How much does a contractor website cost?

How much a contractor website costs depends on who builds it and whether you pay once or every month. Building it yourself starts at $19 a month on a builder like Squarespace, and a typical agency retainer runs $1,000 or more a month. Freelancers, agency builds and one-time packages sit in between. The fair way to compare them is the total over three years, plus the hours it takes you.

Contractor website cost at a glance

This table compares the five common ways to get a site. Builder prices are from the builder’s own pricing page as of October 2026. Agency numbers are typical, not a quote from one company.

Building it yourself on a website builder

Squarespace’s pricing page lists its Basic plan at $19 a month billed yearly, or $25 month to month, as of October 2026. Its Core plan is $29 a month billed yearly, or $39 month to month. Yearly plans include a free domain for the first year. Over three years, Basic billed yearly comes to $684 in plan fees, and Core comes to $1,044.

For that you get templates, hosting and a form builder. You don’t get the words, the photos, the lead alerts or the Google Business Profile setup. You do those yourself.

That makes your time the real cost. Count the hours it takes to write five pages, pick photos and test the form on a phone. Then put a price on those hours at what an hour on a job is worth to you.

Hiring a freelancer

Freelancers charge by the hour or by the project. For a sense of scale, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics put the median pay for web developers and digital designers at $47.85 an hour in May 2025. That is employee pay. A freelancer’s rate also has to cover their own taxes, software and unpaid hours.

A freelancer can be a good deal when you have a referral and know what you want. Before you start, settle three things. Who hosts the site? Who makes changes when the freelancer is busy with other clients? Is the domain registered in your name?

Paying an agency to build it

An agency quotes the project as a whole. You usually get more process for the money: a planning call, design rounds, written copy and a project manager. That suits a large site, several locations or custom features.

The price on the quote is rarely the whole cost. Ask whether hosting, security updates and edits after launch are included or billed separately.

Agency monthly retainers

A retainer bundles the site with ongoing work for a monthly fee. A typical retainer is $1,000 or more a month on a 12-month contract. Over 36 months that is $36,000 before any setup fee. Agency numbers are typical, not a quote from one company.

A retainer earns its fee when the agency does real work every month, such as managing paid ads or writing new content. If the site mostly sits still, you pay every month for a site that doesn’t change. The guide to agency retainers versus one-time websites does the full three-year math.

Done-for-you one-time packages

A one-time package is a fixed price for a fixed list of work. You pay once, the builder does the writing and setup, and you own the result. Other firms sell websites this way too, so compare the list of what’s included, not only the price.

KLR Performance sells three options as an example of how these are priced:

• Website, $457 one-time. Up to 5 mobile-ready pages, a quote form, every lead sent to your phone and email, and launch on your domain.
• Website + Automations, $1,997 one-time. Adds Google Business Profile setup, automatic review requests and local SEO setup.
• Full Growth Plan, $2,500 setup and $497 a month, month to month. Adds ongoing profile management, review texts, blog posts, and hosting and maintenance.

The two one-time options include hosting and small edits free for 3 months. After that you can keep a $49 a month Care Plan or take the site files and host them yourself. The pricing page has the full list for each option.

What drives the price of a contractor website

Two quotes for “a website” can be far apart because they cover different work. These are the parts that move the price:

• Pages. Each service page and each service-area page needs its own writing and layout. Five pages cost less than twenty.
• Copywriting. Someone has to write words that make a homeowner call. If the quote doesn’t say who writes them, it’s probably you.
• Photos. Your own job photos are free and look more honest than stock. A photographer costs extra.
• Integrations. A quote form that texts you, online booking, review requests and a CRM connection each take setup time.
• Hosting and domain. Someone pays for the server and the domain every year. Find out who, and how much.
• Ongoing edits. New services, new photos and price changes come up. Edits can be hourly, part of a plan, or your job.

Why the three-year total matters more than the sticker price

A low monthly fee looks cheap until you multiply it. A one-time price looks expensive until you compare it to three years of monthly fees. Add the up-front cost, then the monthly cost times 36, then any hosting, domain and edit fees. Do that for every quote and the cheapest option is often a different one than it looked at first. The website cost calculator does this three-year math for any quote.

Price is only half of it. A cheap site that doesn’t turn visitors into calls costs you jobs. The contractor website checklist covers what the site has to do, and the guide on what missed calls cost a contractor shows how to put a number on lost leads.

Questions to ask before you pay anyone

1. What will I pay in total over three years, counting hosting, the domain and edits?
2. Is the domain registered in my name, under an account I can log in to?
3. Do I own the site files and the content once I’ve paid? Can I take them if I leave?
4. Is there a minimum contract? How do I cancel, and what happens to the site when I do?
5. Who writes the words, and who supplies the photos?
6. When someone fills out the form, where does the lead go and how fast do I see it?
7. How does the site work on a phone? Google ranks sites by their mobile version, according to Google Search Central.
8. How do edits work after launch, and what do they cost?
9. When will it be live, and what do you need from me to hit that date?

If a seller can’t answer these in plain words, keep looking. If you already have a site, the free website score asks seven questions about it and lists your biggest gaps.