Auto Repair Estimate Calculator
Build a parts-and-labor estimate line by line and print it as a customer copy.
OpenLABOR RATE CALCULATOR
Most shops set a door rate by looking at the shop down the road. That is a way of inheriting somebody else’s overhead. This worksheet goes the other direction: your fixed cost, your loaded technician cost, the hours you actually bill, and the margin you want — out the other end comes the rate that arithmetic supports.
RATE WORKSHEET
Monthly basis
Pre-filled with a two-bay, two-technician shop. Change anything.
FIXED COST / MONTH
TECHNICIANS
PERFORMANCE AND TARGET
| Derived | Value |
|---|---|
| Fixed cost per month | $6,550 |
| Loaded technician cost | $37.76/hr |
| Available hours | 320 |
| Worked hours | 262 |
| Billed hours | 276 |
| Technician cost per month | $9,908 |
| Break-even door rate | $59.74/hr |
| Multiple of loaded wage | 2.03× |
To hit 22% net
Post this rate ______
Door rate needed
$76.58
The arithmetic
Available hours are technicians times the hours they are on the clock. Productivity is the share of those hours spent on a job at all. Efficiency is billed hours over worked hours — above 100% when a tech beats book time. Multiply the three and you get billed hours, which is the only denominator that matters, because it is the only thing you invoice.
rate = (fixed cost + technician cost) ÷ (1 − target margin) ÷ billed hours
Set the target margin to zero and the same line gives you break-even: the rate below which the shop loses money on every hour it sells.
Why copying the shop down the road fails
The national band is wide — $120–$159 per hour — and the state spread is wider still, $85 per hour at the low end to $197 at the high end. Two shops a mile apart can honestly need rates $30 apart if one owns its building and the other leases at retail rent, or if one runs at 85% productivity and the other at 60%. The benchmark tells you whether your answer is plausible. It does not tell you what your answer is.
The rate you post is not the rate you get
Discounts, menu pricing, comebacks and hours nobody billed all pull the realised rate below the posted one. The gap should stay within 5–10% of the posted door rate. Measuring it is a separate job — the effective labor rate guide covers how, and the efficiency calculator shows where the hours are going.
Once you have the number
Put it into the estimate calculator and price a few real jobs with it. If the totals land far outside the published bands for those jobs — a brake job, an alternator — the rate is not the only thing that needs work. Compare against your state band and the dealer gap before you post it on the wall.
RATE BENCHMARKS
- US band
- $120–$159 per hour
- Independent benchmark
- about $140 per hour
- State spread
- $85 per hour at the low end to $197 at the high end
- Rule of thumb
- 2.5 to 3 times the technician's hourly wage
- Productivity target
- 80–90%
- Typical net margin
- 3–9% net
RELATED
Auto Repair Invoice Template
A fillable invoice sheet with vehicle block, line items, totals and warranty terms.
OpenRepair Order Template
Complaint, cause and correction on one authorised sheet with a signature line.
OpenSOURCES
Each line is where a figure on this page came from and the date it was read.
| Figure | Source | Read |
|---|---|---|
| US labor-rate band and independent benchmark | Tekmetric — Average Auto Repair Labor Rates by State | |
| Lowest and highest state averages | Get Harvest / Tekmetric state tables | |
| Rate as a multiple of technician wage | Get Harvest — Hourly Rate Calculator for Mechanics | |
| Productivity target for a functioning shop | AutoVitals — Calculating Technician Efficiency | |
| Acceptable gap between posted and effective rate | Tekmetric — Setting Your Automotive Repair Labor Rate | |
| Typical independent-shop net margin | Sunbit — Good Profit Margin for an Auto Repair Shop |