Charge $100 an hour per person, with a $50 minimum. Here's the math.
Prices vary by region. Check what yours supports. These are the rates that pay for equipment replacement, insurance, self-employment tax, and a life outside the truck.
Start with an hourly baseline, not a per-yard price
The single most common mistake: pricing by the yard ("$45 a cut") without knowing how long the yard takes. A $45 cut on a 30-minute lawn is $90/hour. The same $45 cut on a 75-minute lawn is $36/hour. One of those is a business. The other is a hobby.
Build your prices from an hourly target and back into the per-visit number. My hourly baseline for clean mow, trim, blow, edge work is $100/hour per person. That's the floor. Below that, you're paying the customer for the privilege of cutting their grass.
Why $100 and not $75? Because $100/hour gross is roughly $50-60/hour net after fuel, equipment depreciation, insurance, drive-time between stops, self-employment tax, and the occasional broken belt or replacement trimmer head. $75/hour gross is closer to $35/hour net.
Per-square-foot sanity check
In these examples, yards land between about 1¢ and 3¢ a square foot. Big open yards run lower, tight ones higher. Trust the hour.
| Yard | Minutes | Visit | Per sq ft | Per hour |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 5,000 sq ft, easy access | 30 | $50 | $0.01 | $100 |
| 15,000 sq ft, moderate trim | 60 | $100 | $0.0067 | $100 |
| 3,000 sq ft, tight: fences, beds, 5 trees | 45 | $80 | $0.027 | $107 |
Always have a minimum
$50 minimum visit, no exceptions. Even on tiny postage-stamp yards.
The reason: drive time. A $35 visit at a stop that's 10 minutes off your route is a money-loser even if the mow only takes 15 minutes. 10 minutes there, 10 back, 15 to mow: 35 minutes for $35. That's $60/hour gross, well below your hourly floor. The $50 minimum forces you to either re-price the route, drop the customer, or stack adjacent stops to share the drive.
Landscape labor is a different rate
The $100/hour baseline is for clean, repetitive yard maintenance. The minute the work involves a wheelbarrow, manual digging, hauling material, or pulling rock, the rate goes up to $125-150/hour, plus the cost of supplies.
Why higher? Because:
- It's slower per dollar earned (mowing is fast, wheelbarrowing is not).
- It's harder on your body. Your back is the most expensive piece of equipment you own.
- You're carrying material risk: the customer expects you to source mulch, plants, edging, and to absorb any waste or breakage.
Mark up materials 10-20% over your cost. That's your pay for sourcing, hauling, and any waste. Show it as "materials" on the estimate; you don't need to itemize bag-by-bag.
Machine surcharges
If you're bringing a mini skid, a stand-on aerator, a stump grinder, or any machine bigger than a push mower, it's its own line of cost on top of the labor rate. The numbers I use:
- $100/hour for the machine itself, on top of the operator's hourly rate. The machine has its own fuel, maintenance, insurance, and lost-revenue cost when it's in the shop.
- $50 per yard run with the dump truck (round trip to landfill or material yard). Doesn't include the labor time loading; that's billed separately.
So a half-day mulch job: one person, the mini skid, two yard runs, and four yards of mulch at $40 a yard.
- 4 h labor × $125
- $500.00
- 4 h machine × $100
- $400.00
- 2 yard runs × $50
- $100.00
- 4 yd mulch at $40, + 15%
- $184.00
- Total
- $1,184.00
That's $1,184 for half a day, and it's sustainable. Half-day mulch jobs at $400 are not.
Crew markup math
Once you have a second guy, you have to decide what to charge for his time. Are you allowed to make money off your employee?
Yes. You took the risk to start the business, you're carrying his workers' comp, you bought the second set of equipment, and you're training him. That's what the markup pays for. The standard is roughly 30% margin on burdened crew labor, but I bill him at the same hourly rate I bill myself ($100/hour) when he's doing full operator-level work, and let the margin run fatter. That's what funds the next truck, the next mower, and the day you finally stop riding along.
Say you pay him $22/hour. Add 25% for payroll tax, workers' comp and uniforms: $27.50 an hour.
- Billed, one crew hour
- $100.00
- His cost: $22 wage + 25%
- −$27.50
- Your margin
- $72.50
Is 30% the right margin for the whole business? 30% net is a healthy lawn care business. Most operators run somewhere between 15-35% net, depending on how efficient they are and how much overhead (rent, equipment financing, admin staff) they carry.
Don't confuse markup on a single line (15% on materials, 30% on crew labor) with net margin on the business. The markups go into each estimate. Net margin is what's left at the end of the year after all overhead. Confusing them is how new operators end up underpriced.
Reprice annually
Costs go up every year. Your prices have to follow. Build a 5-8% annual price increase into recurring contracts and put it in writing in November or December for the following season. Customers expect it. If one leaves over a 6% increase, let them go.
The message can be one line: "Starting April 1, weekly mowing is $55. Thanks for another year."
Don't undercut to win the job
What you should never do is undercut on hourly rate to "win the job." Customers who chose you because you're the cheapest will leave the second a cheaper option appears. Customers who chose you because you're organized and reliable will stay for years. Price like the second kind.
Know your rates, then say them
Say your price when you talk an estimate in. Once it's on the plan, every visit carries it to billing. It costs nothing to run. Grass Go takes 0.7% only when a client pays by card.
