Price per SF?

[mark123]

Originally Posted by Edward36

Calculation Form here said it would take 25min. to mow 11000 sq.ft. so call it 30 for loading/unloading and take what you want to make an hour divide it by 2

Sounds about right.

If I made $590 I could work for one week and skylark the rest of the year. So if I come out to california and work for two weeks, Jasonw keeps half for doing the billing. Then I can go home.

[tom]

Originally Posted by jasonw

Ok so I got sick of ether always bidding low or bidding high so I devised a plan to bid the same for every single lawn. I got a measuring wheel today. I use my lawn as an example. I pay myself $20 to mow and edge my own lawn, it is 700SF according to the wheel which breaks down to about $0.03 per SF. Is $0.03/sf a good price to charge or am I wrong? I figure if its like mine, just a quick mow and go then $21 which is $0.03X700 is a good price. Any comments?

sounds to low i would do a minimum of 30.00 from what your describing , u really have to bid each job different u need to look at how much edging or blowing , they could have 3\4 of there property paved u would spend 1\2 ur time blowing especially when the pollen is falling , also do they have a gate can u get the bigger mowers back there , time is money i dont know how established u are but before u know it u will b payin high insurance and high taxes . on top of the high grass dont sell ur self short
tom

[irvinjr]

Originally Posted by jasonw

Thats not 2 small city lots, maybe where you are from but like I said I am judging of my lawn which is 700sf, about the same size as every other lawn in town. I do have about a half acre but i am not estimating the entire thing, only the green grass outside the front door. I have not attempted this on any large areas yet, I normally will charge $50 per hour to do the larger areas out here. Maybe the formula for SF has to go down with size, for example the little front lawns here would be good at $0.03/sf but maybe something like 11,000sf would be better charged at $0.01/sf for a total of $110? Dose that sounds better? Maybe the $0.03 is good for everything up to 2,000sf or something then you go to $0.02 up to 6,000sf then go down to $0.01 for anything larger than that.

I know there is a formula to use sf for billing, its just a matter of massaging it to figure out the proper price. I think I am getting somewhere with this lowering it a penny every couple few thousand square feet though.

I base my price on the sq. ft. of the property 'Example' Up to 8,000 $20, 8001 to 15,000 $25, 15,001 to 25,000 $35 etc. I live in Fl. With those prices i'm not the lowest or highest in my area. I'm competitive (smiling) Bye the way i'm licensed n insured n registerd through sunbiz

[Fisher]

Could try $15 just for showing up and then multiply the footage by about .0014. This seems to get you within a few dollars of the quarter acre and full acre rates. However I think I would have to determine how long it takes to top, edge, and blow to work that into the formula. Maybe .0009 per square footage mowed, a multiplier for edging, $.50 for each tree to go around and so on.

[mark123]

Originally Posted by jasonw

How do you make any money doing it that cheap? One of the properties I did last weekend was an acre and I did it for $200, maybe its just the difference in area ...

I can only tell you what happened to me on Thursday. I mow a commercial lawn and as I was doing it the secretary came out and asked me to give her an estimate on her mother's lawn for one cut every other week. After I finished the cut, I drove over to do the estimate. It came to $22 so since I was done for the day I went back to tell her.

"$22??! She is not going to spend that kind of money!" I've never in my life heard $22 called "that kind of money". LOL

So, yeah. I'd say it's the area.

[cruzgardening]

Originally Posted by mark123

I can only tell you what happened to me on Thursday. I mow a commercial lawn and as I was doing it the secretary came out and asked me to give her an estimate on her mother's lawn for one cut every other week. After I finished the cut, I drove over to do the estimate. It came to $22 so since I was done for the day I went back to tell her.

"$22??! She is not going to spend that kind of money!" I've never in my life heard $22 called "that kind of money". LOL

So, yeah. I'd say it's the area.

I Live in So Cal and this happens to me all the time people think because we are a lawn care company we need to undercarge them...
2 days ago i got 2 estimates for 2 homes in a new area, Monterrey park is the name of the city, we are located northwest of that place it would take me about 20 minutes to get there from my regular maintenance area but i want to get a foot on that side of town. i arrived at the first property the owner seem to have started laying sod but stop half way through he asked me how much would i charge for the clean up, overgrown shrubs, grass and weeds, i always charge 3xthe regular fee i told him it would be $135 for the clean up and $45 a month, i had to go up about 20 steps to get to the top of his property. He stopped looked at me and said... Are you serious? i can get another guy to do it for half that!... i really don't think is the area but the people you deal with some are just plain cheapos :P well i left my card and told him good luck! i went up the street for another lead his lawn was flat and about the same size as the other guy i told him the price would be $45/ cut he said when u start? lol so yeah cheapos are everywhere my company weeds them out all the time haha.

Originally Posted by jasonw

Ok so I got sick of ether always bidding low or bidding high so I devised a plan to bid the same for every single lawn. I got a measuring wheel today. I use my lawn as an example. I pay myself $20 to mow and edge my own lawn, it is 700SF according to the wheel which breaks down to about $0.03 per SF. Is $0.03/sf a good price to charge or am I wrong? I figure if its like mine, just a quick mow and go then $21 which is $0.03X700 is a good price. Any comments?

i think you will be able to come out with a better formula i mean i can bid a lawn by just looking at it and here in California reputable businesses do charge a bit more then the guys who mow because they have to make money... Eventually you will get the feel of any lot and will know how much to charge but man this are hard times to charge $340 for a big lot i bid $250 for a lot the other day and the lady almost felt backwards haha i ended up charging here $150 with a 1 year contract to come twice a month for $50 bucks a pop... i think you just need to work with the clients and test the water before u say any number to them.