What do Y'all charge ?

[ssgp2]

I've been doing side jobs for several years and even added another tractor recently. I do carry insurance for my tractor side work, but was just curious how others charge for your area. I know some charge by the job or acre, but even that is based on an hourly rate. Being in the Ft. Worth area, I'm at $75/hr. from the time I get to the job site 'till I load up. If you do side jobs with your tractor, what's the going rate for your area?

 

[sea2summit]

I don’t do an hourly rate very often. They are hard to bid and one of the two parties never seems happy in the end.

I do $150 minimum unless I can stack jobs that are very close to eachother so I don’t have to load up between them. I do a lot of jobs for $150 for small garden tilling or minor driveway work then go up from there into the thousands of dollars.

 

[Yander]

I would also be interested in hearing opinions of the demographics and who is the cheapest. I did a job for my neighbor (90 years old) in the summer and he thought $140 was a lot when it was probably a $250+ job. I don't like to work for cheap people but I also understand someone that old has no concept of what things cost now.

He was also telling me his furnace guy charged him $75 for a service call and he told the guy he wouldn't be calling him back. My dad is 82 and also a cheapskate but he will pay it.

My neighbor was loaded BTW. He has since passed away.

 

[Lineman North Florida]

I've been doing side jobs for several years and even added another tractor recently. I do carry insurance for my tractor side work, but was just curious how others charge for your area. I know some charge by the job or acre, but even that is based on an hourly rate. Being in the Ft. Worth area, I'm at $75/hr. from the time I get to the job site 'till I load up. If you do side jobs with your tractor, what's the going rate for your area?

I charge $75 per hour for mowing with a 6' or 7' mower, I do custom work such as no-till seeding, harrowing and breaking land as well but it is all done by the acre, also my bread & butter is my skid steer work. I only charge for the time I am on the job which includes loading up and binding down at the end of the day as long as the job is within 25 miles of my farm, I keep a 1 million $ liability policy as well as a state certified business license, this is also just something I do to make extra money as I am retired, things are a little slow here this time of year but will soon pick up and get really busy all the way through the fall.

 

[scootr]

Mowing and grading is a side hustle. Mostly just helping out some neighbors. I charge $75-100 an hour depending on how hard I'm working the machine. Light mowing $75 digging, grading, discing is $100

 

[RjCorazza]

This should be an interesting topic.
With one exception, I charge (or base my bid on) $100 per hour for tractor work and $60 per hour for mowing with my zero turns.
Even my residential snow plowing is estimated on a $100 per hour rate, and is still significantly under what larger companies are charging for residential plowing. That's an easy sell in my very immediate area, as I am done with my plow run by 7am and the big boys won't even come out until their commercial accounts are finished.
The exception is stump grinding, which I bill at $200 per hour of grinding / grading time.

 

[Molalla1]

This should be an interesting topic.
With one exception, I charge (or base my bid on) $100 per hour for tractor work and $60 per hour for mowing with my zero turns.
Even my residential snow plowing is estimated on a $100 per hour rate, and is still significantly under what larger companies are charging for residential plowing. That's an easy sell in my very immediate area, as I am done with my plow run by 7am and the big boys won't even come out until their commercial accounts are finished.
The exception is stump grinding, which I bill at $200 per hour of grinding / grading time.

We, my son and I charge a per stump charge depending on the size of the stump and species.

 

[Yander]

Curious what kind of stump grinders are you guys using? I've thought about adding that to my side hustle offering in a few years.

 

[Complete Turf Care]

I don't charge by the hour. I figure my work by the job.

I don't do mowing. All of my work uses highly specialized equipment. But, if I figure it by the hour, sometimes it works out to as much as $1000 per hour.

But, that includes up to $300,000 of equipment on a job. That would be 2 trucks, 2 trailers, one or two tractors, maybe a skid steer, and several attachments, laser equipment, lots of insurance, licenses, and 2 or 3 men.

 

[Molalla1]

I don't charge by the hour. I figure my work by the job.

I don't do mowing. All of my work uses highly specialized equipment. But, if I figure it by the hour, sometimes it works out to as much as $1000 per hour.

But, that includes up to $300,000 of equipment on a job. That would be 2 trucks, 2 trailers, one or two tractors, maybe a skid steer, and several attachments, laser equipment, lots of insurance, licenses, and 2 or 3 men.

 

[RjCorazza]

We, my son and I charge a per stump charge depending on the size of the stump and species.

My $200 per hour is very roughly equivalent to $3 per stump inch. I got tired of justifying how I measure a stump.

 

[RjCorazza]

Curious what kind of stump grinders are you guys using? I've thought about adding that to my side hustle offering in a few years.

I use a Baumalight 1P24. It's easy enough to use, and the price was right.
While great for occasional use, it's not really the tool of choice if you're doing a lot of stump work.

 

[Yander]

Oh, so your running it off the tractor PTO.

 

[Hay Dude]

Always charge by the job, not by the hour or acre. If you underbid and get asked to do the job again, you can raise your price. If they ask “why higher than last time?” you can simply say you underbid it.
If it’s by the hour, you are kinda stuck, unless you want to “slow walk” the work, which makes you look lazy/stupid. If it’s mowing by the acre, I think you are really screwed. Look at how much less time a flat acre of grass takes to mow compared to an acre with 50 trees on it.

 

[RjCorazza]

Oh, so your running it off the tractor PTO.

Yes, plus it requires moving the tractor rather than swinging back and forth via hydraulics.

 

[two_bit_score]

I would also be interested in hearing opinions of the demographics and who is the cheapest. I did a job for my neighbor (90 years old) in the summer and he thought $140 was a lot when it was probably a $250+ job. I don't like to work for cheap people but I also understand someone that old has no concept of what things cost now.

He was also telling me his furnace guy charged him $75 for a service call and he told the guy he wouldn't be calling him back. My dad is 82 and also a cheapskate but he will pay it.

My neighbor was loaded BTW. He has since passed away.

Im not 90 and I can't beleive the current replacement costs for some of the things I bought in the past.

 

[Yander]

I think we are all in that boat with the inflation

But that also means everyone who comes to do a job at your house has those inflationary input costs in their business.
Expecting prices for service to stay in the 80s rates isn't ok.

They want to give you a $50 or even $100 and think that is plenty when you just spent 3 hours, on your equipment, on your Saturday.

It doesn't matter how old you are, I don't want that job.

 

[oosik]

I don't do ANY off property work with my tractor or any of my equipment. I'm RETIRED - don't want the hassle - don't want the extra insurance. Besides - as we all know - implement costs are just out of sight.

Couple years ago - plowed snow off my neighbors driveway - for free. He complained - didn't like the way I did it. I hope he likes paying $300 to $400 for getting it plowed by a commercial fellow now.

 

[lman]

My neighbor asked me if I could snowplow their driveway last year since their tractor was down and I refused any payment. They later gave me a box of ribeye steaks. I worked on those steaks well into the summer.

 

[RjCorazza]

Years ago I helped a couple of neighbors with plowing over several years. It got totally out of hand with more people asking for help, and becoming almost demanding. I was forced to start charging a seasonal rate.