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Archive 2014 · How much did you earn last year from photography

  
 
Robin Usagani
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p.1 #1 · p.1 #1 · How much did you earn last year from photography


What was your gross wage? I am trying to make it as simple as possible. Let's say you replace your photography business to an 8-5 office job, what would your salary be to match what you were making doing photography last year? How much salary do you pay your self (if that is how you run your company)?

If you run your business with your spouse, maybe reduce it by certain percentage? You be the judge how much he/she is involved. Maybe reduce 30-50%?

If you are a part timer like me, just figure out your gross profit from photography only.

I understand there is no perfect way to do this since people run their business differently. Some has to pay for health insurance, some uses their spouses fulltime job health insurance, etc. This will be good enough to give a general idea how much photographers make.




Jan 30, 2014 at 09:39 PM
thebeginning
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p.1 #2 · p.1 #2 · How much did you earn last year from photography


So am I correct in assuming that you mean take-home pay only? Not just the revenue from the business?

I would take that as meaning:

All revenue - fixed expenses (website, marketing budget, insurance, etc) - variable expenses (albums, prints, etc).


Because that vs. total revenue would be a huge difference.



Jan 30, 2014 at 09:51 PM
Tony Hoffer
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p.1 #3 · p.1 #3 · How much did you earn last year from photography


I think you need to create this poll from a full timers perspective. After all, many full time businesses will gross well above 200k, but the salary amount is much smaller. For example, I live pretty modestly and my salary amount is pretty small, but our overall business gross is much higher. Also, for tax purposes, one of our salaries is much, much smaller than the other and doesn't reflect the true percentage of the workload.

Most part timers keep everything they bet. I think that's where the issue is in making these. If it was straight up 'How much did your business gross' aand the poll went up to 500k, you'd probably get a much better overall impression of a leveled playing field.



Jan 30, 2014 at 10:04 PM
TTLKurtis
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p.1 #4 · p.1 #4 · How much did you earn last year from photography


Robinson you're making this poll of yours way too complicated. Pick a type of figure you're asking for and stop throwing in all the maybe-this-and-maybe-that in your description. Gross sales is probably the easiest. Otherwise there is profit. Getting into salaries and all this crap means you may not be accounting for things like end of year bonus which would be a smart way to pay yourself if you earn a certain amount for accounting purposes, bla bla bla.


Jan 30, 2014 at 10:59 PM
Robin Usagani
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p.1 #5 · p.1 #5 · How much did you earn last year from photography



Kurtis.. If you were to work an office job, how much would that be to match it? I really dont know how to make it easier.
TTLKurtis wrote:
Robinson you're making this poll of yours way too complicated. Pick a type of figure you're asking for and stop throwing in all the maybe-this-and-maybe-that in your description. Gross sales is probably the easiest. Otherwise there is profit. Getting into salaries and all this crap means you may not be accounting for things like end of year bonus which would be a smart way to pay yourself if you earn a certain amount for accounting purposes, bla bla bla.




Jan 30, 2014 at 11:46 PM
TTLKurtis
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p.1 #6 · p.1 #6 · How much did you earn last year from photography


I don't work an office job and the one thing is absolutely nothing like the other. There are benefits, 401k matching, completely different taxes, etc etc etc

I have no freaking idea.



Jan 31, 2014 at 12:29 AM
sboerup
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p.1 #7 · p.1 #7 · How much did you earn last year from photography


This should be titled "how much did you pay yourself".


Jan 31, 2014 at 12:34 AM
TTLKurtis
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p.1 #8 · p.1 #8 · How much did you earn last year from photography


sboerup wrote:
This should be titled "how much did you pay yourself".


Even that is a weird number that doesn't really tell you the whole story because a lot of times the business buys things which are deductible... For tax-purposes you want to state as little income you pay yourself as possible, for things like business loans you want to show as much profit as possible...



Jan 31, 2014 at 12:41 AM
Robin Usagani
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p.1 #9 · p.1 #9 · How much did you earn last year from photography


TTLKurtis wrote:
Even that is a weird number that doesn't really tell you the whole story because a lot of times the business buys things which are deductible... For tax-purposes you want to state as little income you pay yourself as possible, for things like business loans you want to show as much profit as possible...


I know Kurtis... Does not matter how you word it, it is hard to do a poll for everyone. For example Spencer is selling bunch of magmod. He is probably putting a ton back to his company for his next project. Just answer the darn poll.. who cares if you are off .





Jan 31, 2014 at 12:49 AM
TTLKurtis
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p.1 #10 · p.1 #10 · How much did you earn last year from photography


I already answered on the last one. Gross sales ~80k 2013. I kept maybe half that, at most, probably 30% of it realistically after taxes, or less.


Jan 31, 2014 at 01:20 AM
TrailboyWales
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p.1 #11 · p.1 #11 · How much did you earn last year from photography


So why did the other thread get pulled? Did I miss something?


Jan 31, 2014 at 05:51 AM
Robin Usagani
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p.1 #12 · p.1 #12 · How much did you earn last year from photography


TrailboyWales wrote:
So why did the other thread get pulled? Did I miss something?


The range was not high enough.



Jan 31, 2014 at 09:21 AM
Inku Yo
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p.1 #13 · p.1 #13 · How much did you earn last year from photography


I'm an s-corp and I pay myself very little compared to gross sales.


Jan 31, 2014 at 09:28 AM
joelconner
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p.1 #14 · p.1 #14 · How much did you earn last year from photography


Inku Yo wrote:
I'm an s-corp and I pay myself very little compared to gross sales.


same here.



Jan 31, 2014 at 12:08 PM
Prettym1k3
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p.1 #15 · p.1 #15 · How much did you earn last year from photography


Nothing to hide here.

I'm a sole proprietor who is having his LLC docs. drafted up by an attorney as we speak. Should be getting my EIN number next week.

Made 96k last year (not including sales tax).

Had $20k in expenses.

Had another $4-5k in mileage write offs (drove about 9,000 miles).

We set aside $31k for taxes, just to play it save. Kinda' a forced savings account. But we have day jobs so we usually get bumped into a much higher tax bracket with the photography income.

96k - 20k expenses - 31k set aside for taxes left us with about 45k for things like childcare, vacation, home upgrades, car parts for me, surgery for my wife, etc.

I tell people, if they ask what I make, "Take whatever number you hear from my mouth, and cut it in half. That's what I make. Running your own business is expensive. Self employment taxes suck.

I anticipate 2014 to be a little lower, because last year we took many of our bookings in that year, so payments in full weren't spread out to 50% the prior year for retainer, and 50% the year of for final payment. 100% of the payments were in that year.

Although, we did take our pricing up a little, and are looking good for 2014, and have started to book for 2015.



Jan 31, 2014 at 12:11 PM
jcolman
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p.1 #16 · p.1 #16 · How much did you earn last year from photography


TTLKurtis wrote:
I already answered on the last one. Gross sales ~80k 2013. I kept maybe half that, at most, probably 30% of it realistically after taxes, or less.



Same here.




Jan 31, 2014 at 02:08 PM
thebeginning
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p.1 #17 · p.1 #17 · How much did you earn last year from photography


99k total revenue, ~62k take home after expenses and taxes


Jan 31, 2014 at 02:36 PM
Robin Usagani
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p.1 #18 · p.1 #18 · How much did you earn last year from photography


Bump


Feb 01, 2014 at 01:33 AM





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