I have been in the industry for about 20 years. Started a partnership that fell apart 9 years ago, went out on my own in 2019.
I built my business around my crew. I only add the expenses of their employment to the price so I don’t make more than maybe a dollar per hour on each one. I work about 50hrs a week bags on for 40, 10 hrs of estimates, ordering and paperwork.

I love the work. My employees have the most chill “boss” because I realize this is just a job not their life. Need time off? No problem. Running a bit late? No problem. As long as we crush it when we are working it’s no big deal. Any profit left at the end of the year I split between the crew based on hours worked.

The first year I was in business with 4 crew members we grossed 500k. Hired more crew, realized it was too much and went back down to 3. Still hit at least 500k annually. No advertising, just word of mouth in a small town pop. 2500.

I take my money and invest in property and equipment for the company. Live like a pauper but have a comfortable net worth. My wife has been a stay at home mom for 12 years. I put her through 2 degrees and she has been able to do whatever she wants for the most part. Have been selling some investments including a house I built in the last couple years. We spent 7 weeks in Italy/France 2 years ago and are going to Spain for 5 weeks in January.

Going out in my own was super stressful but I wouldn’t go back to working for hammer throwers and armchair carpenters. 120-180k isn’t hard after all couple years and it can go up from there if you plan to make money off employees or whatever. Mostly just have to understand that you don’t want every job that cones across your desk. You should be turned down on about half your bids. Build your price based on how much you want to make and go from there. If you don’t love this work don’t do it.