Designers, developers, writers, marketers. Scope the project, send a proposal they sign on their phone, and collect the deposit before the work starts. No more unpaid "quick calls."
Everything below is included or one tap away, no modules, no add-on pricing, no sales calls.
"Five-page site, logo refresh, monthly maintenance." Describe the project and the AI drafts priced line items in YOUR rates, ready to check and send. (Pro & Crew)
The client signs the proposal with your terms right above their signature. When the project grows, that signed scope is your best friend.
Ask for a percent or a fixed amount at signing. The project starts when the deposit lands, which is the oldest freelancer rule there is.
Monthly retainers invoice themselves, and with a card on file they pay themselves too. You get a "paid" email instead of an awkward reminder to write.
"Can we also add a blog?" One tap adds a priced change order the client signs. The answer to scope creep is paperwork, not resentment.
You get an email the moment the client opens the proposal, and the app shows "Opened, not signed yet" so you know exactly when to follow up.
Three steps between the scope call and the money.
Deliverables, timeline, rate. Type it or talk it, on Pro and Crew the AI drafts priced line items in YOUR rates.
The client opens a clean link, signs the scope, and pays the deposit, card or bank.
Milestone invoices carry pay links, retainers bill themselves, and reminders chase the money. We never touch your funds.
Freelance tools tend to come in two flavors: invoicing apps that treat the proposal as an afterthought, and proposal platforms priced like you bill enterprise rates. SayEstimate does the whole loop, scope, signature, deposit, milestones, retainer, final invoice, for less than a coffee run a month. The client experience is one clean link on their phone: read the scope, sign it, pay the deposit, done.
Open alerts tell you the moment a proposal gets read, automatic follow-ups nudge the quiet ones, and reminders chase overdue invoices so you never have to write that email again. Plans start at $9.99 a month with a 14-day free trial and no credit card to start. Six languages, English and Español both included, on your side and your client's.
Freelancers price hourly, per project, or on retainer, and most healthy businesses use all three at different stages. Hourly is where everyone starts, but it caps your income at your calendar and makes every invoice a negotiation about time. Project pricing is the step up: you price the outcome, and getting faster raises your effective rate instead of cutting your invoice. The rule of thumb is to estimate your hours honestly, add a buffer for revisions, and multiply by a rate that covers the untracked work, the calls, the emails, the file hunting, that hourly billing never captures.
Retainers are where a freelance business gets stable: a fixed monthly amount for a defined bucket of work, invoiced automatically on the first, paid by the card on file. The proposal should define what the retainer covers, what rolls over, and what costs extra. And every project proposal, whatever the pricing model, should carry a deposit, a revision limit, and a written change process, because the difference between a pro and a pushover is usually one signed page.
SayEstimate drafts the scoped, priced proposal from a plain-language description on Pro and Crew, collects the deposit at signature, and runs the retainers on autopilot. Prefer a template? The free estimate template is here.
Handymen · Cleaning businesses · General contractors, or any of the 22 trades that send estimates and want to get paid.
14 days free · No credit card to start · From $9.99/mo after · Cancel anytime
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