The Real Math
$40k A Month
Isn't A
Random Number.
You own a handyman business, and you want three things: financial stability, schedule flexibility, and the room to make a real impact in your community. You get there at $40k a month. Here's the math — line by line.
The setup: you, two techs, 20 hours a week.
Two full-time techs in the field, paid an average of $28/hour, each billing 32 hours a week to your clients. You bill 20 hours a week yourself. That's 84 billable hours a week. You charge $115/hour standard, but your effective rate is $95 once you account for warranty work and package discounts. Materials run about 15% of labor, marked up 20%.
Monthly overhead
Run it all the way through and you net about $141,000 a year. Map that to what you actually wanted:
Financial Stability
$141k a year is a comfortable living that holds through the slow season.
Schedule Flexibility
You're in the field just 20 hours a week. The rest is yours.
Community Impact
Financial and time margin to pour back into the people around you.
But the rate is everything.
Charge $65/hour — what most handymen settle for — and the exact same crew, same hours, same skill, nets about $6,500 a year. The rate can't carry the structure. That's why you can't scale at $65.
$65/hr
$6,500per year, take-home
The rate most handymen settle for
$95/hr
$141,000per year, take-home
You + 2 techs · 20 hrs/wk on the tools
The Honest Part
"I can't get enough work for two full-time techs."
"I can't charge $95 an hour — let alone $115."
If you're sure about both, close the tab and go about your day. We're not going to try to convince you of anything.
But if you've always felt there has to be a way to work part-time and still make real money — here's how it actually works. Fair warning: we're kind of cheating. We know exactly how a handyman business gets to $40k a month, because we built one, and we still run it.
Maybe not today — because right now you don't look or operate like a business that charges $115. Customers who pay $115 aren't price shopping. They're convenience shopping. They want the operator who's easy to reach, sends a clean estimate, confirms the appointment with a tap, shows up on time in professional gear, cleans up after, and makes paying simple. That takes smooth, integrated operations to pull off — and when you have it, people pay for it. Better still: those customers are easier to work with than the ones haggling at $65.
Here's the part that stings: the ads don't matter that much. We've spent well over $100k on ads for our own handyman business. The greatest ad ever made still loses money if a lead waits 24 hours for a reply. What makes ads work is operations and digital presence:
A customer can drop off at any point right up until the work starts. Tighten every step and the leads you already get start converting — which is what finally makes new ads pay.
So what's the actual difference between your business and one that does $40k a month? Most of the time it comes down to those two gaps — operations and digital presence. They're not the whole job; they're where the whole job tends to break. Closing them for good isn't a quick fix — it's the full back office, marketing, hiring, and guidance someone has to run. There's more than one way to get there. We just believe Fulcrum is the fastest, highest-value way — there's no one like us.
If you're doing $5k a month or more and you're ready to scale without the chaos, we should talk.
Our Bold Guarantee
If we don't double your revenue, we refund 100% of your money.
*Subject to program terms and qualification.