Short answer
Charge (loaded wage + overhead per hour) ÷ (1 − margin) for every crew-hour, then add equipment and dump fees. On this page's assumptions, a $20 wage plus 30% burden and $8.25 overhead gives $52.69 per crew-hour at a 35% margin. Two hours of solo yard work with $20 of equipment prices at $136.15.
- Every crew-hour must bill at least $52.69 on these assumptions, before equipment and dump fees.
- Two hours of solo yard work with $20 of equipment prices at $136.15.
- A two-person half-day spring cleanup, 8 crew-hours with two dump loads, prices at $560.00.
- $100 an hour is a 55.75% margin solo but only 21.5% for a two-person crew.
- All figures are example assumptions. Replace them with your own wage, overhead, timed tasks and dump fees.
On this page
- How much should I charge for yard work per hour?
- How much for 2 hours of yard work? A worked example
- How to price a half-day spring or fall yard cleanup
- Solo or a two-person crew: what changes in the price?
- Yard work price table by hours and crew size
- Is $100 an hour too much for landscape work?
- Per hour or per job, and what minimum charge to set
- Common yard work pricing mistakes
- Yard work calculator, app or landscaping bid sheet?
- What to put on your yard work price sheet
- Step-by-step
- FAQ
How much should I charge for yard work per hour?
Charge what one hour costs you, divided by one minus your target margin. On this page's assumptions, a $20 wage plus 30% burden is a $26 loaded rate, overhead adds $8.25, so every crew-hour has to bill at least $52.69 at a 35% margin, before equipment and dump fees.
This page is about general yard work and spring or fall yard cleanup: weeding beds, edging, cutting back perennials, pruning small shrubs, and bagging and hauling the debris. Weekly mowing is a different job with a different season and route, so it has its own page: how to price lawn care jobs. Leaf-only visits are covered in how much to charge for leaf removal.
Most of the search results for this question are mowing threads quoting other people's per-hour numbers. Those numbers carry someone else's wage, truck and dump fees. I'm not a landscaper; I build pricing maths, so every figure below is arithmetic on labelled assumptions you replace with your own.
| What you are pricing | Break-even | Price to quote |
|---|---|---|
| One crew-hour, labour and overhead only | $34.25 | $52.69 |
| One clock hour, solo, with equipment | $44.25 | $68.08 |
| One clock hour, two-person crew, with equipment | $78.50 | $120.77 |
So the solo hourly rate to quote on these inputs is $68.08, and a two-person crew hour is $120.77. Dump fees are added per job, not per hour, because they depend on how much debris there is.
How much for 2 hours of yard work? A worked example
On these assumptions, 2 hours of solo yard work with $20 of equipment and fuel prices at $136.15. That is the calculator's starting example, so you can change any input and watch the price move.
Worked example: 2 hours of solo yard work: $20 wage, 30% burden, $14,520 overhead over 220 days; materials = $10 equipment per clock hour × 2 (all assumptions)
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Workers (input) | 1 |
| Hourly wage paid (input) | $20.00 |
| Labour burden % (input) | 30% |
| Materials (input) | $20.00 |
| Overhead for the year (input) | $14,520.00 |
| People in the field (input) | 1 |
| Billable days a year (input) | 220 |
| Target margin % (input) | 35% |
| Jobs a week (input) | 10 |
| Hours on the job (input) | 2 |
| Loaded labour rate (per hour) | $26.00 |
| Crew-hours | 2 |
| Labour cost | $52.00 |
| Overhead per sellable hour | $8.25 |
| Overhead share | $16.50 |
| Break-even cost | $88.50 |
| Price to quote | $136.15 |
| Profit on the job | $47.65 |
| Price if you MARK UP instead | $119.48 |
| Margin you actually keep with markup | 25.93% |
| Lost per job by marking up | $16.68 |
| Lost per year by marking up | $8,673.00 |
Computed with the same formulas as the free calculators on this site. Change any input in the calculator above to see your own numbers.
The working: 2 crew-hours at a loaded $26.00 is $52.00. Overhead of $14,520 a year over one person × 220 billed days × 8 hours is $8.25 an hour, so $16.50. Add $20.00 of equipment (an assumed $10 per clock hour for trimmer, blower, fuel and wear) and break-even is $88.50. Divide by 0.65 and the price is $136.15, leaving $47.65 of profit.
If the debris goes to a green-waste site, add the fee as materials. One assumed $25 load takes this job to $174.62. Do not fold it into the wage: the wage field is pay, and a dump fee does not grow with burden or overhead.
How to price a half-day spring or fall yard cleanup
A cleanup is priced the same way: convert the task list into crew-hours, add equipment and the dump fees, then divide by one minus margin. On the assumptions below, a two-person half-day spring cleanup is 8 crew-hours and prices at $560.00.
| Task | Crew-hours |
|---|---|
| Drive, unload and walk the property | 1.0 |
| Weed beds | 2.5 |
| Edge beds and walks | 1.0 |
| Cut back perennials and ornamental grasses | 1.5 |
| Prune small shrubs | 1.0 |
| Bag, tarp and load debris | 1.0 |
| Total | 8.0 |
Two people on site for 4 clock hours is those 8 crew-hours. Materials are $40 of equipment (4 clock hours × $10) plus two assumed $25 green-waste loads, $90 in all.
Worked example: Half-day spring cleanup, two people for 4 hours (8 crew-hours); materials = $40 equipment + two $25 green-waste loads (assumptions)
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Workers (input) | 2 |
| Hourly wage paid (input) | $20.00 |
| Labour burden % (input) | 30% |
| Materials (input) | $90.00 |
| Overhead for the year (input) | $29,040.00 |
| People in the field (input) | 2 |
| Billable days a year (input) | 220 |
| Target margin % (input) | 35% |
| Jobs a week (input) | 10 |
| Hours on the job (input) | 4 |
| Loaded labour rate (per hour) | $26.00 |
| Crew-hours | 8 |
| Labour cost | $208.00 |
| Overhead per sellable hour | $8.25 |
| Overhead share | $66.00 |
| Break-even cost | $364.00 |
| Price to quote | $560.00 |
| Profit on the job | $196.00 |
| Price if you MARK UP instead | $491.40 |
| Margin you actually keep with markup | 25.93% |
| Lost per job by marking up | $68.60 |
| Lost per year by marking up | $35,672.00 |
Computed with the same formulas as the free calculators on this site. Change any input in the calculator above to see your own numbers.
A fall cleanup uses the same sheet with different tasks: cutting perennials to the ground, a final edge, and more debris. If leaves are most of the work, price the leaf portion with the leaf removal method and add the bed work as hours.
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Solo or a two-person crew: what changes in the price?
The crew-hours and the overhead per crew-hour stay the same; what changes is the clock time, and every clock hour carries equipment cost. The same 8 crew-hour cleanup done solo takes a full 8-hour day and prices at $621.54, which is $61.54 more than the crew's $560.00.
Worked example: The same 8 crew-hour cleanup done solo in one 8-hour day; materials = $80 equipment + two $25 loads (assumptions)
| Item | Value |
|---|---|
| Workers (input) | 1 |
| Hourly wage paid (input) | $20.00 |
| Labour burden % (input) | 30% |
| Materials (input) | $130.00 |
| Overhead for the year (input) | $14,520.00 |
| People in the field (input) | 1 |
| Billable days a year (input) | 220 |
| Target margin % (input) | 35% |
| Jobs a week (input) | 10 |
| Hours on the job (input) | 8 |
| Loaded labour rate (per hour) | $26.00 |
| Crew-hours | 8 |
| Labour cost | $208.00 |
| Overhead per sellable hour | $8.25 |
| Overhead share | $66.00 |
| Break-even cost | $404.00 |
| Price to quote | $621.54 |
| Profit on the job | $217.54 |
| Price if you MARK UP instead | $545.40 |
| Margin you actually keep with markup | 25.93% |
| Lost per job by marking up | $76.14 |
| Lost per year by marking up | $39,592.00 |
Computed with the same formulas as the free calculators on this site. Change any input in the calculator above to see your own numbers.
Where the $61.54 comes from: 4 extra clock hours × $10 of equipment is $40, and $40 ÷ 0.65 is $61.54. Overhead is the same per crew-hour in both cases because the crew's $29,040 a year is spread over twice the sellable hours of the solo operator's $14,520.
The bigger difference is the calendar. A crew finishes in half a day and can fit a second job; solo, the cleanup is the whole day. If you quote a solo cleanup by copying a crew price, check that the hours you enter are crew-hours, not clock hours, or the labour is half what it should be.
Yard work price table by hours and crew size
Price per job rises in line with time, because these examples have no fixed fee other than the dump loads. Read the row that matches your clock hours on site, then add dump fees.
| Clock hours on site | Solo break-even | Solo price | Two-person break-even | Two-person price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | $44.25 | $68.08 | $78.50 | $120.77 |
| 2 | $88.50 | $136.15 | $157.00 | $241.54 |
| 3 | $132.75 | $204.23 | $235.50 | $362.31 |
| 4 (half day) | $177.00 | $272.31 | $314.00 | $483.08 |
Each $25 dump load adds $38.46 to the price ($25 ÷ 0.65). That is why the half-day crew cleanup is $560.00 with two loads and $483.08 without them.
Searches also ask about yard cleanup per square foot. Area is a weak predictor here: a 5,000 sq ft yard of lawn and a 5,000 sq ft yard of overgrown beds take very different hours. Price the beds and tasks, and use square feet only as a check once you have timed a few similar yards.
Is $100 an hour too much for landscape work?
It depends on who is working. On these assumptions $100 is well above the solo clock-hour price of $68.08 and below the two-person price of $120.77.
- Solo at $100: break-even is $44.25 an hour, so $100 keeps $55.75, a 55.75% margin.
- Two people at $100: break-even is $78.50 a clock hour, so $100 keeps $21.50, a 21.5% margin, under the 35% target.
So $100 an hour is not too much or too little in general; it is a margin you can check. Put your own wage, overhead and equipment in and see where $100 lands. Labour burden is the input most often guessed; the loaded rate here is a $20 wage × 1.30, an assumption.
Per hour or per job, and what minimum charge to set
Quote per job when you can see the work; bill per hour when you cannot. A fixed price rewards you for being quick and punishes you for misjudging the yard. Hourly billing moves that risk to the customer.
The risk in numbers: quote the 2-hour job at $136.15 and it takes 3 hours. Break-even is now $132.75, profit falls to $3.40 and the margin to about 2.5%. Quote per job only after you have timed enough similar yards, or put a clear scope on the quote (which beds, how many bags).
Set a minimum from the smallest visit worth the drive. Assume 1 hour on site plus half an hour of drive and loading, solo, with $15 of equipment: break-even $66.38, price $102.12. A small job never prices below that, because the drive costs the same whether you work 20 minutes or an hour.
Common yard work pricing mistakes
- Wage instead of loaded rate. Pricing labour at $20 rather than $26 leaves out tax, insurance and paid time off before you start.
- Free haul-away. Leave the two dump loads out of the half-day cleanup and the price is $483.08, $76.92 short of $560.00.
- Markup instead of margin. Adding 35% to the $88.50 break-even bills $119.48 and keeps 25.93%, $16.68 short on a 2-hour job. On the cleanup it is $68.60.
- Clock hours typed as crew-hours. Two people for 4 hours is 8 crew-hours. Enter 4 with one worker and the labour halves.
- A mowing price for cleanup work. Mowing is priced over a season of repeat visits; a cleanup is a one-off with bed work and debris. Price them separately.
Yard work calculator, app or landscaping bid sheet?
For one quote, the free lawn care pricing calculator is enough: enter crew-hours, workers, wage, burden, the equipment and dump dollars as materials, and your yearly overhead.
When one property needs several services, the landscaping bid sheet ($14.99) has eight service lines, each taking hours and material dollars, and its shipped example includes a yard cleanup and hauling line. It adds your loaded labour rate and an equipment cost per hour ($15 default), marks up materials by the percentage you set, spreads overhead per crew-hour ($8.25 on its defaults) and shows break-even and the price at your margin. Because it charges equipment per labour hour and marks up materials, its figure will differ from this page unless you set those to match. It is an internal pricing sheet, not a customer-facing proposal. Field-service apps suit owners who need scheduling and invoicing as well.
Spring cleanups often lead to mulch; price that with mulch installation pricing, and overgrown hedges with how much to charge for hedge trimming.
What to put on your yard work price sheet
Your own rates and timed tasks, so any yard becomes a sum. Layout: B2 = clock hours on site, B3 = workers, B4 = wage, B5 = burden %, B6 = overhead per crew-hour, B7 = equipment per clock hour, B8 = dump loads, B9 = dump fee, B10 = margin %, B11 = minimum charge, B12 = break-even.
Hourly rate per crew-hour
=(B4*(1+B5)+B6)/(1-B10)B5 and B10 formatted as percentages. Returns 52.69 on $20, 30%, $8.25 and 35%.
Break-even
=B2*B3*(B4*(1+B5)+B6)+B2*B7+B8*B9Crew-hours × (loaded + overhead) + clock hours × equipment + dump fees. Returns 364 on the half-day crew cleanup.
Price with minimum
=MAX(B12/(1-B10),B11)B12 = break-even.
Real margin if the job overruns
=1-B13/B14B13 = break-even at the actual hours, B14 = the price you quoted. A 2-hour quote that takes 3 hours returns about 2.5%.
- Crew-minutes per task: weeding per bed, edging per 100 ft, cutting back per perennial bed, pruning per shrub.
- Bags or loads per typical cleanup, and the green-waste fee where you dump.
- Equipment cost per clock hour, your minimum charge and your hourly rate for work outside the quoted scope.
Want the rates kept in one file for every bid? The lawn care and landscaping estimate template holds them as input cells and works in Excel and Google Sheets.
Step-by-step: How Much Should I Charge for Yard Work? Hourly Rate and Cleanup Pricing
- List the tasks. Walk the yard and list beds to weed, edges, perennials to cut back, shrubs to prune and expected debris.
- Convert to crew-hours. Drive and setup plus your timed minutes for each task, then divide by crew size for clock hours.
- Add equipment and dump fees. Equipment cost per clock hour × clock hours, plus loads or bags × your green-waste fee.
- Find break-even. Crew-hours × (loaded rate + overhead per crew-hour) + equipment and dump fees.
- Divide by one minus margin. Price = break-even ÷ (1 − margin), never below your minimum charge.
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The spreadsheet version of this guide for Excel & Google Sheets: type your numbers into the highlighted cells and the formulas do the rest. One-time $14.99, no subscription, instant download.
See the Landscaping & Lawn Care Estimate Calculator →Buy now — $14.99All 7 templates — $49Instant access by email after checkout via Payhip. Want to try the maths first? Use the free calculator — no signup.
Frequently asked questions
How much should I charge for yard work?
Charge (loaded wage + overhead per hour) ÷ (1 − margin) per crew-hour, plus equipment and dump fees. On this page's assumptions that is $52.69 per crew-hour, $68.08 per solo clock hour with equipment, and $136.15 for 2 hours of solo work.
How much for 2 hours of yard work?
On a $20 wage, 30% burden, $8.25 overhead per hour, $10 of equipment per hour and a 35% margin, 2 hours solo prices at $136.15. With two people for 2 hours it is $241.54. Add any dump fee on top.
What's a fair hourly rate for yard work?
A fair rate is one that covers your loaded wage, overhead and equipment and leaves your target margin. On this page's assumptions that is $68.08 per solo clock hour and $120.77 per two-person clock hour. Your own costs set your number.
Is $100 an hour too much for landscape work?
Check it against break-even. On these assumptions a solo hour costs $44.25, so $100 is a 55.75% margin. A two-person hour costs $78.50, so $100 is a 21.5% margin, below a 35% target.
How much should I charge for a yard cleanup?
Turn the task list into crew-hours and price them with equipment and dump fees. An assumed half-day spring cleanup, two people for 4 hours with two $25 green-waste loads, prices at $560 at a 35% margin.
What is included in a yard clean up?
Write the scope on the quote. A spring or fall cleanup usually lists bed weeding, edging, cutting back perennials, small-shrub pruning and bagging or hauling debris. Mowing and leaf-only visits are separate jobs priced on their own pages.
What minimum charge should I set for yard work?
Price the smallest visit worth the drive. Assuming 1 hour on site plus half an hour of drive and loading, solo, with $15 of equipment, the minimum is $102.12 at a 35% margin.
Should I charge by the hour or by the job for yard work?
Charge per job when you can see the full scope, and per hour when you cannot. A 2-hour job quoted at $136.15 that takes 3 hours falls to about a 2.5% margin, so time similar yards first.
I'm not a contractor, landlord or accountant. I build the pricing maths, and every number on this page shows its working so you can check it instead of trusting it. Guides are drafted with AI assistance; every worked figure is computed by the same code as the free calculators. How these guides are made → · Watch the breakdowns on YouTube →