firm.
Thanks
Hey Big Red,
Awesome, once you get the site up and running be sure to share it in the comments. Not only will you get some traffic but I’d love to check it out!
Good question. Honestly, none of my customers have ever tried to haggle me when I charge them an hourly rate. However, I have had customers try to haggle me on the price of certain jobs. When this happens I see it as the first indicator that this is not my ideal customer. In a perfect world I wouldn’t even budge. But, if I really need the business, then I’ll provide them with ways they can reduce the price without lowering my hourly rate. Let’s say I was doing a door repair and there was some touchup painting involved. If they wanted to save money, I’d offer to drop the painting cost from the price if they paint it. However, I’d prefer not to do this because I like to leave a project finished.
Good luck with the site!
I have been searching for this quality blogs regarding this niche. Searching in Yahoo drove me here, I just found this kind of satisfactory readings i was looking for. I must bookmark this website to avoid missing it again.
I can surely relate to jobs always taking much longer than anticipated. Old houses provide a huge majority of the work in the industry but it’s quite a challenge to match new work with the old. And there’s always surprises that change your game plan. I’ve been charging by the job and have lost money significantly. I’ve been hesitant to charge by the hour because I wasn’t sure what the market range was (north Florida). As you can tell, I’m still quite new at this. I’m in the middle of changing my business model from property preservation to handyman. Has anyone else here done property preservation doing foreclosures?
Hi Big D and thanks for your practical councils, your blog is very interesting and helpful.
I’m going to start a handyman agency with two employees performing the work. As is paid to these employees? I have yet to clear this concept.
Thank you again.
Hey great post with great information. I have been doing door to door marketing for my business recently, targeting the older homes that would need the small jobs. I am also trying to come up with a list of small jobs that I could bulk together in some sort of package to offer to a customer for a fair and reasonable price.
TotalHomeRepair.org
Tom
That’s a great idea Tom. Are you trying to package it as a recurring service?
Thank you! This is our first year and this is all so accurate!
So I have a job with a customer who has the potential to lead to alot of income but it’s seems they are always testing me. I can clearly tell this man is very knowledgeable but is playing dumb.. if you will. It is a bit stressful but I feel once I get this first job done he might be easier to work with. I hope. Any had this kind customer before?
Hi. So I was wondering if these guidelines are for certain states only or with certain factors such as licensed work only? Maybe I can message you better privately. Wanted to know if you possibly had links to point me in the right direction
This article was very informative. I’m just getting started as a handyman and see that I will have to do some tweaking of my business model. I think I will stick to doing small jobs because I am one of the ADD types, but also, I just don’t think I want to take on the big jobs.
I abandoned my 30 year computer programming career and have been wondering what to do for a couple of years. I’ve volunteered (for a year) at a local animal conservancy hoping they would eventually hire me, but they are TIGHT with spending and that is not gonna happen.
So then, I started running ads in Craigslist, and THAT is a brutal way to start since that place is full of some crazy people. Truly honest people simply give me a phone number and I call and we work something out. Others string me along forever and then disappear. I’m OK with starting out slow, since it allows me time to figure out what I like to do (small engines) and what I do NOT like to do (rake leaves and push a mower). But I’ll eventually wean myself off of Craigslist, and word of mouth and references will be adequate.
Anyway, I charge a very low rate by the hour and I must slowly convince every person I am not another nut from Craigslist, and it is very challenging. But I’m good with people, and explain my flat rate, and there are some things I will not do such as cut down huge pine trees. I also liked small engine repair, and since it is spring in North Central Florida, now is the time get the homeowners’ attention to get that lawn mower in shape! I prefer to pick up push mowers and bring them back to the shop for repair, but I don’t have a trailer (yet) and must work on other equipment on site, if possible.
I live out in the middle of nowhere, so I do find myself driving a lot to a customer or to get materials, so everything must be well defined and thought out before I hit the road, and sometimes I must charge for the drive. I don’t have any firm rules yet, and probably never will.
I could really go on and on about this so far, but I must admit, this tactic of breaking into PAID part time work is far superior to the Volunteer work (NO PAY).
And most people simply do NOT KNOW HOW TO FIX THINGS.
I’ve always tried to fix anything, since, well, its already broken!
I wish all the best of luck, and keep chiseling away doing what you do best,
and digging into other stuff when you can. Treat people nice regardless, and if you don’t like them, be nice, and don’t work for them again.
Long winded since a client delayed today’s work till next week.
I don’t care. I have 9 acres to maintain meanwhile.
Mr. Brown
PS: If you poke around Craigslist in Gainesville, FL, you may even find me!
I quoted a customer about 3500 on a job that involved all these cabinet tops, a bar, and bathroom vanity. That was all costs; lumber and hardware etc. I later said I would do it by the hour! Over a month went by and they still spent more than than 3500! Just on my services plus materials! Lesson learned sometimes by the hour pays! Bonus btw … never build and tell how much you make a job…
Very good article. I think this is great advice for anyone looking to get into the Handyman space – one more thing that I would add is to use services such as GetGigz – unlike Angie’s list and others – GetGigz is free to use, and works similar to LinkedIn, however – with the ability to transact and get paid! By the way, you dont get taken to the bank with crazy messaging fees like in Thumbtack. It is a simple formula that is very beneficial to the Handyman. Check them out, beta.getgigz.com or download the App via Android and iOS. GetGigz!
How has the advent of handyman apps like thumbtack and task rabbit effected your business?
Hi Dan, great article. I’ve been following this website for a couple years now and I’ve found it to be super informative! January 1st marked the 1st anniversary of me biting the bullet and starting a remodeling/ maintenance company with my father in law. I used your advice right from the start, with branding and leveraging the internet for leads and it has really paid off. Most of our leads have come from our strong Facebook precsence, we’ve been totally killing it in our area. We had a full schedule within a couple months! Shooting for $200,000.00 in sales this year! I just wanted to say thanks for doing what you do. We all really appreciate it. My other goal this year is to really strengthen our branding and to make our website more effective. If you happen to have time, visit http://www.hansenpedersen.com and tell me what you think. Also when does handyman marketing machine open up again? Thanks again soooooo much!!
That’s awesome Will! Glad to hear about your success so far. The website looks pretty good at first glance. Looks like you would benefit from some SEO and a few other tweaks. HMM will open soon. Just make sure you are on my email list and I’ll let you know when it does.
Hi Dan,
I’m just starting out, but as you know things can be a little slow going at first. I’ve listened to all your podcasts (some twice!), watched a lot of your videos, and am seriously considering purchasing some of your materials. Unfortunately money is allocated elsewhere right now. Anyway, I am working on my website and although I’ve built and repaired a number of things and am confident in my abilities I never took a lot of pics. I was wondering what your opinion would be about offering service at half-price, say to the next 10 customers, just to get some opportunity to get some good before and after photos. I’ve gotten 3 jobs through Facebook Marketplace so far, but even my first job, a sink and garbage disposal replacement, I forgot to get pics. Thanks for all you have done!
Dave (although I’ve been a Big D since before you were born, but I’ll let it slide)
Hey Dave,
Giving a discount to get customers isn’t a problem as long as the customers understand they are getting a discount. That way they aren’t trying to refer you to friends and talking about how cheap your services are. So, to answer you question, go ahead and give a discount. It will probably help you get some customers are first. But you’ll want to have your real prices set as well for when they hire you in the future.
-Dan
Dan
I am currently considering starting my own handyman business. Thank you for the wealth of information provided via handymanstartup.com
I am in the early stages of setting up a website. Thus, I have been researching other handyman websites … however, I cannot find your handyman business website online. Please give me the link to your handyman business website.
Also, can you please give me the current average amount of time each week you spend working as a handyman and the time you spend working in handyman startup consulting (handymanstartup.com)
Thanks
Randy
These are really useful insights on handymen myths that every professional go through. Amazing post!
Dan,
Excellent post! I’ve been a handyman for many years now, but as I read through the article I can relate to much of the information you have written about. In a sense I was lucky as I started out very young helping my uncle in his home improvement company, so I was able to pick up many of the skills that later helped me when I got my business up and running. You are so right about other handymen not wanting to take the “small” jobs. Often those small jobs end up being bigger than expected or will lead you to other repairs for the same homeowner down the road.
It took me a while before I jumped the gun and started my own business, but I love what I do and if you have a passion for the home improvement industry and are genuine, people will learn about you, trust you and do business with you. Your name will get out there, whether good or bad, so do QUALITY work!
Great information! Really enjoyed reading it!
The plumber I use for most of my work at home is female (not that this matters) but all she does is small house repair work. No commercial work. No new home construction work. Has enough small jobs every day to fill the week. She doesn’t even need to work on weekends.
What makes her effective is that she is available within 24hrs, same day a lot of the time.
I’ve been a full-time pro handyman/carpenter for 7 years in Maine (I just sent out invoice #533 – that’s a lot of little jobs!). I’m glad to see others treating “handyman/woman” as a serious profession. Sometimes I get the vibe that people don’t see me as a true professional; like this is just a side, under-the-table gig to make some spendin’ cash. I always point out to people that this is my full-time means of supporting my family. This is my job. I do love the autonomy and the diversity day to day and week to week. But it’s a challenge to get hours sometimes despite having plenty of jobs (I frequently have months of work on my “jobs list”). I know this paradox doesn’t make sense but it’s a persistent frustration. Scheduling around vacation property rental tenants is my biggest challenge. But I’m making it work.
Here’s what created the success I’ve experienced so far: Early on I had the good fortune of meeting the owner of a local rental property management and cleaning service. I became her go-to handyman. That one connection is the source of 90% of my jobs. I do not advertise or do any marketing. It was a lucky break.
Good luck to you all and remember that we are professionals filling a niche that is desperately needed (at least where I live).