Free tool
Lawn Care Pricing Calculator
Do the costing math once. Get your true billable man-hour rate and a ready-to-publish 5-tier rate card, then quote in seconds.
Your rate card
Break-even $0.00. Below this you are paying to mow.
Price per mow (weekly)
| Small · under 5,000 sq ft | — |
| Medium · 5,000–10,000 sq ft | — |
| Large · 10,000–15,000 sq ft | — |
| Extra large · 15,000–20,000 sq ft | — |
| Over 20,000 sq ft | Site visit |
Frequency
Weekly = base · Biweekly +15% · Monthly +35%. Biweekly costs more per visit, not less, because the grass is longer and the job takes longer.
This is a starting point, not gospel. Validate it against ten real jobs before you publish it.
You just built a rate card. Sorvius turns it into bookings.
Load these tiers into Sorvius and customers answer a few questions about their property, see your price, pick a start date, and leave a card while you're on a mower.
Start free with Sorvius →Worked example
Take a two-person crew working 45 hours each per week at 60% billable time. That is 2 × 45 × 4.33 weeks × 0.60 = 234 billable man-hours a month. Every fixed cost you carry has to be recovered inside those productive hours, not the hours spent driving, quoting, or waiting out rain.
Say your monthly overhead is $2,050 and you pay $20 an hour with a 22% labor burden. Overhead spreads to $2,050 ÷ 234 = $8.76 per man-hour, and loaded labor is $20 × 1.22 = $24.40. Add them and your break-even is $33.16 per man-hour. Below that number you are paying to mow.
Apply a 30% net margin: $33.16 ÷ (1 − 0.30) = $47.37, which rounds up to $48 per billable man-hour. If the crew finishes 12 lawns in an 8-hour day, that is (2 × 8) ÷ 12 = 1.33 man-hours per average lawn. Multiplying each size band's man-hours by $48 produces the published card:
- Small (under 5,000 sq ft): $41
- Medium (5,000–10,000 sq ft): $64
- Large (10,000–15,000 sq ft): $89
- Extra large (15,000–20,000 sq ft): $118
- Over 20,000 sq ft: site visit
The formula
The calculator recovers your overhead across the hours you can actually bill, adds the true cost of labor, and applies a margin. Each input maps to one line of the math, and the price per mow scales your average job by a size multiplier. Nothing rounds until the final per-mow figure.
billable man-hours = crew size × weekly hours × 4.33 × billable %
loaded labor = wage × (1 + labor burden %)
overhead / hour = monthly overhead ÷ billable man-hours
break-even = overhead / hour + loaded labor
billable rate = break-even ÷ (1 − target margin %)
price per mow = avg man-hours per lawn × size multiplier × billable rateOverhead is every fixed monthly cost, from the truck payment to software. Billable percentage is the share of paid hours spent producing on a property, which for most crews sits between 55% and 65%. Average man-hours per lawn comes from the lawns you finish in a day and how long that day runs, so a faster route lowers every price on the card.
Common questions
How much should I charge for lawn mowing?
Price each mow off your own billable man-hour rate, not a competitor’s flyer. For the worked example on this page (a two-person crew with $2,050 monthly overhead and a 30% margin), the rate lands near $48 per man-hour, which produces mows of roughly $41 for a small lawn up to $118 for an extra-large one. Run your own numbers above, because your overhead and route speed move the price.
How do I calculate my hourly rate for lawn care?
Add your monthly overhead and divide it by your billable man-hours (crew size × weekly hours × 4.33 × your billable percentage). Add your loaded labor cost (wage plus payroll burden) to get break-even, then divide by one minus your target margin. That final number is what you charge per productive hour on a property.
What is a good profit margin for lawn care?
Most solo and small-crew operators target a net margin between 15% and 45%, with 30% a common middle. Margin is what is left after every cost, including a real wage for the owner, so a thin margin leaves nothing to absorb a broken mower or a slow month. Set the margin on the slider above and the whole rate card updates.
Should biweekly mowing cost more or less than weekly per visit?
Biweekly should cost more per visit, not less. The grass is taller and wetter, so each cut takes longer and puts more strain on the equipment. This calculator adds 15% to a biweekly visit and 35% to a monthly one, which you can adjust before you publish.
How do I price a lawn by square footage?
Measure your average man-hours per lawn, then scale it by size band instead of guessing a flat price. The tool multiplies your average job by 0.65 for a small lawn up to 1.85 for an extra-large one and prices each band at your man-hour rate. Lawns over 20,000 sq ft get a site visit, because at that size a fixed band underprices the work.
Related reading: How to price lawn care in 2026
Turn these numbers into a booking page
Load your prices into Sorvius and customers answer a few questions about the job, see your price, pick a date, and leave a card on file while you're on site. Your rate card becomes a live booking page.