Wix, Squarespace, or hire someone?

A site builder like Wix or Squarespace is the right call if you enjoy the work, you have fifteen to thirty hours to spend on it, and you'll keep the site up yourself afterward. Hiring someone is the right call if you'd rather be on a job, you want it live in a week, and you want the site to be yours to take with you. Neither is wrong. The builders are good tools, the trade sites built on them are often fine, and the honest comparison is about your time, the cost over three years, and who owns what at the end. This is that comparison, with the numbers we can stand behind.

• You like this kind of work and you'll actually finish it
• The business is new enough that a plain site, live this month, beats a better one in March
• You want to change the page yourself every week without waiting on anyone
• The budget really is zero for now, and you understand the monthly fee is coming
• The site is a placeholder while the Google listing and the truck do the real work

If most of those are true, build it. Pick the plainest template, put the phone number at the top, type the services and the towns, add six real photos, and publish before you're happy with it. Then read the rest of this so you know what it costs and what to watch.

The free plan is free the way a free puppy is. On Wix, the free tier puts Wix's own ads on your page and gives you an address that ends in their name; the paid plans remove both, and the current prices are on their plans page (opens in a new tab). Squarespace has no free tier past the trial; the plans and what each includes are on their pricing page (opens in a new tab). Both prices change, so we don't print them here. What we'll say is that a paid plan with your own domain is a monthly fee for as long as the site is up, plus the domain's yearly renewal, plus your hours. Multiply the monthly number by thirty-six before you compare it to a one-time build.

Then add the evenings. A first site on a builder takes most people fifteen to thirty hours: learning the editor, fighting the template on a phone screen, writing the words, resizing photos. That's not wasted time if you enjoy it. It's a week of evenings you don't get back if you don't.

Most of the DIY trade sites we see were started in January and never finished. The template is picked, the home page is half done, the phone number is still the placeholder, and it's been that way since spring. The second failure is the template look: three stock photos, a hero image of a handshake, and copy that could be any company in any town. The third is the phone screen. The template looked fine on the laptop and the number is below the fold on a phone, which is where every customer is. None of these are the builder's fault. They're what happens when the site is the last thing on the list.

A site built inside a builder lives inside the builder. The domain can be yours, and it should be; make sure you register it in your own name and not through a reseller you can't get into. But the site itself is made of their editor. If you leave, you take the domain and the words and the photos, and you rebuild the page somewhere else. That's fine for a one-page trade site, which is a day's work to rebuild. It's worth knowing before you spend thirty hours on a five-page one. What you should own covers the logo side of the same question.

• You'd rather spend the evenings on the business or at home
• You want the site live in a week and done, not in progress
• You want it built for a phone first, with the number where the thumb is
• You want someone to handle the domain, the hosting and the edits so you never think about it
• You want the site to be yours to move: the files, the source and the domain in your name

Here a one-page site is $100, plus $50 for its local SEO, paid once. That's less than a year on most paid builder plans, and you keep the evenings. The monthly side looks about the same either way: a builder bills its plan, and Afterburn is $50 a month for hosting, the domain and two edits. What a website costs goes through each price point.

1. 01

   Whose name is the domain in?

   Yours, renewing on your card. A designer who registers it in their name owns your address. The builder gets this right if you buy the domain yourself; make sure the designer does too.

2. 02

   Do I get the files and the source?

   The site as it runs, the source it's built from, and the logo files if they made one. On a builder the honest answer is no, the site lives there. From a designer it should be yes, in writing.

3. 03

   What happens when I stop paying?

   On a builder, the site goes down when the plan lapses. With a designer on a monthly plan, ask whether the site stays up and stays yours if you cancel. Ours does: stop Afterburn by email and the site is still yours.

Build the site yourself and hire out the two things a builder can't do. A logo that works in one color on the truck and the shirt, which is Spark at $150. And the Google Business Profile, which is where most local searches actually end, set up properly for $75. That's $225. Ignition adds the one-page site and its SEO for $150 more, so at these prices most owners skip the builder. If you'd still rather write your own page, the middle path works: the DIY page has a real logo on it and the listing is sending people to it, and if the page never gets finished, the listing still works. Setting up the listing yourself is a guide too.

A website is $100 a page, so a one-page site is $100 and a five-page site is $500. Local SEO is $50 a page on top. Ignition, at $375, is the logo, the one-page site with its SEO and the Google Business Profile setup together, with the first month of Afterburn included. After that, Afterburn is month to month: $50 a month covers hosting, the domain and two edits a month. $75 a month is the same plus more bandwidth and two Google posts. $100 a month is the $75 plan plus the most bandwidth and replies to your Google reviews. The domain is in your name, and you own the files and the site. The price sheet has every line.

A ONE-PAGE SITE IS $100 ON THE SHEET. SPARK IS $150. GOOGLE BUSINESS PROFILE SETUP IS $75. IGNITION IS $375 FOR ALL THREE, WITH THE SEO.

If you've already started a builder site, send the link and we'll tell you honestly whether to finish it or start over; sometimes the answer is finish it. Otherwise: the business name, the phone number you answer, the towns, the services, whatever logo you have, and six phone photos of the truck and the work. It all runs by email, and you get a price and a date back.