I'm buying a commerical jeep for starting a business of landscaping gardens

a list of tools i need to start getting, a good lawnmore, elertic hedge strimmer. shovels, forks,picks,a good spade. wheel barrow,a rack, bush man saw.

can you name a few more tools?

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Have you ever worked doing this type of thing before?

You might start by working for someone else first - so you can learn from someone who is already knowledgeable - and also learn what tools you need.

And really - its not just the tools you need. You need to know how to run a small business. How to market your services, how to quote different types of jobs (many people will want a fixed price contract - so you need to be able to calculate the number of hours different jobs will take you so you don’t end up working for $1/hour), etc.

Its always best to have someone else pay for your early learning. Perhaps even work for free for someone for a while just so you can learn all these things.

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Yeah, what’s your experience in this line of work? I’ve been doing yard work for money since I was 7 years old and our property manager gave me a quarter to weed a 4X4 patch of ground on the side of our house. In fourth grade me and my friends carried a bamboo rake around and went door to door in our neighborhood asking people if they wanted the leaves raked off of their front lawn for 50 cents.

In seventh grade we pushed a lawn mower around the neighborhood and asked people if they wanted their lawns mowed for $2.00. On a Saturday we would make $8.00 or $9.00 and then three of us would ride our bikes downtown and spend all of it in the local pizza parlor on pizza and pinball and Pong (the very first video game).

In high school a lot of my families friends from church would hire me to do light or semi-heavy yard work at their homes. They would come and pick me up at my house and take me to their homes where I would mow lawns, trim hedges, edge their lawns, prune trees, rake leaves, weed areas, and other miscellaneous jobs. I worked for the same 4 or 5 people regularly; I think I was making $3.00 an hour and this was 1974-78.

After high school I started working in restaurants and department stores so I wasn’t doing as much yard work. This was all before I got sick.

When I was 19 I was living with my parents still and I got serious about doing work at peoples homes. I was now doing various work at our families friends homes from our church regularly but a lot of their neighbors saw me outside working hard and hired me to do work at their houses too.

By now I was doing heavier work besides mowing lawns like cutting down trees with a chainsaw and making it into firewood, splitting logs into firewood, using a weed-eater on whole hillsides and clearing off whole hillsides of brush and vines, digging ditches, digging post holes, laying brick sidewalks, digging out small trees including taking out the whole stump, digging drainage ditches. Weeding and spading and turning the soil of ground to make vegetable gardens.

One time I did a lot of the work of installing solar heating panels in our friends home when the craze hit in the late seventies. I was doing light carpentry work like fixing wooden fences and wooden gates, cleaning rain-gutters, planting flowers and ground cover, painting, etc. Just doing these things I was making about $300.00 a month which was a nice chunk of money in those days. That’s my story.

I guess my point is to start off slow and learn as you go along. SZadmin is right about maybe learning the business from someone who is already knowledgeable about it. Find someone who has experience and get hired and work for them for awhile while you learn the business. After you work for someone else maybe they will start trusting you and give you the responsibility to work on your own at his clients houses.

Once you start learning the business maybe you can get a few clients of your own on the side and get a feel for doing business on your own on your own time. I would also suggest using the internet to learn about landscaping and starting small businesses in conjunction with the hands-on experience of working for someone else. If you really want to commit yourself to learning about landscaping maybe do what SurprisedJ does and take landscaping courses at your local colleges. Anyway, good luck.

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If you don’t know what tools you’ll need then maybe this isn’t the job for you.

You can start off small @san_pedro - maybe you could just mow lawns for a while, like around town - lots of people, especially elderly folks could use this service.
Start of small and expand your business later, when you gain more experience - Best of luck to you!

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i started this work since i was 12, i have it all sussed out, i am well experinced, i will knock doors and ask would you like your grass cut, and a lot of the time you get other work
, i can lay patios, construct wooden decking boards, i can build garden walls and also plaster them, as i said im in it since i was 12

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well im doing it for cash, no tax needed for cutting grass and trimming hedges , its a experiment first 6 months is to see can i get enough customers, and if it grows enough than i will pay tax, but only after the 6 month trial

i can turn on the convinsing style and charm, ive done it 1000s of times in my youth

lets say a 10foot by 10 foot garden needs cutting i will only charge 10 euro. i know by looking at a garden what it would cost to cut it. i have it all sussed out because of experince

see if i knock 100 doors in posh areas that have money… lets say in one day to cut grass, i would surely out of a 100 get at least ten that will say do it, lets say 10euro a garden, well that is 100euro for ten gardens, and from my experince they could need other work done totally different to grass cutting…see? the grass cutting is the bate until you getting chatting about other work lets say for exsample a patio laying or plastering or a fancy design in the garden, im telling ya thats the way it works, the grass cutting is small money until they want extra work done, :)ya know…the grass cutting is the bate hahaha

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When people ask me questions… I break out the soil testing kit and moisture meter so I can see if the soil is too base or acidic or hasn’t been watered.

I use my rototiller a lot to mix in fertilizer. Good set of smaller hand tools too… I have a small rake (as well as a big one) so I can spread mulch in tight spaces and not disturb the plants.

A dolly for any extra hauling of path stones, or other stuff that the wheelbarrow might not cut it.
If you are going to lay stone paths or slate or brick paths… a good wide head broom for getting the sand on between the stones.

Here’s one… you would be amazed how many people have huge gardens… and do NOT have a long decent garden hose.

A post hole digger is also good for plants that need deep roots… and post holes. I know there are expensive and fancy augers that can start a small hole in tight spaces… but I’ve had good luck with the post hole tools.

For me… I’m working in already well established gardens where I can NOT disturb the other plants around. If your starting a garden from scratch or doing a complete turn over… you have a lot more room to move.

As much as I try to multitask a tool… save some money… the one thing I DON’T skimp on is a good set of pruning sheers. Different sizes for roses or small bushes and tree limbs.

Good luck and I hope all goes well. Is independent contract work as competitive in Ireland as it is in the states?

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One reason I can think of where a home owner will give your (new) services a try, is if he/she is displeased with a hired contractor.

Here is a little info about STATS you might browse through.

The Global Industry Analysts Report says “the landscaping services market in the U.S. is expected to recover and poised and reach $80.06 billion by 2015.”

You may want to build a portfolio that you may show to home owners who are in the process of selling their homes. This looks like a Ground Work Pay Off approach.

Ninety-three percent of real estate agents recommended landscaping as a top five home improvement recommendation responding that at an average cost of $540 a homeowner can expect a $1,932 price increase on their home for a 258% return on investment.

https://www.landcarenetwork.org/PLANET/Media/Statistics/PLANET/Media-Press/Landscaspe-Industry-Statistics.aspx?hkey=153835e3-12da-4656-85a6-430be2358ec1

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good top class work equals good honest pay

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Love this… it’s so true… new home buyers are less likely to buy a home where low hanging branches block the door or hedges gone amok make the house look unwelcoming.

I work for the city parks… haven’t thought about doing any contract work… it is an idea.

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i love earning money

A lot of possibilities for sure. Win over at least one real estate agent, that agent may have no problem dropping your name day in, day out. Gain the approval of the seller, his/her next home may be lined up for you. Gain the approval of the buyer, more work down the road. Lots of possibilities.

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Sounds good Pedro. I just did a quick search on google for “landscaping business tools” and there is lots of info - for example these two links:

Google is your friend when starting any type of business…

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im not only STARTING JUST NOW! i only asked to hear other opinions, i played with enough tools i know what i need kk?