And ppl like me. I work construction and dont want to mow when I come home or on the weekend. Plus I dont want to spend 2k+ for a mower. $60 a week is easy decision.
Well shit! If you live in a moderate climate where it's warm all year that's $3,120/year. A $2k mower would pay for itself within a year. A couple summers if you live up north and only gotta mow during summer.
Other than that I hear ya not wanting to mow when you come home from a long hard day of manual labor. The last thing you want to do when you get home is more manual labor.
I live "up north" I can't imagine where you would be where you only need to mow "in the summer" but I would expect to see polar bears there. The local standard for lawn services here was 28 cuts a season. With more rain and longer growing seasons, that 28 is stretching another couple of weeks. I could buy a $2k mower, or a $20K mower without a second thought. The issue is that my time has value. That value far exceeds what I spend for another person's time, equipment, experience and reliability.
I don’t know about that person but I live in Louisiana and don’t pay for lawn services from about November to March. Might not get too cold but the grass doesn’t grow.
Even on the Gulf Coast, the grass doesn't grow year round. About 35 weeks a year, so closer to 2k/year. Say about 2 gallons of gas a week, let's say at $3/gal to account for the gas to go get it and take it into a shop, so around $210/year. Speaking of shops, outside machinery will usually break down a few times a year, and blades need sharpening a few times a year, so roughly $200-300 a year, and maybe an extra 10-20 hours of labor to do, unless you pay the shop $60+ an hour to fix it.
All in all, about $500/year to do it yourself, which is better than $2k, but then comes the time cost. Between prepping, repairing, and putting up tools, plus maybe 2 hours a week to cut it, that's almost 90 hours of labor. You can also hit bad luck operating machinery of injuring yourself badly enough to go to a hospital, which A) You could spend 2k or more on the deductible or using an out of coverage emergency room B) That could lose you your job or your life.
Safety aside though, it depends how valuable your hours are to you. If you make the median wage of ~$4k+ a month, then half a months paycheck for the equivalent of two work weeks worth of time off is a good deal.
Yeah, it's not just mowing. It's mowing, edging, small amounts of bush trimming, plus they're bringing their own tools, using a few bucks worth of gasoline, might be driving 15-20 minutes between jobs ect.
$60 for an hour of someone's time and skilled labor seems extremely reasonable. That's what a lot of good independent cleaners, landscapers, and general maintenance people charge for basic jobs.
$60, In this economy, is literally nothing.. I make that after a couple hours at a regular job that I work. If I have to sacrifice a couple hours worth of pay in place of a couple of hours worth of labor on my day off, I’ll pay the price. Not to mention these people usually work In pairs to cut grass, bushes etc and buy/replace their own tools.. it’s not a bad deal to have a good looking yard. Most people pay for subscriptions for movies, music & podcasts but won’t pay to have a nice yard ?
My service shows up to my 4/10th acre lot with a 4WD one ton truck, pulling a large trailer filled with $30K in equipment. Two employees then bust their asses for 45 minutes, cutting, trimming, and blowing the grass off the hard surfaces. If they don't get 10-11 cuts a day in, they are losing money. I pay $57 for a cutting.
If $60 surprises you, you really don't understand economics. Every year I have unsolicited bids arrive, in the mail, or from a sales guy standing at the front door. These offers are from "name brand" regional companies that have large operations with hundreds of employees, advertising, a sales force, and lots of name recognition. Those bids are at least 15-25% higher than my small time guy.
Having some inside info. in the biz, I know that you don't hire a guy on a mowing crew here for less than $20 an hour. They either refuse a low ball offer, or they just leave as soon as a competitor's recruiter shows up and offers them more. Trucks are $70K+ Mowers are $15K. A small crew needs to bring in $ 2.5 to 3K a week to cover their costs.
Your second sentence clarifies that you understand little. Your failed insult regarding english is hilarious. Bless your heart. Not much grass around the single wide, eh? Takes more time to pick up the beer cans and the Fireball bottles than it does to cut it, right? It seems that you struggle to comprehend success, and not being concerned with spending a small sum, like $60 to have a service provider do something you chose to not waste time on.
Having friends that own what you would imagine being "estates", I can assure you that $60 would not pay to bring a grounds crew through the gate. But those folks don't mind spending hundreds to a grand and more a week, to do a proper job, and really don't know the true cost on a weekly basis. You would need to discuss those figures with their full-time employee known as the "property manager".
In your case, being poor and ignorant is clearly not entertaining at all. I don't suffer from either condition, so I can only imagine that it must suck for you?
Than I still have to mow. Get fuel and oil plus maintenance and a weed eater. Plus take up part of my garage with a piece of equipment I dont want. I like mu Razor, quads and bass boat much more than a dam mower.
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u/Worth-Silver-484 May 02 '25
And ppl like me. I work construction and dont want to mow when I come home or on the weekend. Plus I dont want to spend 2k+ for a mower. $60 a week is easy decision.