Why Your Lawn Care Estimates Are Too Low (And How to Fix It)

Why Your Lawn Care Estimates Are Too Low (And How to Fix It)

You’ve been around the block. You send out a bunch of estimates. You have no clue why your profits look like a joke at the end of the month. You know what’s going on here? You’re underpricing your jobs.

This isn’t a guess. I’ve been in your shoes — running Augusta Lawn Care, building it past 200 franchise locations and $60 million a year. We've seen it wreck businesses and I've helped fix it dozens of times.

Here’s the brutal truth: you’re pricing based on what YOU think customers will pay, not what it actually costs you to do the job.

Underpricing Is Mostly About Psychology

I remember one tech in Augusta telling me he was afraid to charge more because "people won’t book if it’s too high." That’s a classic trap. You’re so scared of losing a job that you price too low. You confuse "winning the bid" with "winning the profit."

When I started Augusta Lawn Care, I had this exact problem. I wanted to be "competitive," so I priced everything too cheap. I thought I had to be the cheapest guy in town to win jobs.

Spoiler: I didn’t. I just worked myself to the bone for crumbs.

You need to shift your mindset from trying to be the cheapest option to delivering value and running a profitable business.

What Costs Are You Forgetting?

Here’s the biggest reason estimates come in too low: you only price for the visible stuff.

I see this all the time:

• Gas and wear and tear? Nope, forgotten.
• Equipment maintenance? Nope.
• Employee benefits? Not factored.
• Office costs? Nope.
• Marketing expenses? Never included.

You can’t just add your labor and chemicals and call it a day.

At Augusta Lawn Care, we run detailed cost analyses on every job type. We break down all costs — direct and overhead. If you don’t, you’ll never hit target profits.

The Real Cost of Labor

This one kills businesses faster than anything: misunderstanding labor cost.

When you calculate labor cost, you can’t just take the hourly wage and multiply it by hours worked. You have to factor in:

• Taxes (payroll taxes, workers comp)
• Benefits (health insurance, bonuses)
• Training and onboarding time
• Sick days and holidays
• Slowdowns and downtime

Let me give you a number here from Augusta Lawn Care: Our effective labor cost per hour was about 35-40% higher than just the hourly rate once you include all the extras. So if you’re paying $15/hr, your real cost is closer to $20-$21/hr.

In other words: if you price labor wrong, your profit gets sliced before you even start.

How to Recalculate Your Estimates

Here’s how I fixed it for Augusta and how you can get it right:

Step 1: Track Everything Spend a week or two tracking actual labor hours, gas, equipment hours, and materials for your typical jobs. Use Home.works software if you want to skip the spreadsheet chaos — this is exactly why we built it.

Step 2: Break Down Your Costs Calculate your real labor cost per hour (including taxes and benefits). Add fuel, equipment depreciation, and all overhead.

Step 3: Price for Profit Decide the profit margin [blocked] you want. At Augusta, we shoot for at least 25%. Add that on top of your total cost.

Step 4: Benchmark and Adjust Compare your recalculated prices to what you’ve been charging. If you’re off by more than 20%, you’ve found your undercharged jobs.

When I walked through this with our franchisees, they often found they were underpricing by 30-50% without realizing it.

Real World Example

A buddy of mine was charging $80 for a full lawn mow. His tech took about an hour but this guy forgot:

• $15/hr labor + 35% taxes and benefits = $20.25 labor cost
• $5 fuel and $3 equipment wear per mow
• $12 overhead allocation per job

Total cost = $40.25

Add 25% profit = $50.31 minimum price

He was cutting himself dry at $80, but after talking, he realized with travel time and real prep/breakdown, it was often closer to 1.5 hours. He raised his minimum price to $110. He kept the job, kept customers happy, and doubled his profit per job.

The moral: get your costs straight. If you don’t know that first, you’re guessing in the dark.

Don’t Guess. Get It Right.

If you want to compete on price alone, you’ll race to the bottom and run yourself out of business. It’s better to compete on systems, professionalism, and honesty.

Use every tool you can. Home.works software makes tracking easier. If you want to learn the exact system I use to price jobs right, check my free courses at MikeAndes.com.

You don’t have to figure it out alone. Hundreds of Augusta Lawn Care franchisees run this system and they’re killing it because they get their pricing and costs dialed.

Bottom line

Pricing right isn’t sexy. It’s math, discipline, and honesty.

Start tracking every cost, adjust your labor rates, and price for profit, not just to WIN.

Your next step: grab a spreadsheet or Home.works, plug in your real labor + overhead numbers, and run your prices against them. If your prices don’t cover your real costs plus at least 20-25% margin, you’re leaving money on the table.

Stop that. Today.

If you want my full step-by-step pricing system, go to MikeAndes.com/free-courses and dive into the "Pricing for Profit" module. You’ll thank me later.

Mike Andes Founder, Augusta Lawn Care