As the co-owner of a handyman business with my spouse, I primarily handled all the administrative and marketing tasks, but I wasn’t afraid to swing a hammer or grab a paintbrush when needed. 

My partner had always been good at building and fixing things. He had worked for several companies, and starting our own handyman business made sense, but we weren’t fully prepared for all the pitfalls of running our own maintenance and repair company.

Experience in the field is essential to learn many of the things you need to succeed, but I can offer some practical strategies to help you avoid common mistakes in vital areas like pricing, marketing, finding jobs, and ensuring you have the proper insurance and licensing. 

By sharing this advice, I hope to help handyman entrepreneurs enhance their business practices, improve client satisfaction, and achieve long-term success.

Related: Guide to starting a handyman business

Pricing Mistakes

Pricing your handyman services is one of the most challenging aspects when you’re first starting. We fell into the bad habit of overpricing our services to attract clients. However, we also underestimated the time it would take to complete certain tasks and didn’t fully account for overhead costs.

Underpricing impacts your business’ profitability and continued sustainability. Lowballing your prices can also diminish prospective clients’ opinions about your expertise. However, overpricing can be just as damaging because clients may look for a lower-cost option. You must find the right balance between being affordable and remaining profitable.

To get us back on track, I closely monitored exactly how long it took to complete various tasks to calculate labor costs and added these to the cost of all materials used. I also identified all our overhead costs, broke them down into a cost per hour, and incorporated them into our pricing strategy. I initially tracked all this data in an Excel spreadsheet until we began using more comprehensive handyman business software.

Related: How to set prices for a handyman service

Marketing Mistakes

Ignoring your online presence is a huge marketing mistake that could impact your credibility and potential growth. I quickly learned that creating an online presence costs less than traditional advertising and reaches more people because more people turn to online sources when looking for services. If your business isn’t online, you might as well not exist.

I began establishing our online presence by building a professional website using WordPress. I chose WordPress because it was easy to use, inexpensive, and helpful with search engine optimization (SEO), which we knew nothing about. We later switched to HubSpot for its additional marketing, customer service, and sales features.

We also took advantage of social media, primarily Facebook, because it remains the most popular platform year after year. Facebook offered us a place to show off images of our completed projects and share professional tips that promoted our expertise. YouTube is another viable platform, especially for videos demonstrating your work, and Instagram can also be beneficial.

Keeping up with social media can eat up your time, so consider outsourcing these marketing efforts as your business grows. Even an established business’ momentum can suffer without a social media presence.

Mistakes Finding Jobs

Don’t overlook the importance of utilizing online directories, which can affect your ability to find jobs. We made sure our business appeared in popular online directories like Yelp and Angi (formerly Angie’s List).

However, creating a Google Business Profile is vital to ensure you reach customers through Google Search and Google Maps. It didn’t cost us anything to create our Google Business Profile, and it was a great place for us to start gathering customer reviews to boost our credibility. Most importantly, it optimized our visibility in local search engine results. This visibility made sure clients in our area searching for handyman services found our business.

While having an online presence greatly improves your ability to find jobs, ignoring local networking efforts is also a mistake. We found lots of work by partnering with real estate agents and building relationships with local property managers or management companies. 

Providing reliable and timely service to these partners helped us get repeat business. It also opened doors to additional job opportunities through referrals to people in similar roles as our satisfied partners.

Referrals are the bread and butter of a handyman’s business. It’s been proven that people trust recommendations from their friends and family more than any other advertising your business does, making it a significant mistake to ignore this avenue for attracting new clients. 

Consider providing an incentive to encourage more referrals from satisfied customers, such as discounts for future work or cashback on completed work.

Related: How to find handyman jobs

Mistakes With Insurance

Even if you do everything else right, operating without proper insurance coverage is a recipe for disaster. One accident that causes property damage leading to a costly lawsuit without insurance can be an expensive mistake that ruins your business. Although we may not have fully understood the liability risks when we started our handyman business, we understood the importance of having the right handyman insurance to protect our assets.

At a minimum, your handyman business must have general liability insurance to cover any possible property damage or bodily injury to a customer. The coverage amount you need depends on the scale of your projects. We went with $500,000 per incident as recommended by our insurance agent, but we also got quotes for a $300,000 and a $1 million policy.

If you have employees, most states require workers’ compensation insurance to cover medical expenses for injuries or illnesses that occur on the job. Other types of insurance to consider include: 

• Professional liability insurance covers alleged incomplete, unsatisfactory, or late work.
• Commercial auto insurance covers vehicles used for business purposes.
• Tools and equipment insurance, aka inland marine coverage, covers repairing or replacing damaged or stolen tools or equipment.

Insurance providers may also offer surety bonds that protect customers if you don’t fulfill your contract. These bonds are relatively inexpensive, so we used them to gain an edge over competitors.

Licensing Mistakes

Another common misstep among handyman businesses is not fulfilling licensing requirements, which can lead to legal issues. Even though many states don’t require handymen to get a license, complying with licensing requirements is challenging because they vary by state, county, and city and can change based on the type of work being completed.

For example, our business was located in Oklahoma, where we didn’t need a license from the state to repair, remodel, or renovate properties. However, we also took jobs in neighboring states. While Kansas and Missouri didn’t require state licenses, Arkansas required a home improvement license for jobs like painting a house or laying flooring if clients paid more than $2,000 in labor and materials combined.

We also had to comply with local regulations by checking with each city and county before beginning a job. While licenses often weren’t necessary, many cities require building permits for various projects. For example, some require permits for building a fence, large decks, or carport.

It never happened to us, but doing work without the proper permit can lead to a fine, a stop work order until obtaining the permit, or a misdemeanor charge. It can also severely damage your reputation, which you can’t afford in a competitive market.

Related: How to start a handyman business while working full time

Learn From Your Mistakes

Overall, if you’re not properly licensed, bonded, and insured, many clients will not want to hire you (unless you are charging below-market rates). You’ll lose money or clients if you underprice or overprice your services. Handyman businesses that fall short in marketing efforts or don’t take advantage of all the avenues to find jobs will find it difficult to grow.

In my years of experience in the handyman industry, I’ve learned from mistakes and implemented strategies to prevent them from being repeated. My parting advice to handyman entrepreneurs is to use every setback as an opportunity to learn and grow. With dedication and a willingness to adapt, you can navigate the pitfalls and achieve long-term success.