Hello. I have a request to give an estimate to paint a 1900 sq ft interior of a house (2 story). Some wall need priming for nasty stuff. (It’s a rental). Ceilings, walls, trim, doors basically everything to paint. How much and how long for 1 person to paint? Thanks.

Hey guys, Welcome to the Goo Crew. If you’re reading this, you took the plunge and joined during the group’s startup phase. Right now, we make vague promises about helping you make money and save money—and there’s almost nothing in the classroom. Reminds me of school. 😂 A lot of guys in the group have asked about pricing. After Jeremy and I have completed somewhere between 1,500 and 1,800 estimates over the past 20 years, here’s my favorite way to price a job. But first… The most important part of estimating is figuring out how long the job will take. That’s probably 95% of it. If we get the time right, the rest is pretty easy. At this point, Jeremy and I have a large base of past jobs to pull from: A new bathroom usually takes two to three days. A typical bedroom might take three days. And so on. Once we estimate the time, we have to decide what to charge for that time. Over the past year and a half, we’ve adopted what’s called the Charge Rate Method. What is a charge rate? It’s the hourly amount you charge to cover: - Labor - Materials and supplies - Overhead - Profit In other words, it’s one hourly rate that includes everything. Why do we like it? Because once we figure out how long the job should take, we multiply those hours by our charge rate and—BAM—the estimate is complete. What should your charge rate be? It depends. Last year, we took an expensive and fancy coaching course for painting contractors. They recommended a charge rate between $70 and $90 per hour. What do we currently charge in the suburbs of Philadelphia? $85 per hour. If you’re thinking, “There’s no way I can charge that much,” I understand. I thought the same thing. Last year, we raised our rate from around $67 per hour to $85. What happened? We made more money—and we still have a 77% acceptance rate. Jeremy handled the price increase better than I did. I was fairly certain it would destroy the business and leave me homeless. There’s more nuance to pricing than this simple explanation, but fear not. I’ll be uploading everything we know about pricing jobs to the classroom this week.