Author Topic: Electrical Engineering Consultant company as a side gig?  (Read 1308 times)

Mr.GrowingMustache

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Electrical Engineering Consultant company as a side gig?
« on: February 14, 2018, 09:51:11 AM »
Hi,
My friend and I are electrical engineers with 8 and 10 years professional experience (mostly electronics, and project management) and we have have done a lot of DIY stuff in our houses. I also summer interned for a Consulting company that marked up the wiring runs, and my friend has done several engineering drawings for his house that needed a PE signature and has saved himself a few grand. We are still employed but we have been talking about a consulting company as a side gig.

My friend is going for his PE license and we are fairly confident that we can Learn the Electrical code book, local codes and eventually do some consulting residential work. We won't be looking to setup some major business here, perhaps something that can eventually generate 10-15k each per year. This might takes a few years to setup and get going.

Does anyone here have experience doing this? Any tips, pointers, research material, or first steps suggestions would be appreciated.

BiggerFishToFI

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Re: Electrical Engineering Consultant company as a side gig?
« Reply #1 on: February 19, 2018, 10:42:14 AM »
One thing I don't see you mention is insurance. Around here that would cost ~$500-$750 / month for a 1-2 PE consulting firm. As a side gig this could eat a lot of your profits.

Also, I'd really recommend trying to find more of a niche than residential electrical design (hint: industrial/complex commercial i.e. water treatment, mining, food processing, oil/gas, manufacturing, hospitals, schools etc. is where the $$$ is at). Most residential stuff is so cookie cutter it will be hard to compete at a decent rate. Many residential EE firm price per job are very low because they can pump out designs in a couple of hours.

Expect to be able to bill from $120/hr on the low end to $200/hr on the high end.

Source: I'm a EE PE :-)
« Last Edit: February 19, 2018, 10:45:52 AM by BiggerFishToFI »