The short answer
Renting means a monthly fee that covers the site, the hosting, and usually a few small changes. It is easy to start and the meter never stops. Owning means paying for the build once, then paying to host it. At the monthly rates we see around here, the two lines cross inside the first two years - and after that one of them keeps climbing while the other flattens out. Renting is not a trick. It is a different deal, and the deal gets worse the longer you stay in it.
What renting looks like from the inside
Month one is genuinely good. You pay a hundred dollars or so, a site appears, and nobody asked you for thousands up front. Nothing about that is dishonest.
What changes is nothing at all. Year two costs the same as year one. So does year five. And because the site was never yours, none of what you paid is behind you - stop paying and it goes away.
Two clients who did this maths the hard way
Both of these are real, and both are anonymized to their category. What they were paying is their business, not ours - the numbers are here because they are the whole argument, and the names are not.
A trades business was renting its website at $100 a month, and had been for years. Price is not what pushed him out. Simple changes did - asking for the opening hours to be corrected, then waiting two to three weeks for it to happen. By his own reckoning he had paid about three times what a build with us would have cost. He owns the site now, hosts it with us for $15 a month, and when he needs one of those occasional changes we usually have it live before the end of that business day.
A professional services firm was renting at $430 a month, and had been for over four years. That is more than $20,000 paid out, and they did not own the website at the end of it. We rebuilt it for less than a tenth of what they had already spent.
Where the lines actually cross
Our builds typically start at $2,200. Set that against a rental and the crossover is not far out:
- At $100 a month, you have spent the price of a build in about 22 months
- At $250 a month, about nine months
- At $430 a month, about five months
After the crossover the owned site costs $15 a month to host, and the rented one costs whatever it always did. The gap does not narrow again.
When renting is genuinely the right call
Sometimes it is, and we will say so on the call.
- The business is brand new and you are still testing whether it works
- You need something online this week and cash is the binding constraint
- You expect to need the site for a year or less
- The alternative is honestly no website at all
If that is you, rent with your eyes open - and read the four questions below first, because they matter more when you are renting than when you are buying.
Four questions to ask before you sign anything
- Who is the domain registered to? It should be you, in your own account, always
- Do I own the website files, or am I licensing them for as long as I pay?
- What happens to the site the day I stop paying?
- How long does a simple change take - in writing, not in principle?
That last one is what actually moved the trades client. A price you knew about is survivable. Three weeks of waiting to correct your own opening hours is the thing that wears people down.
What owning it costs on our side
A from-the-ground-up build typically starts at $2,200 - SEO-first, with a real page for every service you offer. After launch you can host it with us for $15 a month on the set-and-forget plan. Updates, SSL and backups are handled there, because that is the baseline of keeping a site online rather than a premium add-on. If you want us in the site regularly, managed hosting is $55 a month and includes up to thirty minutes of support time.
And if the up-front number is the obstacle rather than the value, say so on the call. We have arrangements that have made a proper site workable for businesses that could not write one cheque for it - including matching what someone was already paying in rent and putting it toward a site they own. They are agreed case by case, and we will tell you honestly whether one fits.
Common questions
Do I own the website when you build it?
Yes. The site is yours - files, content and all. You can host it with us or take it elsewhere, and we hand over what the next person needs either way.
Isn't $2,200 more than $100 a month?
For the first 22 months, yes. After that the rented site keeps billing $100 and the owned one costs $15 a month to host. Most businesses keep a website far longer than two years.
What if I can't pay for a build all at once?
Ask us. We have arrangements that have made a proper site workable for businesses without the cash sitting there - agreed case by case, for established businesses. There is no published finance product and no promise here; there is a real conversation.
Can I move my rented website to you?
Usually you cannot move the site itself - that is what renting means. What does come with you is the domain, your Google Business Profile and your reviews. Keep those in your own name and you have lost far less than it feels like.
What does hosting cost after the build?
$15 a month for set-and-forget hosting - right if you need us a few times a year - or $55 a month managed, which includes up to thirty minutes of support time.