← Home Inspection Fee Calculator
This calculator vs. a franchise's internal fee schedule
Different situations. A home inspection franchise hands its inspectors a fee schedule already built for the brand. An independent inspector has to build their own — and pricing purely by square footage quietly underprices a hard job and overprices an easy one. This free calculator prices from the specifics that actually drive on-site time.
What each one is for
A franchise's internal fee schedule comes bundled with joining that franchise — brand recognition, referral pipelines, training, and often software, alongside a royalty or fee structure. That is a business decision about the inspector's whole operation, not just one job's price, and it is not what this page is about.
This calculator answers the narrower question an independent inspector already faces without a franchise's schedule behind them: what should this specific job cost. It prices from square footage, stories, foundation type, and home age — the factors that actually drive on-site time — rather than square footage alone, then adds radon, sewer scope, termite/WDO, and mold testing as their own flat fees and a same-day rush premium applied to labor time only. It needs no account, no brand affiliation, and nothing uploaded.
It exists because a flat per-square-foot number prices an easy slab job and a hard crawlspace job the same, which overcharges one buyer and undercharges the inspector on the other. See a full worked example for exactly how the numbers move.
| Question | Where to answer it |
|---|---|
| What should I charge for this specific job, right now? | This calculator's suggested fee — free, private, no account. |
| Does my fee schedule already account for stories, foundation, and age? | Check against this calculator's model if you're not sure it does. |
| Should I join a franchise for its brand, referrals, and fee schedule? | A business decision this calculator does not evaluate. |
| How do I price radon, sewer scope, termite/WDO, or mold add-ons? | This calculator's add-on fields — priced as flat fees, not folded into time. |
| Am I booking enough jobs to hit a weekly income target? | This calculator's weekly income check, from your own profit-per-job and booking count. |
| Is my data uploaded anywhere? | No. Everything runs in your browser; your last job's numbers stay on this device. |
This calculator is a general-purpose model, not a reproduction of any specific franchise's proprietary numbers, and it does not evaluate whether joining one is a good business decision. It is arithmetic on numbers you provide, not licensing, insurance, or business advice.
This tool needs no account and no sign-in: it is a static page, the arithmetic runs in your browser, and nothing you type is uploaded anywhere.
Common questions
Should an independent inspector use this calculator or join a franchise for its fee schedule?
Different decisions. Joining a franchise brings a built-in fee schedule along with brand recognition, referral pipelines, training, and a royalty or fee structure — a business decision well beyond pricing one job. This calculator answers the narrower question an independent already faces without a franchise behind them: what should this specific job cost, given its square footage, stories, foundation type, and age. It does not evaluate whether joining a franchise makes sense.
Why does pricing purely by square footage underprice some jobs and overprice others?
Because square footage alone does not capture what actually drives on-site time. A crawlspace foundation means suiting up and physically moving through a tight space that a slab or basement does not require; an older home usually has more deferred maintenance to document at the same square footage as a newer one; an additional story adds real minutes to climb and inspect. Two houses of identical square footage can take very different amounts of time, so a single per-square-foot number prices the easy job and the hard job the same — overcharging one buyer and undercharging the inspector on the other.
Does this calculator replace a franchise's own fee schedule?
No, and it is not built to. A franchise's internal fee schedule is proprietary to that brand and may reflect brand-specific factors this calculator has no visibility into. This calculator is a general-purpose model built from the factors that drive on-site time for any inspector, independent or franchised, and it does not claim to reproduce any specific brand's numbers.
Can add-on services like radon or sewer scope testing be priced the same way as the base inspection?
Not usually, which is why this calculator prices them separately. A radon test, sewer scope, termite/WDO inspection, or mold air sample is typically a separate instrument or specialist step rather than additional minutes of the same walk-through, so each is priced as its own flat fee rather than folded into the time-based base estimate.
Open the Home Inspection Fee Calculator to price your own job, or read a full worked example.