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Help with becoming IC (salary, etc…)

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Hey all. Just making the jump to full time IC as opposed to salaried employee and want to have a bit of data to present my current boss who I will now be working as a contractor for related to hourly wages for coding, graphics, video, dB development, etc…

In a nutshell, I have to sit down with him and renegotiate my salary into either and hourly or “per project” rate and I wanted to have supporting info to claim that the fair market value of an hour of HTML coding is $30/hour… or dB development is $75…. or whatever the “actual market rates” are…

I’m in Los Angeles if that makes a difference, and my current salary here is around 65K after bonuses etc… (that doesn’t include the 401K, benefits, or SS that I’ll now need to pay myself) and that translates to roughly $32/hour…

Anyone have any advice on the negotiation, what I should ask for, what I should be looking to accomplish, or the like? I have a handful of other clients as well, and basically the growth in my work with them has necessitated the move to IC, but my current employer will still likely be my “biggest client” for at least a few months.

Any help, ideas, or comments would be greatly appreciated…

Thanks,

John

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In reply to Help with becoming IC (salary, etc…)

Rates vary depending on location, duration and what the work actually is. Most consultants use firms that add 30% or more on top of what the consultant sees because of overhead. As an independent, you’ll have overhead too. You need to take into account commuting costs, health insurance and whether you need your own laptop. Always remember that no contract is forever and that you may want to retire someday or continue living indoors and eating between contracts so plan accordingly. Shorter contracts should always have a premium, because unless something unforeseen happens you know it’s going to end real soon. Also consider cutting the client a break if the work looks real good on a resume.

Just remember that rates are one of the first things that the client sees and that if you price yourself out of the market it could be a long time between contracts.

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