Starting a Service Based Home Business

Every day I receive emails asking me about beginning a service based home business. Some folks want to offer an errand service. Some folks want to offer a cleaning service, and others want to offer a tutoring service.

The most common questions are “how do I start?” and “how much do I charge?”

By preparing a simple business plan, both of these questions will be answered. A few resources I always suggest taking advantage of are the SCORE website which can be found at www.score.org and the small business/home business section on the IRS site http://www.irs.gov/businesses/small/article/0,,id=99336,00.html These two sites will answer many startup questions.

The fees to charge will vary by state and even by city. I do have someone clean my home for me. The fee I pay her is much higher than the fee someone outside of California pays. The fee I pay is very average for the town I live in.

There are a few ways to find out what the average fee is in your town. You can start on the internet. If you want to run an errand service, look online and see what services are being offered at what rates by other people. If you can, find a few businesses in your town.

Next, if your town has a “services offered” section in the daily newspaper, look and see what others are charging. My own local paper lists gardeners, house cleaners, tailors, party planners and many other services. Often, the advertiser will put their fees right in their ads to save phone calls from folks simply wanting to know their fees.

My final suggestion is to actually contact the other businesses and ask what they charge. You can look in your local yellow pages for other businesses offering the service you wish to offer.

Service based businesses are very popular and can be quite profitable. The key is in creating a business plan that will be your roadmap to success!!

Audrey Okaneko has been working at home since 1983. She can be reached at audreyoka@cox.net or visited at www.recipe-barn.com

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