The salary isn't the real cost
Most owners compare a developer's salary to a vendor quote. The real comparison is salary plus recruiting, time-to-hire, payroll overhead, and the months where nobody is shipping yet. That's the gap Webhouse is built for: internal tools, MVPs, replacing spreadsheets, and automations — without standing up a full recruiting pipeline for a role you may only need for one build phase.
Why timeline beats the line item
Two businesses have the same need — a dashboard, a workflow, a customer-facing product. One posts roles, screens candidates, and waits months for a hire to ramp. The other scopes with a team that ships in weeks. Same calendar window; completely different outcomes. On our homepage we say it plainly: most projects ship in 3–6 weeks for the right scope, not a multi-quarter hiring cycle before line one of code.
The calculator shows how expensive "waiting" is in money terms. The business case is usually time: the tool you need is funding waste, manual work, or missed revenue every week it doesn't exist.
What the defaults assume
The hiring side uses typical tech hiring benchmarks (calibrated in AUD): recruiting fees as a percent of first-year salary, a ramp where productivity climbs over months, overhead on top of base salary, and a turnover-risk buffer. None of that is universal — use "Edit assumptions" to match your market.
The Webhouse side assumes full output from week one: an AI-native team with senior engineers close to the work — no recruiting queue, no three-month ramp. That matches how we price most work: fixed quote, clear scope, weeks not quarters, aligned with our FAQ (about $5k–$30k AUD typical projects, many builds in the $10k–$50k AUD range depending on scope).
The number that actually matters
Whether you answer to investors or only to yourself, the useful metric is outcome per dollar and per week: a live tool, an automated process, a product customers can use. Headcount looks cheaper on a payroll report until you count the calendar. A shipped build looks better on a P&L when you measure what the business actually gained.
When your only developer leaves
The model doesn't bake in full replacement cost, but it's worth remembering. One departure can mean recruiting again, lost context, and months before the next person is effective. A project-based or retainer relationship with one accountable team avoids that single point of failure — and you're not carrying a salary when the build is done.
This isn't "never hire"
If you already have technical leadership, keep them. Webhouse is for when you need delivery capacity — design through launch — without hiring a bench to fill. You stay focused on the problem; we handle the build with the same plain-English, no-jargon approach we use on the homepage.