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Your not the boss of me! - Starting a Business
MeepZero
Registered User regular
Registered User regular
Does anybody out there have any experience starting a small business? I'm in the process of building my own IT Consulting company and I need to learn more about the accounting side of it. Basically, if I'm working right now at a particular annual income, how would that translate to roughly if I was running my own business and grossing that much per year? How much additional money would I be throwing out for taxes generally speaking?
Also, for being an IT Consultant doing general sys admin work, what rates are normal to work with? When I say general sysadmin work I mean stuff like general maintainance and troubleshooting, rolling out exchange / domain services, basically being the IT admin for a small non profit. Is it better to go hourly or work off of a retainer?
Also, for being an IT Consultant doing general sys admin work, what rates are normal to work with? When I say general sysadmin work I mean stuff like general maintainance and troubleshooting, rolling out exchange / domain services, basically being the IT admin for a small non profit. Is it better to go hourly or work off of a retainer?
MeepZero on
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As for the rates, you'll want to bill your client hourly to start, build up a reputation, and when you're ready to offer reliable on time service and support, make the suggestion that they hire you as a retainer.
For an hourly rate as a systems administrator, I'd expect somewhere in the ballpark of 30 to 40 dollars an hour depending on your location. That's roughly 50 to 60 thousand a year (gross)
First off, thanks for responding! Even though much of this starting off is "Talk to accountant" its still an important step that I guess I really need to look into.
As for the rate advice. I think the per hour rate will help out doubly due to the weird spikes in hours that I'll need to worry about while running things. Once things stabilize at the business and most of the crazy exciting work gets done I can go on retainer and pop in once or twice a week to do upkeep on things. Good ideas
Are there any weird expenses that I should know about? I'll start off working out of home so most expenses will be things like electrical and whatnot. I have all of my own hardware so that would be less that I would need to worry about investing as well. Medical insurance is something I need to look into as well.
Also, that rate is for base server maintenance and desktop support/setup.
When you get into sharepoint administration, .net framework, etc. There needs to be a restructure.
To figure out what your current hourly rate is divide your annual salary by 2080. As a contractor/freelancer, I'd suggest between 1.7x current and 2x current. There are a lot of other expenses that you'll have to cover that you most likely don't currently, e.g. social security, multiple kinds of insurance, taxes, etc.
Also definitely speak to an accountant in your area. That may help you figure out what your market can handle.
Make sure you keep track of your miles! The IRS loves to go after businesses that falsify miles. Additionally, your first and last trip of the day do not count towards your driven miles.
That's just my general experience and I am not your accountant. :rotate: