Hey guys, I am brand new to the business I am starting. I have a backhoe, and soon to be getting a dump truck. Im really curious about job bidding. For myself I am fairly inexperienced with what i am doing, and I plan on starting out small, then extending my business as my experience and knowledge grows. I know a guy will have to bid on jobs, and Im just not sure how one goes about doing that. Im not so much interested in the process, as much as just how to figure out what to charge! Any advice and discussion would be greatly appreciated!
well first, you need to sit down and guage how many hours you plan on working that year, how many gallons of fuel you're going to burn, oil and filters/grease you're going to use, the cost of your backhoe, interest, insurance, man, there's not enough internet to put it all down...what i'm trying to say is...the first year, you'll need to estimate what your TOTAL expenses are going to be for the first year. you need to decide what profit margin you want. you need to decide how much money you want to make a year.....guess how many hours you'll work during the year....divide your total expenses/profit/wages by hours worked....that's your hourly rate. might not hurt to "feel the market" by finding out what competition charges. my suggestion is NOT trust these #'s...maybe use them as a guage on where you need to be. you're business may have more/less overhead than others, you really need to determine what YOUR costs are.
When you bid a job you go through the entire job in your head, if you miss something during the bidding process then you do it for free if you get the job. It's all about equipment time and man hours and the hourly rates as said in the above post. All you have to do is come up with a job total before you do it, that will be reasonable enough you get the work and still make a profit at the end of the day. Lots of money is made and lost on paper. Good luck
I never thought about going through a whole year figuring out costs like that. I have a good job in the oil field right now, so Im just kinda doing this as a side business when Im not working my full time job. Hell i would be happy with paying for the equipment and thats it! Thanks for the repleis fellas, keep em coming!