Full disclosure up front: we sell websites for pressure washing contractors, and we charge a build fee plus a small monthly plan. We used to sell sites as a pure one time payment with free hosting forever, so we know that pitch from the inside. Read everything below knowing that. The math is still the math, and the ownership questions apply to anyone you buy from, including us.
The short answer
THE SHORT ANSWER
One time is mostly a myth
Somebody always pays for hosting, SSL, backups, security updates and the domain. The only real questions are how big the recurring number is, what it actually buys, and who owns the site when you stop paying.
Most contractor websites are sold one of three ways. A pure subscription where you own nothing and the site disappears when you cancel. A large project fee from an agency, usually with a care or hosting plan on top. Or a modest build fee plus a small monthly plan. Very few sites are genuinely one time, and the ones that are usually mean nobody is maintaining anything.
The catch in 'one time'
Hosting, SSL renewal, security patching, backups and the domain registration are ongoing real costs. They do not stop because the invoice said 'one time.' A site sold as one time with nothing behind it tends to break, go stale, or quietly expire, and you find out when a customer tells you your site is down.
We used to sell exactly that model, one payment with free hosting forever. We stopped, because 'free hosting forever' means either the company eats the cost until it cannot, or the maintenance simply never happens. Neither ends well for the contractor. So when you read a one time pitch from anyone, ask who is paying for the server in year three and what their incentive is to pick up the phone when something breaks.
The flip side is just as true. When a provider charges a serious monthly fee 'for hosting and security,' most of that fee is margin, not servers. Hosting a small business site costs very little at scale. The honest monthly number is a small one that covers real maintenance, not a three figure one that covers the provider's growth targets.
The three questions that actually matter
Forget the label on the model. Before you sign with any provider, us included, get plain answers to these in writing:
- How much is the recurring number? Not the teaser rate, the real one. A $49 first-year rate that becomes $149 is a $149 site.
- What does it include, specifically? Hosting, SSL, backups, security updates, the domain, edits. If the answer is vague, the plan is too.
- What happens to the site, the domain and the content if you stop paying? If the site goes offline and there is nothing to take with you, you were renting. If you keep the domain, the content and the code, you own the asset even if it needs a new host.
- Who owns the domain? It should be registered to you, in your name. If the provider owns your domain, they own your phone number's best friend.
A provider with good answers will give them fast. A provider that dodges these questions just answered them.
The 3-year math
Run the numbers on the common models. The provider and agency examples are illustrative price points chosen to show the structure, not quotes from any specific company. The WasherAuthority rows are our real current pricing, build fee plus the Site Care Plan. Plug in whatever you were actually quoted.
| Model | Year 1 | 3-year total |
|---|---|---|
| $99/month managed provider (example) | $1,188 | $3,564 |
| $249/month 'all-in' plan (example) | $2,988 | $8,964 |
| $3,000 agency build plus $50/mo hosting (example) | $3,600 | $4,800 |
| $6,000 agency build plus $100/mo care plan (example) | $7,200 | $9,600 |
| WasherAuthority Authority, build fee plus Site Care | $1,347 | $2,043 |
One thing we will not claim: that we are cheaper than a DIY builder subscription. We are not. A builder at roughly $29 a month lands near $1,044 over three years, which is less than our Starter all in. Against DIY you are paying us the difference to build it, maintain it, and hand you a site you actually own, instead of spending your own evenings inside a template editor. Against a managed provider or an agency, the math above is the whole argument.
When monthly actually makes sense
Monthly is legitimate when there is monthly labor. Someone actively managing your Google ads, building new city and service pages, writing content, and working your rankings every month is a real service with real hours in it, and it should cost money every month. That is marketing, and it is separate from the small maintenance cost of keeping a site hosted, patched and backed up.
The problem is bundles that staple a big marketing promise to the website itself so you cannot own one without renting the other. Buy the site with a plan that covers real maintenance. Buy ongoing marketing separately, from whoever earns it, for as long as they keep earning it. Then firing your marketer does not mean losing your website.
How we price it, for comparison
Our model is a one time build fee plus the Site Care Plan. Starter is $299 for a one-page site. Pro is $499 with quote forms, a gallery, and local SEO. Authority is $999 for a multipage build with dedicated service pages, service area pages, and advanced SEO.
Then the Site Care Plan is $29/month, or $290/year which is two months free, the same on every tier, with the first 30 days included. It covers hosting, SSL certificate, domain registration, daily backups, security and software updates, uptime monitoring, unlimited content edits, instant lead alerts by text and email, and support by text.
If you cancel, the site is unpublished, but you keep the domain, the content and the site code, and you can host it elsewhere. It was yours the whole time. That is the difference between a purchase with a running cost and a rental, and it is the whole pitch.
Whatever you buy and whoever you buy it from, get the ownership answers in writing first. That one habit protects you from every bad version of every model.
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