A done-for-you workbook + playbook that hands you your true hourly rate, tells you exactly what to bid, and shows you whether last week's job actually made money — or just kept you busy.
```"I'm booked solid eight weeks out and I still can't make payroll without sweating it. Where's the money going?"
— what half this trade says out loud"Some kid with a van and a Sawzall is bidding the same job at half my number. I'm not racing him to the bottom."
— on the lowballers"I pay my journeyman $35 an hour, so I figured $35 was my cost. Turns out he actually costs me $46 before I make a dime."
— on labor burden nobody taught you"Add it up wrong on a $6K job and there goes the whole month. That's the Chapter 7 quick road right there."
— on what one bad bid doesHow much contractors underbid by when they price off direct cost and ignore burden.
Actual billable hours in a year — not 2,080. Spread your overhead over the wrong number and every bid is short.
The net margin most small shops survive on. One mispriced job erases it.
It was never the wiring. It was the math behind the wiring — and nobody handed you the sheet that does it.
```Built in plain Excel and Google Sheets. You type in your wages, your overhead, your state's comp and taxes — it does every calculation that's been quietly eating your margin.
Bidding, job costing, labor burden, true hourly rate, live job tracking, P&L and break-even — all wired together.
The "why" behind every tab, in contractor English. Read it once, price right forever.
From download to your true hourly rate in about 20 minutes. No spreadsheet skills needed.
Different burden, markup and margin targets for each — so you stop blending two businesses into one bad number.
Knowify and TurboBid are powerful — and built for shops with an office manager and time to learn them. You don't need another login at $99–$149 a month. You need the math, done once, in a tool you already own.
Opens in Excel or free Google Sheets. Nothing to install, no seats, no IT.
What does an hour really cost me? What do I bid? Did the job make money?
No bloated modules you'll never touch. Just the tabs that move your bank balance.
Pay $97 once. No card on file. No "your plan is expiring" emails forever.
Here's what's behind each tab and what it spits out. Type your numbers once; they flow everywhere.
The number that fixes everything else. Turns base wage into what an hour actually costs once burden and real billable hours are in — the figure most shops have never calculated.
Plug in hours and materials; it builds a defensible price at the margin you set. Separate builders for resi and commercial because the burden and markup aren't the same.
After the job, see exactly where you bled — labor, materials, or change orders you ate. The feedback loop that makes your next bid sharper.
Every active job on one screen — hours logged vs. bid, projected profit, what's slipping. Catch a job going sideways while you can still fix it.
The number you have to hit before you've earned a dollar. Know it cold and you'll never panic-bid a January job again.
The whole shop at a glance: a plain-English profit-and-loss, your fixed and overhead costs itemized, and a dashboard that turns it all into the few numbers you actually steer by.
Download it, build your true hourly rate, and price your next few jobs with it. If in 60 days it hasn't shown you money you were leaving on the table — or you just decide it's not for you — email me for a full refund, no questions, no hoops.
And keep the files. I'd rather you walk away with the workbook than feel boxed in. Fair is fair.