Lawn care pricing calculator that runs on your own cost library
A lawn care pricing calculator is only as good as the numbers inside it. Landscapeestimating prices every estimate from your company's own cost library: materials, labor rates, production rates in square feet per man-hour, equipment, disposal, overhead recovery and target margin. Measured quantities flow in, prices come out, and every estimator on the team uses the same math.
Contents
Materials, labor, equipment and overhead in one place.
What goes into the cost library
The library holds everything a line item needs. Materials carry a unit and a cost, such as mulch per cubic yard, sod per square foot, pavers, stone and plants. Labor carries a burdened rate per man-hour. Production rates tell the calculator how much work a person does in an hour, for example 90 sq ft of mulch spread at 3 in. depth or 70 linear ft of spade edging. Equipment and disposal attach to the services that use them.
- Materials with units, costs and waste factors
- Labor rates and production rates in sq ft, linear ft or units per man-hour
- Equipment, delivery and disposal charges
- Overhead recovery percentage and target margin
Assemblies
Bundling everything a service needs into one line.
Assemblies turn one measurement into a complete line
An assembly bundles the items a service always needs. A "Mulch bed refresh" assembly takes bed area from the map, multiplies by depth to get cubic yards, adds your waste factor and delivery, and converts area into man-hours with your production rate. Sod repair, shrub trimming, seasonal color and paver patios work the same way. Assemblies and waste factors are included on Company and above. The landscaping estimate example walks through four assemblies with every number shown.
Maintenance
Pricing recurring services per visit and per season.
Lawn care pricing per visit and per season
Maintenance services price per visit, then multiply by visits per season. Mowing uses turf area from the lawn measurement tool and your mowing production rate; edging, fertilisation and cleanups add their own lines and visit counts. For example, a 6,000 sq ft lawn at a mowing rate of 12,000 sq ft per man-hour takes 0.5 man-hours per visit; at $50 per man-hour that is $25 of labor per visit, and with 20 percent overhead recovery and a 25 percent target margin the visit prices at $40. Over 28 visits the season totals $1,120.
- Per-visit price and season total on the same proposal
- Visit counts per service, such as mowing, fertilisation and cleanups
- Equipment and travel costs added as library items on each service
Margin
How overhead and target margin set the price.
Overhead recovery and target margin, applied the same way every time
Direct cost is materials plus labor plus equipment and disposal. Overhead recovery adds your share of fixed costs, and target margin sets the price so that margin is a fixed percentage of what the client pays. Because these settings live at the company level, two estimators pricing the same yard reach the same number. On Operations, margin guardrails flag estimates below your floor and route large bids to a manager for approval above a set amount.
- Company-wide overhead and margin settings
- Separate cost libraries per branch on Operations (up to 10 branches)
- Margin reports per estimator, service line and branch on Operations
Current rates
Updating production rates from finished jobs.
Keep production rates honest with job costing
Production rates drift. Crews get faster on some services and slower on others, and material prices change every season. When a job closes, landscaping invoice software shows estimate against actual per line, so you can see that mulch took 14 man-hours where you priced 12 and adjust the rate for the next estimate. For a deeper method, read how to price landscape jobs.
FAQ
- Can I import my current spreadsheet prices?
Yes. You enter or paste your materials and rates into the library. On Enterprise, cost library migration from spreadsheets is part of dedicated onboarding.
- Is my cost library visible to other companies?
No. Your cost data belongs to your company and is never shared. See landscaping software security.
- Does the calculator handle hardscape as well as lawn care?
Yes. Pavers, stone, base material, walls and plantings sit in the same library, with production rates for installation, so maintenance and construction estimates share one set of numbers.
Get started
Price with your numbers, not a guess
Load your materials, rates and margin once, and every estimate after that uses them. Compare plans and start with the one that fits your team.