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Comment by throw_away_584 | Hacker News Reader

fwiw my current billing rate is $300/hr. Full stack. Mostly web. 18+ years of experience. San Francisco. Clients all over the Bay Area.

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Got any spill-over you'd like to get rid of? Experienced freelancer/consultant here, no hand-holding necessary.

Sorry, no.

Is that a high rate in SF? Can you bill a full month of it (160 hours) or are larger jobs at a different rate?

Frankly, I don't know if it's a good rate. I shoot for 80% utilization of my time. If I get busier than that, I raise my rate. So that's the simple algorithm that got me to $300/hr now. I don't think I'd want higher utilization than 80% anyway. You need time to do bizdev etc.

I used to kill myself with 60 hour weeks a long time ago though. That wasn't smart.

I've never had to lower my rate. There were lean periods where I was "between projects" for a couple of months. I just considered this a much needed time off to catch up on my reading list.

Given the high salaries in sf for software development, your rate sounds reasonable.

Working only remotely? afaik face-to-face interaction is highly valued in Bay Area.

I meet the clients f2f a lot at the beginning of the project. Then I'm off to just writing code at home until it's time to deliver the project. It's just the nature of the projects I've taken on. I'm sure there are other kinds of software consulting where you need to meet them everyday, go to their standups and things like that. Fortunately, I've avoided that. I've developed a reputation for "going off and getting it done". That's the brand. So people don't expect constant meetings.

Cheesy title notwithstanding, I found this book to be useful: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/260218.Million_Dollar_Co...

So, if you can answer this question, which kind of projects do you work with mostly?

Backoffice projects? Actually working on their main project? Maintenance of legacy systems?

Or basically, what kind of projects companies put contractors on as opposed to their employees/founders?

If they could hire someone full-time to do it, they would, I think. I say this because every single company I've consulted for has tried to pressure me into coming on full-time. I always politely decline, but it is exhausting sometimes. I remind myself that I'm fortunate and that I should be grateful for the opportunities.

Either they can't hire fast enough, or they can't have the employees deliver fast enough.

Anyway, I don't know if there's a clear pattern.

Let me just list a few examples:

1. Large company. New CTO wanted a proof-of-concept. Big company with slow teams and processes. He got me to build it fast, and demoed it to the board, and got the leadership team excited.

2. Startup. CTO and the 3 engineers were mobile devs. They were raising their next round and wanted a web version of their product. Ended up building a full product that got them much bigger traction than they expected.

3. Startup. CEO and the investors thought that the team needed to focus on X. CTO thought that Y will actually get them product-market-fit. CTO asked me to build Y, and the CEO agreed, to preserve optionality. Turns out the CTO was right.

Part of the reason you can get stuff done fast is precisely because you're not part of the company. The 'you should come work here full time' scenarios almost never seem to really get that point. The moment you come on 'full time', their perception of you changes, expectations of you change, and you're rarely likely to deliver what you could because of these changes.

Exactly! It reminds me of https://local.theonion.com/girlfriend-changes-man-into-someo... I'm tempted to send them that link, but so far I haven't ;-)

How do you find freelance opportunities in the Bay Area?

To simplify it, it's been:

1. Talk to people and sound like you know what you're talking about. In my (admittedly limited) experience, it's been "be opinionated, and be able to back up the opinions when challenged".

2. They mention opportunity for equity. You mention you only work for money. Sometimes they take you up on it.

3. Do a great job. They brag about you. This gets you more clients. But don't count on that. Ask for referrals.

4. Increase your rate as your utilization goes up.

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