Job Profitability Calculator

1. Select the job type. Choose the category that best matches the work you completed. This helps you compare profitability across different types of handyman jobs over time.

2. Enter your labor details. Put in the total hours you worked on-site, your loaded cost per hour (what it actually costs you including taxes and benefits, not your billing rate), and travel time to and from the job.

3. Add materials and subcontractor costs. Enter what you spent on hardware, lumber, fasteners, paint, and any other supplies. If you hired a specialist (plumber, electrician) for part of the job, include their invoice amount.

4. Set your overhead allocation. This is the share of your monthly business costs (vehicle, insurance, tools, phone, marketing) that this job should carry. A simple method: divide your monthly overhead by your average number of jobs per month.

5. Enter the customer price and review. The calculator instantly shows your gross profit, profit margin, and effective hourly rate. Use this to evaluate whether the job was worth your time and to identify which job types deliver the best margins.

Profitability is what you keep after every cost is accounted for. Revenue is not profit. A $500 job that cost you $400 in labor, materials, and overhead only netted $100. Knowing this number for every job you complete is the difference between growing a business and running in place.

Target 30-50% gross margin on handyman jobs. Below 25% means you are underpricing or spending too long on the job. Above 50% is strong and usually happens on quick-turn mounting and assembly work. The effective hourly rate tells you what your time is actually worth after all costs. If it is below $40 per hour, you need to raise prices or improve efficiency.

Track every job to find patterns. After 20-30 entries, you will see which job types consistently deliver the best margins. Double down on those. If drywall repairs always land at 22% but TV mounting hits 55%, you know where to focus your marketing dollars.

After every completed job. Run your numbers while they are fresh. Enter the actual hours, actual material receipts, and what the customer paid. The five minutes it takes to log a job saves you from repeating unprofitable work for months without realizing it.

Reviewing your pricing strategy. If you have been quoting drywall patches at $250 but this calculator consistently shows 18% margins on that work, you know your price needs to go up to $300 or more. Data-driven pricing removes the guesswork and the guilt of raising rates.

Deciding whether to take on a new job type. A customer asks about tile work you have never quoted before. Estimate the costs, plug in what you would charge, and see if the margin is worth your time. Better to know before you say yes than to discover after the job that you lost money.