What Rising Insurance Costs Mean for Your Bottom Line

Insurance Is Eating Your Margin—And You Need a System to Track It

If you're a custom home builder or remodeler, you've probably noticed your insurance premiums creeping up. General liability, workers' comp, auto, umbrella policies—they're all climbing.

What We're Seeing

• Workers' Comp premiums up 15-30% in the last 18 months
• General Liability renewals jumping 20-40% for builders with claims history
• Auto insurance doubling for fleets
• Umbrella policies getting pickier

The Three-Step System

Step 1: Know Your True Overhead Rate per labor hour or per job.

Step 2: Update Your Estimating Templates immediately.

Step 3: Track Insurance as a Job Cost where appropriate.

Real Life Example

A custom home builder doing about $3M in revenue had workers' comp jump $22,000 in one year. We recalculated his labor burden rate, set up job costing in QuickBooks, and built a custom financial dashboard. Within a year, he had his best profit margin ever—despite the insurance increase.