How to start a handyman business

Handyman work is the easiest trade in this catalogue to start and the easiest to accidentally do illegally, because the line you cross is invisible and it moves when you buy materials.

The threshold, and the three things people get wrong about it

Most states let you work without a contractor licence below a set value. That exemption is real and plenty of good businesses live inside it. But:

• It is per job, not per day and not per year. Two jobs at the same house on the same afternoon are two jobs — but a single job you have chopped into pieces to stay under the limit is still one job, and treating it otherwise is exactly the behaviour the rules target.
• It includes materials. This is the one that catches people. A $600 limit with $400 of materials leaves you $200 of labour. Operators quote their time against the threshold and forget the receipt in the van.
• It is small. Commonly $500 to $2,500. Oregon is $500. Arizona and Nevada $1,000. Georgia $2,500. Utah $3,000. Virginia requires a licence at $1,000 and up. California raised its own from $500 to $1,000 in September 2024 — and a lot of published advice still prints the old figure, which is why the bill itself is linked at the bottom of this page.
• Check your own state and write the number on the van. It is the single most useful fact in your business and it changes what you are allowed to say yes to.

The work you may never take

Separate rule, and it is not a threshold. In nearly every state these need the specific trade licence no matter how small the job or how confident you are:

• Electrical. Including that light fitting.
• Plumbing. Including the water heater everybody asks about.
• HVAC and gas. Gas especially — this is where people get hurt and where insurers stop returning calls.
• Roofing and structural. Anything holding the building up or keeping the weather out.
• Anything needing a building permit. If a permit is required, an unlicensed person cannot pull it, and that is the tell.

The commercial answer is not to refuse and walk away. It is to have a licensed electrician and a licensed plumber you can hand the job to, and to be the person who arranges it. You keep the customer, they get it done properly, and the referral runs both ways — see how to get handyman work.

Insurance, and being honest with the insurer

• General liability is the minimum. Many customers, and every property manager, will ask before they book.
• Tell them what you actually do. A policy written for “handyman” may exclude the roof you were standing on. The exclusions are where these policies live.
• Some states require a bond alongside or instead of a licence. Not the same thing as insurance — a bond protects the customer, not you.
• If you hire anyone, workers’ compensation from day one. See your first hire, which also covers why paying that person on a 1099 is usually a mistake.
• Vehicle cover that contemplates tools and business use. A personal policy may not.

What it costs to open

Less than any other trade here, which is the attraction and also why the bottom of this market is crowded and cheap.

• The van and the tools you probably own. Resist buying for jobs you have not been offered yet.
• Licence or registration if your state or city requires one below the threshold — some do.
• Insurance, which will be one of your larger fixed costs early on.
• A way to take card payment on the spot. Small jobs, paid on the day, is the whole cash‑flow model.
• Working capital for materials, because you will front them.

Price the visit, not the hour

Handyman economics are dominated by one thing: the jobs are short and the driving is not. A forty‑minute job with a thirty‑minute drive each way is a two‑hour job.

• Set a minimum charge and never go under it. Commonly $125 to $200 a visit. It is not greed — it is the cost of turning up, and it quietly filters out the customers who were never going to be profitable.
• Flat‑rate the jobs you do constantly, hourly for the genuinely unknown. Charging by the hour for work you have done two hundred times means every improvement you make is a pay cut — see why charging by the hour is costing you money.
• Bundle deliberately. “While I’m here” is the most profitable sentence in this trade, because the drive is already paid for.
• Mark up materials openly and say that you do. You are carrying the cost and the trip.

The numbers are in how much to charge as a handyman, and the handyman price calculator works out your real hourly rate and the minimum charge that stops small jobs losing money.

What to stop doing

• Quoting against the threshold without counting materials. The most common way a legitimate operator ends up over the line.
• Splitting one job into two invoices to stay under it. Everybody thinks of this and it does not work.
• Doing “just a small bit” of electrical or plumbing. There is no small bit. There is licensed and unlicensed.
• Working without liability cover because the jobs are little. The job is little; the kitchen you flood is not.
• Saying yes to everything in year one. The fastest way to a callback you cannot fix.
• Doing $40 jobs with no minimum. You are paying for the privilege of driving there.

Sources

Checked in August 2026. Thresholds and restricted trades are state law and they change — California’s moved in 2024 and much published advice has not caught up. Check your own state board before you rely on any figure here, including ours.

• California AB‑2622 — the bill that raised the state’s exemption from $500 to $1,000, effective 14 September 2024. Linked directly because secondary sources still quote the old number.
• CSLB licensing classifications — what the separate trade licences actually cover, which is the clearest way to see where the handyman line sits.
• Handyman licensing and bonds — from an insurance broker, on the licence‑versus‑bond distinction and what cover is normally asked for.
• The state‑by‑state threshold figures are drawn from handyman trade reporting across several independent sources and cross‑checked against California’s statute. Treat them as a starting point for your own check, not as current law in your state.