The Fencing Contractor

How these numbers were built: installer wages come from the BLS OEWS (Fence Erectors, SOC 47-4031, median $21.35/hr in May 2023; Construction Laborers, SOC 47-2061, median $45,300/yr in May 2024); industry structure comes from the U.S. Census Bureau (NAICS 238990 All Other Specialty Trade Contractors, the category that includes fence installation); per-company revenue, margin, and the linear-foot pricing structure are anchored to a secondary, directional industry estimate for independent fencing contractors; financing terms come from the SBA; and survival and loan-default signals come from Census/BLS business-dynamics data and published SBA-performance analyses. The default operation is built from sourced pieces: a standard-lot fence of about 150 to 170 ft takes a crew 2 to 4 days and sells for $25 to $50 a foot (HomeAdvisor), so each 2-person crew finishes about six jobs a month at about $5,800; materials run about 42% of the job at contractor cost (HomeAdvisor materials pricing, and franchise gross margins above 41%); a crew of a lead and a helper costs about $8,200 a month at fence erector wages; trucks are leased; marketing runs about $300 per job won; and one crew sells about $250k to $400k a year (Wexford). The opening kit is priced line by line from dealer, insurer and franchise sources. Figures are current as of 2024-2026.

Labor uses BLS fence erector wages; job size, price per foot, install time and the materials share use HomeAdvisor cost guides cross-checked against Superior Fence & Rail franchise figures; sales per crew and owner earnings use Wexford Insurance’s fence company benchmarks; the owner cash margin is set against BizBuySell construction sale data for a staffed firm. No single source publishes a full operating-ratio breakdown for fence companies, so the remaining ratios are directional estimates built around those figures.