Handyman Business Quick Start Guide: How To Start and Operate Your Own Handyman Business In Any Economy

By A. William Benitez

When the economy crashed in 2008 millions lost jobs and many struggled for years and some are still struggling to catch up. I was fortunate then but years before I had a profitable writing and consulting business helping federally funded housing programs across the country. My reputation was established and I was selling books, a monthly newsletter, and traveling to help communities leverage the housing funds they received from the federal government. Unfortunately, after a national election, everything changed and all the housing funds disappeared and so did my business. Just as those who lost their jobs, the money stopped. What saved me was the handyman and carpenter skills I learned in my youth.

My limited savings were dwindling and I didn’t have time to find a job. I no longer owned a truck so I purchased and outfitted a small trailer with all the handyman tools I needed and hit the ground running. After just a few ads in local weekly papers I was working everyday and making a decent living. At first most of the jobs were small and could have easily been handled by someone with limited experience and that was good because money flowed promptly.

As time passed I started taking larger jobs and gradually moved from just handyman work to small remodeling jobs and finally, after renting a small shop, to woodworking which I continued for over twenty five years.

Like losing a good job, a business failure can be traumatic and impose a serious financial hardship but with a few handyman skills anyone can quickly start making money. I know that first hand and my book Handyman Business Quick Start Guide can help you do the same on a full time or part time basis.

My new book, Handyman Business Quick Start Guide, can help you start immediately making money with your home repair skills. Based on more than 30 years of personal, first-hand, self-employment experience in home repair and woodworking it’s a complete course on succeeding in the home repair business. I cover every step from getting started to the day-to-day operation of the business using methods that worked for me for many years.

This is no pie in the sky romancing about self employment. It takes good home repair and business skills to operate a business successfully and now you can learn exactly how to use your present skills to succeed financially in the handyman business.

Handyman Business Quick Start Guide helps you avoid losing money and many other potential problems encountered during your business startup. I won't tell you that this is easy to do. It,s a lot of work but my book covers everything that worked for me for over 30 years.

With that information you will work effectively and profitably and enhance your present skills while operating a financially successful full-time or part-time handyman business. You can start small and either grow a larger business or simply stay small and use your skills as a lucrative sideline. The choice is yours.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Positive Imaging, LLC
• Release date: May 4, 2016
• ISBN: 9781944071066

A. William Benitez

From age twelve I spent my summers and weekends working with my dad, a general contractor, building homes and buildings. I contracted my first home at age nineteen and built my own home by age twenty. I’ve operated one-person businesses for more than 30 years. Twelve years of my life were spent working for local government managing federally-funded housing programs. I started as an inspector with a three month assignment and left as Director of Community Improvement with 78 employees twelve years later to do writing and consulting. Writing, Publishing and Consulting I established Rehab Notes Library, a publishing company that published a monthly newsletter (Rehab Notes) with subscribers in all 50 states, Canada and England and nine books on housing related topics. I also did consulting and public speaking on housing related topics for agencies and organizations in cities across the country. After 1980 when most federal funding was pulled from housing activities, I took advantage of my construction and business experience and started a handyman and woodworking business. Over Twenty-Five Years of Woodworking For over twenty-five years, first in Tampa, Florida and then in Austin, Texas, I built hundreds of small and large cabinet and furniture projects for individuals, companies and government agencies. During these years I began writing books about my experiences. Positive Publishing My company, Positive Imaging, LLC at http://positive-imaging.com, does what I call positive publishing for my books and the books of other authors. To date I've published over a hundred print and ebooks and presently have several books in various levels of completion.   

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Thanks for buying this copy of Handyman Business Quick Start Guide. I’m certain it will help you to succeed in the handyman business

If you have any questions about the handyman business I’ll be glad to answer them. Just drop me an email, and thanks again for buying my ebook.

Bill Benitez

http://home-repair-business.com/

[e-mail]

Woodworking Business Guidebook

Woodworking Business Quick Start Guide, my complete guide, based entirely on over 25 years of first-hand experience operating my professional woodworking business is available now for only .99 cents. Get your copy NOW by clicking on the link below. Thanks.

http://ninetynine.woodworkbusiness.com/

Handyman Business

Quick Start Guide

How To Start and Operate

Your Own Handyman Business

In Any Economy

A. William Benitez

Cover Photo by Barbara Frances

Published By

Positive Imaging, LLC

http://positive-imaging.com

[e-mail]

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be resold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

Copyright 2016 A William Benitez

ISBN 9781944071066

Contents

Introduction

One – Is The Handyman Business For You

Two – Inventory of Your Skills

Three – Inventory of Your Tools

Four – Home Repair Vehicle and Space

Five – Licensing, Accounting, and Taxes

Six – Getting Started

Seven – Using Your Computer and the Internet

Eight – How Much to Charge and Why

Nine – Contracting Jobs

Ten – Getting Help

Eleven - Safety

Final Notes

Disclaimer

Glossary

About Bill

Other Books

Additional Resources

Introduction

You may be one of those DIY individuals with home repair (handyman) skills you could use to increase your income promptly and with little investment. Home repair and improvement is a multi-billion-dollar business. The profusion of Home Depot, Lowes, and other home improvement stores across the country is a reflection of the popularity of home repair.

Now, more than ever, people are choosing to stay in their homes instead of purchasing new and larger homes. This opens up a large market for anyone who has home repair and home improvement skills. Some of that work involves major remodeling and is most often handled by professional home improvement contractors. But much of it involves small jobs that could form the basis of a profitable business for those with basic home repair skills.

Homeowners everywhere are regularly making repairs and improvements to their home. Most of them will need some help at one time or another. Purchasing this book reflects your interest in helping these thousands of home and business owners across the country to get these repair jobs done well and at reasonable cost.

In this book, home repair business and handyman business are interchangeable. This business is often referred to by either name and both mean exactly the same thing. The term handyman refers to a person who performs various repair jobs on a home or office. This could be either a man or a woman. Anyone with basic home repair skills can use this book to make money and establish a financially successful small business.

If you have already been making repairs to your own home or helping out friends and family to get their home repairs done, you have the basic skills needed for this business. This book will help you expand those skills and make the best possible use of them by developing them into a profitable business.

The handyman business shows so much financial potential that there are already franchise opportunities available. Just Google handyman and check it out for yourself. Joining a franchise is certainly is one way to get started but you can do your own thing and keep much more of the profit by using the information in this book. This also allows you to control your own activities and maintain pricing at a more competitive level.

Chapter One discusses the first step which is to determine if the business is for you. Once you determine that running a part time or full-time home repair business is for you, an in-depth inventory of your skills is critical. Obviously, different people have various skills and even various levels of those skills. To do the best possible work and insure profit for yourself and the satisfaction of your customers, you need to recognize the things you do best and the weak areas where you need additional or improved skills. Chapter Two helps you discover your best skills and shows how to develop others.

Tools and Work Vehicle

Home repair requires a fair collection of tools but it's not necessary to have the more expensive commercial duty tools to get started. Your present collection of tools is probably quite adequate for most home repair work. Chapter Three will help you to make the best use of the tools you already have and explain how to make the best use of consumer level tools if you must purchase more. Chapter Four covers how to set up a work vehicle to help you be prepared for any job.

Licensing, Accounting, and Taxes

Once your inventories are complete and you feel ready to get started with the business, it’s time to determine all of the licensing, accounting, and tax issues you will face. This varies greatly depending on the community where you live and the level of work you will be doing. It certainly won’t be the same for someone who is doing small jobs on the weekend as for someone working the business full-time. The important thing is to get all of this worked out before contacting a single customer. Chapter Five helps you make certain to adhere to community requirements for your business. And, to make certain you meet all Internal Revenue Service tax codes, it describes the best ways to handle the necessary ac- counting procedures for any successful business.

Getting Started

Now you are ready to actually get started with