Your crew hourly wage, payroll burden, overhead on direct cost and target net margin are the same on every job you bid. Save them once and every trade bid calculator here opens with your numbers instead of a stranger’s ballpark.
Kept in this browser only, on this site’s own storage. Nothing is uploaded, and clearing your browser data clears it. Forgetting them leaves the numbers already on this bid alone.
Keep this bid so it is still here when the customer calls back. Every number on this form is saved together, under a name you choose, along with the figure it gave you, and restoring one puts the whole job back exactly as you priced it. Mark each one won or lost when you hear — the ones you have not heard back on stay listed as waiting, with how long they have been out. Once a few have come back, this panel says how long yours actually take, and how many are still out past that. Once enough of them have been decided, it also says whether the bids you save here have been landing differently lately than they used to. Once a few here are decided, this panel says what the ones you won averaged against the ones you lost, so you can see where your price tips. On a lost bid you can also note what the job went for, if you heard — then it says how far off you actually were, which is the part guessing gets wrong in both directions. On a won one, note what the job came to once it was done and this panel says what those jobs actually kept, so you can see whether the ones you are winning are worth winning — and it tells you how many of your won jobs are still missing that figure, rather than going quiet about it. Restoring a bid also pins the figure it was saved at above this panel, so when the customer asks what it costs without the tear-off, the new number is shown against the one they already have — and by how much, in money and in percent.
Kept in this browser only, on this site’s own storage. Nothing is uploaded, and clearing your browser data clears it — download a backup to keep a copy or open your bids on another device. Bids are kept per tool, so these are the ones you saved here.
FOR WINDOW CLEANING OPERATORS
Price the stop, not the pane count.
A flat “per window” quote cannot see that ten French panes both sides are a different job from ten ground-floor plates, or that a 25-minute drive does not shrink when the house is small. Time each glass type, add travel and setup, load the wage, and see the visit price, the price per pane, and the number below which the stop loses money.
The glass
One row per glass type. Minutes are per pane on one side — pick a type to start from a common figure, then replace it with a time from your own stops. Sides: 1 is in-only or out-only; 2 is both.
Glass typePanesMin / paneSides
Your costs
Travel and setup is the block that sinks small jobs: drive, park, hose-up, and pack-out happen once whether the house has 8 panes or 80. The minimum job charge exists to cover that block. Payroll burden covers employer taxes, workers’ compensation, and insurance — underestimating it is the other common miss.
Your bid
$—
per visit
Hours on this visit
Of that, travel & setup
Loaded labor
Supplies, fuel & other
Overhead
Cost per visit
Profit per visit
Price per pane
Effective hourly rate
Walk-away price
Monthly average (if recurring)
A bid link carries every glass type and your own rates — wage, burden, overhead, and target margin — so the page reopens exactly as you left it. Send it to yourself or a second estimator. The customer should get the price, not the link.
Where the pane labor goes
Transparent arithmetic from your own inputs. The starting minutes are common ballpark figures, not an industry standard, a benchmark, or a guarantee — time your own stops and replace them.
Hand the customer a proposal
The price above is for you. This is the page you print or save as a PDF and give to the customer — your details, their details, the scope, the deposit split, and a line for them to sign. Your business details are saved on this device so you only type them once; the customer’s details are never saved.
Everything on the printed page is text you typed or a number this calculator worked out. It contains no warranty, lien, or cancellation wording — those depend on your jurisdiction and your contract, and this tool is not the place to invent them.
Common questions
How much should I charge per window?
A flat per-window price hides travel and glass type. Time each pane type, add the drive and setup, load the wage, then divide the visit price by pane count. Ten French panes both sides are a different job from ten ground-floor plates.
Why do small window cleaning jobs lose money?
Travel and setup do not shrink when the pane count does. A 25-minute drive plus hose-up on an 8-pane ranch is mostly windshield time. A minimum job charge exists to cover that block, not to pad profit.
How do I price interior and exterior together?
Count sides. One side is exterior-only or interior-only. Two sides is in and out. Minutes per pane stay per side, so a French pane at 4 minutes both sides is 8 minutes of glass before you have moved to the next one.
How much more should I charge for second-story, lift, or hard-water windows?
The calculator’s own starting figures show the jump: ground-floor exterior on a water-fed pole starts at 1.5 minutes per pane. A second-story ladder job starts at 3 minutes — double. Third-story, bosun-chair, or lift work starts at 6 minutes, four times the ground-floor figure, because rigging and safety add time before the glass gets touched. Hard-water or restoration glass and skylights both start at 8 minutes per pane — over five times the base rate — since mineral deposits need a chemical pass or a second wipe regardless of how reachable the glass is. Pick the preset closest to the access and glass condition in front of you, then replace it with a time from your own stopwatch; these are starting points for the group, not a published rate for the trade.
Want the margin, walk-away price and overrun headroom as well, or pricing a different trade? Price this job in the Bid Price Engine, one calculator for 121 trades.