part time lawn mowing business while working a regular job

No matter what the economy is, the grass keeps growing. There is always someone nearby who needs to mow the lawn and cannot do it himself. These folks have a problem, and you, the full-time employee wanting to start a part-time lawn mowing business, have the solution. They can pay you to mow the lawn. Problem solved.

I am often asked if you can start your lawn business part time evenings and weekends and keep your full time job. The answer is a big yes!

the question is can you has to? If you have a lot of energy, enjoy being outdoors and working in your yard, and can only handle an extra 5-10 hours of physical labor each week, you can start a part-time lawn mowing business and keep your regular job.

People who work rotating 12-hour shifts are in a great position to run a lawn mowing business part-time and keep their full-time jobs because they have plenty of days off.

Marketing
First, you need to find some clients. Write a brochure using word processing software, print it out, take it to your local copy shop, make 25-30 copies, and distribute them in your neighborhood a short drive from your home. You may want to use a half page flyer so you can distribute it to 50-60 households. Include what you offer the prospect (mowing the lawn, edging, cleaning concrete), your name, the best phone number to contact you, your address so they know you’re a neighbor, and how much you charge. Since you are new to the business, charge at the lower end of the average rate charged by other lawn care professionals in your area. Five dollars cheaper than average can get your neighbors to stop using someone outside the neighborhood and start using you.

Another reason to start with your neighbors is that they know or know about you and we all want to help other people, especially people we know. Since these people are close by, you can get out there, knock on doors, and meet your neighbors while promoting your business to them. Smile, introduce yourself and tell them which house is yours or which street you live on and get to know a little about them and some things they may have in common. Give them a flyer at the end of the conversation and move on to the next house.

Continue like this until you have at least one person ready to go home, get their gear right now, come back and work that day, and are pulling out their checkbook to pay you. If this happens, stop trading that day, serve your new customer, and make some money. Continue marketing the next day.

When you have the number of clients you think you can handle, stop trading daily and only do a little occasionally or when someone asks for your information. You will want to have some flyers on hand to hand out. Keep an eye out for overgrown gardens and see if a lawn service comes along to cut them down. These people may need someone closer to service their lawn on a regular basis. Be sure to visit them and ask.

Equipment
Do not buy any commercial equipment or go into debt. You just need the mower you use on your own lawn, a gas-powered string trimmer, and a blower to get started. If you have an electric string trimmer and blower, you can still use them, but make sure the customer knows you’ll need access to an electrical outlet and you’ll need a very long extension cord.

Alternatives to gas and electric trimmers and blowers are cordless rechargeable models. They are less expensive than their gas-powered cousins, cheaper to run, and much friendlier to the environment. If you have electrical equipment that requires an extension cord, you’ll want to replace it with cordless or gas-powered electrical equipment as soon as you make enough money mowing lawns to do so.

Starting just a short distance from your home eliminates the need for a truck or trailer to transport equipment to job sites, keeping costs down. If you live within walking distance of work, you can put your gear and gas can in a wagon or cart and pull your mower by hand. If you’re willing to do this extra manual labor, you’re more likely to succeed because you’re not afraid of hard work and you’re not prone to overspending.

Profits
One of the most important reasons to own a part-time lawnmower business is that you make much more money for the time you spend working than you do in most other part-time ventures.

If you charge $50 for mowing, edging and cleaning and can do 5 gardens after work and on weekends each week, you will earn $250 per week. You will need to set aside 15% of your income after expenses (gas, parts, repair, replacement equipment, etc.) for self-employment taxes due each quarter. If you spend $9 on gas and save $36 in taxes, your net weekly earnings will be $205. Six weeks of hand-carrying your gear will build physical strength and net you around $1,230. You can also resubmit your W-4 form at work to deduct the correct amount of additional money from your paychecks to cover these taxes. However, if you are trying this to determine if you want a full-time lawn mowing business, I recommend that you familiarize yourself with the quarterly self-employment tax payment.

After 20 weeks of mowing 5 lawns a week, you will have earned almost $4,000. It will be less than this because your equipment will need maintenance and repair. That won’t cost him more than a few hundred dollars, so he’ll still have about $3,700 if he saves up his winnings.

Now you will have the money to buy a good used commercial lawn mower. Once you have a commercial mower, you will be able to increase the number of yards you can mow per week in the same amount of time it took with your residential mower, increasing your income. You may be able to mow 10 yards per week instead of 5, increasing your gross receipts to $500 per week. After another 10 weeks, you may have enough cash to buy a used trailer to haul your business equipment.

Remember that in many areas there are only 3 mowing seasons or about 40 steady work weeks each year. If you spend the first 40 weeks earning enough to get some business teams and grow your customer base, your second year of part-time will be mostly profit.

Two years part-time in the business will allow you to decide if you want to start mowing full-time. You’ll know it’s time to work full-time when you turn away customers because you don’t have time to service their yards, and if you could serve those customers, you’d earn more annually than you would at your full-time job.

Earning more means earning more than your current annual salary after taxes, plus paying for the benefits you and your family need, like health insurance. If your spouse works outside the home, he or she can carry the family benefits, leaving you free to earn lots of cash. You’ll need to save for retirement and pay for your own disability insurance, even if your spouse can provide the other benefits. Few companies offer spousal retirement or disability coverage.

If you’re willing to work during your off hours and not spend money on equipment you don’t need, you can work part-time mowing lawns and earn a lot of extra money. It is also possible that you will eventually be able to quit your job and run your business full time.

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