What drives a repaint job’s contribution?
Illustrative case · Owner-led residential repaint crew with two employed painters; interior and exterior work; no industrial coatings or lead abatement · United States; Pennsylvania regulatory case outside Philadelphia and Allegheny County; no modeled city
Explore this business · Unit economics and KPIs
The useful planning unit is a bid person-hour attached to a defined repaint scope. In this interior example, an 80-hour job bills $6,016 and leaves $5,479 contribution before the paid roster and overhead. Rework adds 6.0% labor, so actual direct time becomes 84.8 hours. A crew-day and a person-hour are different units.
How should the unit be defined?
A person-hour is one person working for one hour. Two painters working a full day consume twice the person-hours of one painter, while elapsed job duration can also include drying and customer access. The bid should specify measured paintable surfaces, preparation standard, coat count, product/finish, protection, included repairs and cleanup. Square feet of floor area alone do not describe the wall, ceiling and trim scope.
The normal example divides 80 bid hours into 24 preparation, 8 protection/setup, 40 application and 8 cleanup/handover. This is a declared scope estimate, not a productivity benchmark. Unpriced extra repairs or covered lead-disturbing preparation must be evaluated separately.
How does the normal job calculation work?
| Interior example | Calculation basis | Amount |
|---|---|---|
| Labor billed | 80 bid hours × $70 | $5,600 |
| Materials consumed | 80 × $4.00 | $320 |
| Materials billed | Cost × (1 + 30.0% markup) | $416 |
| Total earned job revenue | Labor + material charge | $6,016 |
| All variable costs | Materials + supplies + fuel + rework material + processing | $537 |
| Contribution before roster | Revenue less variable costs | $5,479 |
| Allocated direct paid labor | Actual job hours × weighted burdened rate | $2,684 |
| After allocated direct labor | A diagnostic margin, before idle labor and overhead | $2,795 |
The last two rows help compare estimated jobs; they do not replace monthly payroll. All scheduled employee and owner pay remains in fixed operating cost. Deducting allocated direct labor again in the monthly model would double-count wages. Conversely, ignoring paid idle, travel and estimating time would overstate whole-business profit.
The modeled first payment is $1,805, progress/completion payment $3,008 and next-month final balance $1,203. Receipts timing does not change earned revenue. This simple collection pattern assumes only short jobs completed in the month and no customer deposits for future unperformed work.
Does the material allowance fit a measured job?
Not necessarily. Consider a separate measurement check: 2,000 square feet of paintable surface, 2 coats, 350 square feet per gallon and 10.0% waste. The exact requirement is 12.6 gallons; whole-gallon procurement rounds up to 13. The manufacturer gives a 300–400 coverage range for BEHR PRO i300 on prepared/primed surfaces, excluding spray loss. Product coverage.
At the separate assumed $30 per gallon plus $23 of other materials, that check costs $413. It exceeds the normal modeled job’s $320 material allowance by $93. The measured check therefore disproves the allowance for that specific scope; it is not quietly substituted into the executed case. Keeping the same labor and markup would yield a revised bid of $6,137. Primer, repairs, packaging sizes and customer color can still change it.
The observed $109 price for a five-gallon white pack is a supplier comparison, not the assumed single-gallon cost and not a complete job bill. Checked SKU and price scope.
How many hours can the crew actually sell?
The employees are paid for 346.7 person-hours monthly in aggregate. After the employee availability factor and 160 owner hours at the owner’s direct-work share, the crew has 364.3 direct hours before weather. Reserving base rework yields 343.6 bid hours in an all-interior month.
In month six, the assumed exterior share is 55.0% and exterior weather loss is 10.0%. Base sellable capacity falls to 324.7 bid hours. The model accepts the smaller of requests and capacity. Each accepted hour also consumes extra callback time. Increasing quotations beyond this ceiling requires fewer lost hours, a changed job mix or a separately costed roster.
The simple debt-inclusive all-interior threshold is 297 whole bid hours per month. A capacity ceiling above that threshold does not guarantee there are enough accepted jobs; the opening ramp is demand-limited. A narrow exterior window can be capacity-limited even while the crew is fully paid.
Which measures should appear on the job sheet?
| Measure | Record it consistently | Decision it supports |
|---|---|---|
| Preparation variance | Actual prep person-hours less bid prep hours; separately code unexpected scope. | Revise scope questions and change-order practice. |
| Material variance | Actual product/primer/repair consumption versus measured takeoff. | Replace the generic material-per-hour allowance. |
| Callback ratio | Unbilled rework hours divided by original accepted bid hours. | Reserve capacity and identify causes. |
| Paid availability | Direct completed-job hours divided by paid roster hours. | Check scheduling, travel, estimating and idle time. |
| Final-balance aging | Completion date, due date and actual collection date. | Separate earned margin from usable cash. |
| Weather loss | Direct hours lost by exterior job/product and reason. | Keep a dated alternate schedule, not an invented sale. |
Use consistent units so a rate quoted per crew-day cannot silently become a rate per person-hour. Keep approved additional scope separate from callback work. A premium coating can lower apparent application time while increasing material cost; test the whole job rather than treating a sprayer’s maximum flow as labor productivity.
When does ordinary preparation become a different estimate?
For covered pre-1978 work, paint disturbance can bring EPA RRP into scope. The estimate needs an applicability decision and a documented site method before hours are priced. Firm certification and a trained renovator do not make any sanding, containment or cleanup assumption automatically sufficient. Employee lead exposure can create separate OSHA obligations. RRP scope; Training; Worker protection scope.
The normal 80-hour illustration is not a lead-disturbing quote. Add the actual time, protection and waste-handling cost, then rerun the quote and capacity plan. A profitable repaint estimate depends on what is inside the scope, not the label “painting job.”
Sources and scope
- Illustrative case assumptions and calculation method · Checked 2026-10-04 · First-party modeled scenario, not observed market data. Exact inputs are privately preserved in reference-model/inputs.json.
- BEHR PRO i300 Interior Eggshell PR330 · Checked 2026-10-04 · Manufacturer coverage for this product on properly prepared/primed surfaces; coverage excludes spray loss and is not a labor productivity standard.
- Home Depot: BEHR PRO i300 5-gallon White Eggshell PR33005 · Checked 2026-10-04 · Listed retail observation for one white 5-gallon SKU; location, custom color, delivery and tax are not a project quotation.
- EPA RRP contractor requirements · Checked 2026-10-04 · Lead-paint-disturbing work in covered pre-1978 housing and child-occupied facilities; applies to relevant surface preparation as well as paint application.
- EPA renovator training requirements · Checked 2026-10-04 · Initial EPA-accredited renovator course and assigned certified renovator; the case course price is an allowance, not an observed course quote.
- OSHA construction lead standard · Checked 2026-10-04 · Employee occupational lead exposure in covered construction work; an RRP firm certificate alone does not establish OSHA compliance.