The Tree Service Pricing Calculator Pack: Seven linked calculators, every formula checked by recalculation

Seven calculators for pricing tree work from your own crew, your own equipment and your own timed jobs, not from someone else's price list: an hourly crew rate with the bucket truck, chipper and stump grinder each spread over the hours it works, a removal estimate from height, trunk diameter and a difficulty factor you set, trimming and pruning, stump grinding per diameter inch, debris haul and dump fees, a bid from a target margin with markup and margin side by side, and a check of estimated against actual hours once the job is done. Start with sheet 1. In the worked example a crew of 3 with truck and chipper costs $119.25 an hour. Every figure is an example for you to overwrite; none of it is a claim about what tree work sells for, how fast anyone works or how a tree should be taken down. These are estimates, not financial advice. Every formula was recalculated and checked against an independent implementation before this shipped.

What is in it

7 calculators, one per sheet. Overwrite the blue cells with your own numbers and everything else follows. Nothing is locked, there are no macros, and it opens in Excel, Numbers, LibreOffice and Google Sheets.

• Crew and equipment rate: What does an hour of your crew and its equipment cost you?
• Removal estimate: What will taking this tree down cost you in crew time?
• Trimming and pruning: What does trimming these trees cost you in crew time?
• Stump grinding per inch: What should you charge per diameter inch to grind these stumps?
• Debris haul and dump fees: What does getting the chips and wood off site cost you?
• Bid from target margin: What bid gives the margin you want, and how is that different from a markup?
• Job profitability check: Did the job make what the bid said it would?

Every formula was checked

This pack contains 67 formulas. Before it was published, every one of them was recalculated by a spreadsheet engine and compared against an independent implementation of the same arithmetic written in Python. All 67 agreed to within a cent, and the workbook carries a Verification sheet saying so.

That is an unusual thing to be able to claim about a spreadsheet, and it is the main reason to buy this one rather than download a free template. A formula that looks right and is wrong is worse than no formula at all, because you will act on it.

What each calculator assumes

There is a sheet listing this, because a calculator that hides its assumptions is just a number generator:

• Each machine's yearly cost is spread over the hours it actually works on jobs, not the hours the crew works. Overhead (office, yard, advertising) is not in this rate; it is spread over jobs on sheet 6. If the climber is paid more than the ground crew, enter the average cost per person-hour.
• Cutting time scales with height and with trunk diameter, at your own minutes for each; spread and lean are left to the difficulty factor. The factor multiplies cutting time only, not setup or cleanup. This sheet prices time; it says nothing about how the work should be done. Hauling the debris is on sheet 5.
• Every tree on the list takes the same minutes. For a mixed list, price each group separately and add them. The whole crew and both machines are on the clock for the visit; if the chipper stays home, lower the crew rate.
• Grinding time scales with diameter at one rate per inch; surface roots, depth below grade and chip removal are left to your minutes per inch and per stump. The grinder goes out with its operator only; the rest of the crew is not on this clock.
• One driver hauls while the rest of the crew keeps working, so only the driver's time is costed. Wood is charged by the ton and chips by the load; if your dump charges both by weight, enter the chip fee per load from your last ticket.
• Overhead is spread evenly across jobs. If your jobs vary a lot in size, spread it by crew-hours instead: overhead a year divided by crew-hours a year, times this job's hours. Leave a line at 0 for work not on this job.
• Every crew-hour is costed at the sheet 1 crew rate and every grinder hour at the grinder rate. Extra work the customer agreed to pay for should be added to the bid before comparing, or it shows up as an overrun.

What this is not

Not financial, tax or legal advice, and not a recommendation to buy, sell, borrow or sign anything. These are calculators: they show what a choice costs, not which choice is right for you. Where a published rate or threshold is used it is the one current when the pack was built; those change, the arithmetic does not.

Honest about the format

One .xlsx workbook, 7 calculator sheets plus Start Here, Assumptions and Verification. Not a PDF, not a physical product, not a Notion template. Available immediately after purchase; nothing ships.

Refunds

If this isn't what you expected, email me within 30 days and I'll refund you in full. No need to explain. Because it's an instant download I can't take the file back, so I'd rather you just had your money back.