Free price book builder for tradespeople

How each price is worked out

Every job's price is the same sum, and every part of it is a box you can change:

• Labor: the hours for the job × your hourly rate.
• Parts: what the parts cost you × (1 + your markup). The box starts at the middle of the retail range we checked (where a job takes one of two parts, a 1/2 or a 3/4 hp disposal, the range runs from the cheaper to the dearer); type what you actually pay. The markup starts at 20%, a starting point, not a rule.
• Travel, if you turn it on: the miles there and back × the IRS business mileage rate ($0.76 a mile from July 1, 2026), plus the drive time × your rate, added to every job.
• Price: labor + parts + travel. A job priced per window, per shrub or per 100 square feet is priced for one of those.

Where the starting rate comes from

Three steps, each shown under the rate box. First, the Bureau of Labor Statistics' median pay for your trade's occupation (Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics, May 2025) in your metro area, else your state, else the whole country, and it says which. Second, what employers pay on top of that pay for the same kind of work: health and other insurance, retirement, and payroll taxes such as Social Security, Medicare, unemployment and workers' comp (BLS Employer Costs for Employee Compensation, June 2026: about 31.4% on top for natural resources, construction, and maintenance occupations, 20.9% for service occupations). Paid leave is left out, because the calculator already gives you four weeks off.

Third, the hourly rate calculator's own math treats that total as your profit before tax, sets its share aside for income and self-employment tax, adds its starting business costs and spreads it over the hours you can actually bill. So the rate starts from what the same work costs an employer, not from what an employee takes home. You can type your own rate instead.

Each trade reads one BLS occupation: plumbing, Plumbers, Pipefitters, and Steamfitters (47-2152); electrical, Electricians (47-2111); hvac, Heating, Air Conditioning, and Refrigeration Mechanics and Installers (49-9021); handyman, Maintenance and Repair Workers, General (49-9071); house cleaning, Maids and Housekeeping Cleaners (37-2012); landscaping, Landscaping and Groundskeeping Workers (37-3011).

Where the parts prices come from

For each job, the main parts a tradesperson buys for it, priced at major retailers' public product pages and checked by hand on November 6, 2026: two or three products each, from cheaper to better, so each part shows a range. Every product is listed with its page and the date it was checked; a sale it was on is shown but not used. A Menards or Ace Hardware price is one store's online price (the store is named beside it), never a national price. Two parts could not be checked and say "not checked". These are retail shelf prices for parts, not what a job costs.

The whole data set is one file anyone can read: price-book.json, with its description. Where our data comes from.

Every trade's jobs, on their own page

Each trade's page lists its jobs with their starting hours, the parts and every retailer page, and the starting rate for the whole country.

• Plumbing price book — twelve jobs, from the plumbing price book template
• Electrical price book — thirteen jobs, from the electrician price list template
• HVAC price book — twelve jobs, from the hvac price list template
• Handyman price book — thirteen jobs, from the handyman price list template
• House cleaning price book — thirteen jobs, from the cleaning price list template
• Landscaping price book — fourteen jobs, from the landscaping and lawn care price list template

Keep your prices in Workeey

Keep your prices in Workeey: put your hourly rate and parts markup in its rates once, and every line you type on an estimate with a name and a price is saved and offered on the next one, so your price book builds itself as you quote. Start free.