What this is
JobCostLab makes calculators that answer one question: what does this job actually cost me, and what should I charge? Not a market average, not what the guy down the road charges, but a number built from your crew, your equipment, your overhead and the margin you want to keep.
The free calculators on this site each do one thing on one screen. They are meant to be used on a phone, in the driveway, before you say a number to a customer.
Who it is for
Owner-operators and small crews in the trades where the owner is also the estimator: tree service and stump grinding, junk removal and cleanouts, mobile detailing, roofing repair. Businesses with one to three trucks, where a bad quote is not a rounding error but a bad week.
How the calculators work
Every tool follows the same method. Add up direct costs (labor at a loaded rate, equipment by the hour, disposal, fuel). Add an overhead allocation per billable hour. Apply a multiplier for difficulty where it applies. Then divide by one minus your target margin, because markup is not margin. The free versions use blended numbers and sensible defaults. The full spreadsheets, sold on Etsy, break every number out by role, machine and line item, save your rates, and add printable quotes and job logs.
What it is not
Every default on this site is a placeholder. Wages, insurance, comp rates, fuel, dump fees and equipment costs vary by region and by business, and you should replace them with your own before you rely on the result. Nothing here is legal, tax, insurance or accounting advice.
How it is made
The formulas, articles and spreadsheets are developed with AI assistance and checked against worked examples. If you find an error or a case the calculators get wrong, please tell us. Corrections get made.
How we check our numbers
- Every formula is worked by hand first. Each calculator starts as a worked example with every step written out (labor, equipment, disposal, overhead, margin). The web tool and the spreadsheet must both reproduce that example to the cent before anything is published.
- Edge cases are tested. Zero crew, 0% margin, very large jobs, heavy loads that hit a weight limit before a volume limit. If an input would give a nonsense answer, the tool says so instead of showing a number.
- Defaults are labeled as defaults. Price ranges and starting values are there to make the tool usable on first open. They are not quotes and not market surveys, and every page says to replace them with your own numbers.
- Dates are shown. Each guide shows when it was published and last updated. When a method or a number changes, the date changes.
- Corrections are made, not argued. If you find a mistake, send it. Confirmed errors are fixed on the site and in the spreadsheets.
Who runs it
JobCostLab is a small independent publisher. There is no investor, no sales team and no software subscription to upsell. The site is paid for by the spreadsheets sold on Etsy and Gumroad and, in time, by the ads shown on these pages. Ads never change what a calculator shows or what a guide recommends.
The full spreadsheets
The paid workbooks are on Etsy under the shop name JobCostLab. They are Excel files with a Google Sheets copy link, one-time purchase, no subscription.