Reddit mentions of Markup & Profit: A Contractor's Guide, Revisited

Lot's of good input, but nobody has said anything about generating a good business plan being the very first step.

How are you going to get paid? Hourly, or as a percentage of the project?

How much overhead will you have, what kind of insurance etc.

If you're going to be handling more in depth projects you'll probably be doing project management as well, i.e paying flooring subs or painters etc.

There is a great book on kindle, it's called "Markup and Profit"

https://www.amazon.com/Markup-Profit-Contractors-Guide-Revisited/dp/1572182717/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=markup+and+profit+stone&qid=1567475083&s=books&sr=1-1

It is geared more towards construction/specialty contracting, but most of it applies to what you're wanting to do as well. I use basically the same methods taught in this book when I do interior projects.

I use the method he describes, calculate my total cost to complete the job, then add my markup to cover overhead and profit.

One word of caution would be on having clients paying subs or paying for things directly. Remember, when there's a problem they're going to call you, not the store or the flooring guy, so marking these things up isn't being greedy or making free money, it's a reflection of the work you put in to bring it all together and the time YOU have to spend when things don't go exactly right.

I also hate working hourly. It's no fun spending 8 hours helping a client pick out a color combo for a epoxy floor and then having them bitch about paying you for 8 hours, but that 8 hours at $75 an hour on 2000 sqft of floor at $12 a foot isn't even noticeable if it's just rolled into the floor cost.

​

Sorry, a bit rambling, but it's late and I'm tired :)

Buy this book. Markup & Profit: A Contractor's Guide, Revisited https://www.amazon.com/dp/1572182717/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_api_9DPMybNWXW6S9 Read it a couple times front to back.