About Charging for building a site
 

I am designing a site for a friend of mine and his Dad. I'm basically installing vB, starting all the forums, installing all the mods and getting it ready for release. Then I'll be maintaining it throughout it's runtime.

I'm looking for suggestions to charge for the initial setup and how much to charge monthly for maintaining.

a friend in need is a pain indeed :) - only kidding
Depends on how much of a friend he is to you.I work on the principle do your friends a favour and one day they will do you one back.
TBh this is a question in my view only you can answer about how much to charge for intial setup and maintaining his site.

I agree with the above comment. I started designing/maintaining someones forum on a monthly basis at no charge because I liked the community. I designed every image on the website along with all the coding and didn't charge him a dime.

Then about a year later, he started paying me $300/month for running his site just because it got to the point where it made so much money :)

I have a strictly no friends or family policy. When you start doing work for them, they always expect a good "deal". The time I spend giving them a good "deal", I could spend earning much more :) Your question is rather vague btw..

like lasto... friends are pain when they need something... i have no more friend on the net because they are costly... and they bring no reputation gain, compared to a client which you give some job for free... (because you can gift a client)

if you do a small job, charge a small fee... if you do a lot, charge a lot... so they know where to stop asking for free stuff.

Amazing, maybe I'm in the wrong game giving my work out for free.

A friend in need is a friend that can be called upon when you need a favour in return. Design their site for free and you'll feel all warm and fuzzy inside. :)

Don't think like that! you're a truly Artist! [although you never responded my petitions which I was willing to pay :mad:]

Here's my view...

If a friend is doing a job for me (even outside of computers and something electrical for example) I would pay him the same price as the current ongoing rate for the trade. Of course my friend doesn't expect it. The way I look at it, he/she does good work and I have the trust. We all know, especially in business, trust is hard to come by. I have no issues paying for quality. Yes, I've even paid family members for their time.

On the other hand I've also did things and have work done for me at no monetary cost. What we're talking about in this thread, however, is based on a business model. If it is business, then there is always something to exchange.

Unfortunately friends and family don't always work that way Freesteyelz :)

It's unfortunate but the upside is that not all families and friends are built the same. :)