Contractor Calculators: Ten Free Tools for Pricing, Rates and Pay
Each calculator here answers one pricing question with a formula you can see: what to charge per hour, the lowest price a job can take, what a markup really leaves as margin, and what your business can pay you at the end of the year. All ten run in your browser, need no signup and store nothing.
Start with the question, not the tool. The table below matches ten common questions to the calculator that answers each one.
Which calculator answers your question
Ten questions contractors actually type, and the one tool for each.
| Your question | Use |
|---|---|
| What do I charge per hour? | Contractor Hourly Rate Calculator |
| What is the lowest price this job can take? | Contractor Break-Even Calculator |
| If I add 20% to my costs, what margin is that? | Contractor Markup Calculator |
| What markup gets me a 25% margin? | Markup vs Margin Calculator |
| What should this job be priced at for my target margin? | Contractor Profit Calculator |
| Hours times rate plus materials: what is the price? | Job Cost Calculator |
| What do I charge for a service call? | Service Pricing Calculator |
| What can the business pay me this year? | Contractor Salary Calculator |
| What does one HVAC technician hour have to sell for? | HVAC Labor Rate Calculator |
| How do I price an HVAC install or repair? | HVAC Profit Margin Calculator |
All ten calculators, by the question they answer
What each tool takes in and what it gives back. Every page shows its formula, a worked example with labeled inputs, and the sources behind any benchmark it quotes.
Price one job
Contractor Profit Calculator
You enter: Wages, labor burden, materials, other direct costs, overhead, a risk reserve and a target margin.
You get: The job price that margin implies, with the equivalent markup.
Open calculatorJob Cost Calculator
You enter: Labor hours, an hourly labor rate, material cost and a markup.
You get: One job's final price from the simplest cost build-up.
Open calculatorService Pricing Calculator
You enter: Labor hours and rate, materials, an overhead percentage and a target margin.
You get: The price to charge for a service call.
Open calculatorHVAC Profit Margin Calculator
You enter: Labor, material and equipment costs, overhead and a target margin for an HVAC job.
You get: The target price for that job, with HVAC benchmark tables.
Open calculatorMarkup and margin
Contractor Markup Calculator
You enter: Labor cost, material cost and the markup you plan to add.
You get: The selling price and the real margin that markup leaves.
Open calculatorMarkup vs Margin Calculator
You enter: A job cost, a markup, and the margin you actually want.
You get: The margin a markup produces, and the markup a target margin needs.
Open calculatorRates
Contractor Hourly Rate Calculator
You enter: Your take-home goal, annual business expenses, billable hours a week and weeks worked.
You get: The hourly rate you have to charge to reach the goal.
Open calculatorHVAC Labor Rate Calculator
You enter: A technician's wage, paid and billable hours a month, labor burden, monthly overhead and a target margin.
You get: An example selling rate for one billable technician hour.
Open calculatorThe order that makes the numbers agree
1. Set the rate from what you need, not from what the competition charges.
The hourly rate calculator divides your take-home goal plus a year of expenses by the hours you can bill. That rate is the labor line in every estimate you write afterward.
2. Find the floor on each job before you negotiate.
The break-even calculator adds your overhead share to labor and materials. Anything below that number is a job you pay to do.
3. Price above the floor with a margin, and know the markup that margin implies.
The profit calculator prices the job at your target margin; the markup calculator shows what a markup you already use actually leaves. Then the salary calculator checks, at year end, that the rate and the prices paid you.
Questions about the calculators
Are these contractor calculators free, and do they store my numbers?
Yes, they are free, and no. Each calculator runs in your browser; nothing you type is sent to us or saved. The Download button writes a plain text file to your device and the Share button uses your phone's share sheet or copies the results to your clipboard.
Do the calculators recommend a markup, margin or rate?
No. Each one applies the formula on its page to the numbers you enter. Where a page shows a benchmark, it names the source and the date it was checked, and it describes the group that benchmark came from rather than presenting it as a target for your business.
Why are there separate markup, margin, break-even and profit calculators?
Because they answer different questions on different bases. Markup is measured against cost, margin against price, break-even is the floor with no profit in it, and the profit calculator prices a job at a chosen margin after overhead and a risk reserve. Putting a markup where a margin belongs is the most common pricing error these tools exist to catch; the markup calculator shows the gap on a worked example.
Which calculator should I use first?
If you have never set a rate, the hourly rate calculator: it works backward from what you need to take home. If you already have a rate and price by the job, the break-even calculator for the floor and the profit calculator for the price. The salary calculator is the year-end check that the two of them actually paid you.
Start with the rate
Every other number on this page depends on it. Open the hourly rate calculator, enter what you need to take home, and keep the result for the labor line of your next estimate.
When the estimates, invoices and job hours behind these numbers need a home: Pocket Boss, from $19.99/month with a 14-day trial. Start the trial or see plans and pricing.