If you're just trying to work out a budget, start with what a small business website costs in Hawaii. This article is for the next step: you've asked around, you have two or three quotes in front of you, and they don't look anything alike.
That's normal, and it usually isn't because one designer is greedy. It's because they're quoting different pricing models, and until you convert them to the same shape you're not comparing anything.
The four models you'll see on Maui
- One-time flat price. A single number for the finished site. You pay once, you own it, ongoing costs are just domain and hosting. Easiest to compare and hardest to hide anything inside.
- Hourly. A rate, times an estimate. Fine with a designer you trust, but the estimate is the part that matters and it's the part that moves. Always ask what happens if it runs long.
- Monthly subscription build. Little or nothing up front, then a monthly fee that covers the build, hosting, and support rolled together. Attractive cash flow, and the total depends entirely on how long you stay.
- Free or near-free build with a lock-in. The site costs almost nothing because the money is in a required hosting or maintenance contract. Read what happens if you leave.
Convert everything to a three-year number
This is the single most useful thing you can do with a stack of quotes. Websites get replaced every three to five years, so three years is a fair window. Take each quote and work out what you'd actually have paid by then.
| Model | Up front | What you pay by year three |
|---|---|---|
| One-time flat | The whole build price | Build price, plus domain and hosting |
| Hourly | Deposit, then billed | Whatever the hours came to, which may not be the estimate |
| Monthly subscription | Little or nothing | 36 payments, which is usually the largest number on the page |
| Free build, locked hosting | Nothing | 36 payments, and often no site to take with you |
Do that arithmetic before you decide. A monthly plan that looks like the cheap option in month one is frequently the most expensive of the four by month thirty-six, and that's the comparison the pricing page is not doing for you.
The cheapest quote and the lowest three-year cost are rarely the same quote.
What the number usually leaves out
Two quotes can describe genuinely different amounts of work. Before you compare them, check each one for these:
- Copy. Is someone writing the words, or are you? Writing your own is fine, but it's real work and it's the most common reason a build stalls for a month.
- Photos. Included, stock, or yours to supply? On a restaurant or a trades site this is the biggest quality difference there is.
- Revisions. How many rounds, and what happens after them.
- Hosting and domain. Included for a year, billed separately, or locked to them.
- Maintenance. Optional or mandatory. Mandatory is where lock-in usually lives.
- SEO basics. Built in or an upsell. It should be built in.
The question that matters most
Ask every single person who quotes you: do I own the site and the domain outright?
If the answer involves any hesitation, you're looking at a rental. Renting is a legitimate model and some owners genuinely prefer it, but you should know that's what you're buying. The test is simple: if you stopped paying tomorrow, would you still have a website, and could you move it to another host without asking permission? My own answer is that the site and domain belong to the client in every case, with no lock-in, and I'd hold anyone else to the same standard.
Red flags in a quote
- No price until a sales call. Sometimes it's a genuinely complex job. Often it's so the number can be set after they've sized up your budget.
- Guaranteed rankings or guaranteed leads. Nobody can promise this. Anyone who does is guessing with your money.
- A price with no scope attached. "$1,500 for a website" means nothing without a page count and a list of what's included.
- You can't reach a human quickly. If they're slow now, while they're trying to win the work, that's the fastest they will ever be.
- A portfolio of sites that all look the same. That's a template with different logos. Here's how to spot one in about ten seconds.
What I charge, publicly
One-time flat, listed on the site so you can compare it against anyone without booking a call. Starter from $300, a full small-business build around $800, larger and e-commerce projects from $2,000. Most launch in 3 to 5 business days. Hosting and domain stay in your name, you own everything, and maintenance is optional at $50 a month rather than a condition of the deal.
I publish it because the alternative is asking you to sit through a call to find out whether we're even in the same ballpark. If a competitor's quote beats mine on a three-year basis, that's genuinely useful for you to know.
The bottom line
Put every quote in the same shape, run each one out to three years, confirm you own the result, and then pick. Do that and the spread between quotes stops being confusing, because you can finally see what each one is actually selling.