Pay model sandbox

An interactive demo crew you can add, rename, re-rate and delete freely, to see exactly what each pay model does to the money before committing to it.

What it is

A sandbox with a demo crew whose hours are editable per day, plus the model's own variables (bid, materials, margin, unit rate, tiers, days figured, equipment). Every model answers the same three questions in its own way: what the crew gets, what it costs per day, and who is exposed if the job runs long. Nothing is saved.

Also called: what if calculator · play with the numbers · model my crew pay · pay simulator

See it
Pay model sandbox
CustomerBuildingAmountStatus
Ivy BrubakerHobby Shop$16,020Approved
Sutter KlineBarndominium$15,640Open
Ronan PetschHobby Shop$5,760Draft
Sutter Kline30×40 Garage$13,740Sent
Delia Yoder40×64 Shop$16,970Approved
The sandbox: the demo crew grid with per-day hour cells, the model's variables above, and the totals card with 'finished 2 days early' beneath. Sample data — no customer information appears here.
How it works
  1. 1runSandbox() dispatches per pay model; the day-rate model runs through calculateCrewPayout — the same function real payouts use.
  2. 2Hourly and cost-plus price each person's own hours at their own rate; lump sum and per unit split a crew total by hours.
  3. 3Each model returns headline figures, extra rows, and one plain-English insight about what the arrangement means for the builder.
  4. 4Starter numbers are chosen to be believable rather than flattering — the starter crew costs $3,424 in hours against a $4,200 bid.
  5. 5A builder can swap a demo worker for a real staff name from the roster; only the name is used and nothing is written.
Why we built it

Nobody experiments with their own people's wages on screen, so a builder deciding how to pay a crew was doing it on paper or not at all. The sandbox runs demo workers with adjustable rates, hours and days, so an hourly crew, a day-rate crew and a fixed-bid crew can be priced against the same job before anyone is committed to anything. It runs the same arithmetic that pays real crews, so what the sandbox shows and what a payout produces cannot drift apart.

The problem
  • No safe way to evaluate a pay change before making it.
  • Calculators that disagree with the real payout screen.
Sound familiar?
What you get
A builder can see the consequence of a pay model before adopting it.
The demo and the real payout can never quote different math.
Nothing typed in the sandbox touches anyone's actual pay.
What's inside

See it on your own jobs

Twenty minutes, your numbers, no slide deck. We’ll build one of your real buildings in front of you and send you the estimate link at the end — yours to keep either way.

or keep browsing features →