Your company’s approach to setting its construction labor rates will ultimately have a huge impact on profitability. Keep reading to learn more about setting labor rates for construction projects, including helpful methods and tools.
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How to calculate construction labor rates
Step 1: Calculate your base construction labor rate
Calculating your base construction labor rate is an important first step in understanding your costs.
Running this calculation per crew may make sense if your crews differ substantially in what you pay each worker. The end result would be each crew having its own base rate.
Otherwise, if crews are fairly standardized across your company, you can run this calculation using averages.
Let’s look at an example.
Imagine the following construction crew:
- One lead paid $45 per hour
- One concrete pourer paid $30 per hour
- One concrete finisher paid $30 per hour
Your base rate for this crew is $105 per hour (the sum of their hourly wages).
Step 2: Calculate your labor burden
Of course, your base construction labor rate only tells half of the story. An employee costs you more than just their wage. You also need to consider costs such as:
- payroll taxes
- payroll administration
- vacation pay
- benefits
- insurance
- training
These costs factor into what’s known as your labor burden. We explore this concept in more detail in our article about calculating construction labor costs. Read that article and apply the methodology we share to determine your labor burden (again, either by crew or a company average if applicable) before proceeding.
Step 3: Add your markup
You should understand how much the crew(s) in question cost you per hour at this stage. Next, you need to determine how much you should charge clients to ensure you turn a profit on projects.
What constitutes an appropriate markup will vary based on several factors, including:
- geography
- what type of construction work your company does
- your company’s size
- your objective for taking the project (i.e., building your reputation in a new market vs. earning a profit)
- how much money you’re investing into the project (i.e., purchasing new equipment or hiring new workers)
It may be worth researching average construction labor rates in your market to ensure you aren’t pricing yourself inappropriately relative to the competition.
The Construction Labor Market Analyzer is one such tool widely used throughout the industry to gain insights into commercial and residential construction labor rates.
In calculating your markup, you may discover it only makes sense to take a particular project if it guarantees a certain number of work hours. A clear sign of this would be if the hourly markup greatly exceeds the average rate for labor in your market. It may make sense only to accept jobs in this category once profits have exceeded a certain amount (i.e., the point at which your costs are covered and you’ve generated a minimum profit).
Tips for calculating and optimizing construction labor rates
Now that you know the general process for calculating construction labor rates, let’s explore some tips for ensuring your calculations are as accurate as possible – and optimizing your labor rates once you’re certain they are.
1. Use data as specific to your work as possible
Construction is a very broad industry. Don’t make the mistake of relying on general construction labor rates. Instead, use numbers as specific to your company as possible. That might mean collecting localized data from a tool such as the Construction Labor Market Analyzer or (preferably) relying on your company’s own data (more on this in the next point) from past similar projects.
2. Use dedicated construction labor management software
Dedicated construction labor management software helps professionals collect and analyze company data more efficiently.
This proves useful at every stage of the construction labor management process – from coordinating crews based on productivity data (who works best together) to determining the minimum number of hours it makes sense to have a specific crew work.
Check out this article to learn more about the construction labor management applications we recommend.
3. Revisit your construction labor rate calculations periodically
Construction labor rates aren’t static. They changed based on market conditions, including the current demand for workers. It’s, therefore, important to revisit your construction labor rate calculations periodically. You may even want to run the numbers during the estimating process for every major project.
4. Choose the appropriate strategy for your needs
The unit pricing method we discussed earlier in this article is the construction labor rate calculation method. While it’s a very commonly used method, it’s certainly not the only one out there, nor is it right for every situation.
Other labor rate calculation methods include the following.
Square foot method
The square foot method entails pricing work not hourly but in terms of how much the project would cost you per square foot of work completed.
This is useful in scenarios where you’d like to compare labor and material costs. After all, it wouldn’t make sense to price materials per hour but labor certainly can be viewed in that terms, making it easier to adjust.
Rule of two method
The rule of two method entails relying on the knowledge that labor generally accounts for roughly 50% of construction costs, with the rest being spent primarily on materials. Consequently, if your material costs are easier to calculate and predict, you may want to determine them first and fill in the gaps in labor using this method.
5. Avoid unnecessary labor costs
Not all labor costs are essential. Some (i.e., forms of time theft, such as buddy punching) should be avoided as much as possible. This is another area where tracking labor costs using labor management software is helpful; it becomes easier to spot patterns and make evidence-backed decisions.
Construction labor rates: Conclusion
We hope this article has given you valuable tips for calculating and optimizing construction labor rates. For more articles related to construction management, visit our blog.
Brandon-Richard Austin
Brandon-Richard Austin is a writer and content strategist focused on the construction sector. He’s passionate about educating readers on construction management techniques and best practices.
