How to Start a TV Mounting Business

How do you start a TV mounting business from zero to your first paid job?

Pick your service area, register the business, buy a tool kit, get general liability insurance, set flat prices, then book your first paid mount from friends, neighbors, or a local Facebook group.

None of this takes months. The paperwork is a week of evenings. What actually takes time is getting your hands on three different walls: drywall over wood studs, brick or block, and one full-motion arm where the TV swings out and the cable has to survive the travel. Do those three free, for people who will forgive a patched hole, before anyone pays you.

• Practice on real walls first. Drywall over 16 inch on-center studs, then brick or block, then an above-fireplace job. Learn how each one behaves before money is involved.
• Register the business with your state. Fees run $50 to $500 depending on where you live, and most cities add a general business license of about $50 to $100 a year.
• Buy the tool kit. Plan on $500 to $1,200 for professional-grade gear: a cordless hammer drill, a good stud finder, and a level are the three that matter most.
• Get general liability insurance before the first paid job. A one-person operation in this class runs about $40 to $80 a month, often at $1 million per occurrence and $2 million aggregate limits.
• Check whether your state licenses low voltage work. Hanging a bracket is usually fine. Running cable inside a wall is where a license can be required.
• Set flat prices, not hourly. Write down a base mount price, a size upcharge, and a fixed add-on price for wire concealment so you never have to guess on the phone.
• Claim your Google Business Profile and load it with photos of your own installs: the wide shot, and a close-up of where the cable exits the wall. People pick an installer off the photos.
• Book the first paid job, then ask that customer for a review and one referral before you leave the driveway.

What does it cost to start a TV mounting business?

Plan on $1,500 to $3,000 to open without a vehicle. Tools take $500 to $1,200 of that. General liability insurance runs $40 to $80 a month, plus registration fees.

That $1,500 to $3,000 does not include a truck or van. Most people start with the car they already own, because a mount, a bracket, and a tool bag fit in a back seat. Add a vehicle when route density justifies it, not before. If you do need to borrow, SBA microloans top out at $50,000 and service startups typically take about $10,000, which is far more than this trade needs.

Reggie opens at the low end of that band. A $550 drill, stud finder, level and driver set. $200 in lags, snap toggles, in-wall rated cable and recessed boxes. $250 of bracket stock so he can sell the mount instead of sending people back to the store. $200 for a ladder, drop cloths and a shop vac. $40 for his first month of liability, $100 to register with the state, $60 for the city license, and $100 of flyers and printed price sheets. That is $1,500 exactly, and seven jobs at the $249 average clear it with $243 left over.

What licensing does a TV mounting business actually need?

There is no national TV mounting license and hanging a bracket is usually unlicensed. Running cable inside a wall can trigger a state low voltage license, with exam and fees around $150 to $400.

No certification is required to hang a TV. The license question is only ever about what happens inside the wall. Rules vary by state and often by city or county, so check both before you quote. The trigger is almost never the bracket. It is pulling cable through a wall cavity, which counts as low voltage or limited energy work in some states, or crossing a dollar threshold that makes the job contracting work.

Florida, California, and Georgia run comprehensive statewide low voltage licensing. Texas and New York use a mix of state rules plus local permits. Colorado and several Midwest states leave it mostly to cities and counties. In Florida the authority is the state electrical contractors licensing board. In Georgia the low voltage rules sit in Rule 121-2-.04. Call your state board and your city clerk. Ten minutes on the phone beats a stop-work order.

• Low voltage license exam and fees: about $150 to $400 where a license is required.
• General liability is the coverage that actually matters day to day. Handyman-class averages land near $55 to $67 a month, and about 41 percent of buyers pay $35 to $55 a month.
• A common policy is $1 million per occurrence and $2 million aggregate with a $500 deductible.
• TV mounting sits at the lower-risk end of this class. Roofing, electrical, and plumbing push premiums much higher.
• If a job needs a new outlet behind the TV rather than a recessed power kit, that is an electrician's work in every state. Sub it out and mark it up.

What should you charge for TV mounting?

Most independents charge a flat $150 to $400 per TV with the bracket billed separately. A 55 inch tilt mount runs $119 to $149. Add $150 to $300 for wire concealment.

Marcus quotes a 55 inch tilt mount over drywall at $149 and adds in-wall concealment at $200, so the invoice is $349 with the customer supplying the bracket. He is on the wall two hours and drives fifteen minutes each way, so $349 across two and a half hours door to door is about $140 an hour. Bill that same job at the published $75 to $100 installer hourly rate and the two on-site hours pay $150 to $200. The clock would have cost him $149 to $199 for identical work, and it would have punished him every time he got faster.

The national average TV mounting job is about $249, with a typical range of $150 to $348. A second source puts the average band at $153 to $353. Use $249 as your planning number for a mixed week of work.

Never quote a firm price before you know three things: the TV size and weight, the wall type, and whether they want the wires hidden. Ask for a photo of the wall in the text thread and a second photo of the outlet. Brick, a mantel, or an outlet six feet from where the TV is going all change the job.

How do you get your first TV mounting customers?

Work the places people already ask: local Facebook groups, Nextdoor, and Google Business Profile. Ask every customer for a review and a referral. Flyers near new apartment builds and furniture stores work too.

Judge a marketing spend by how many mounts it takes to break even. Dana prints and walks $300 of flyers, roughly a thousand doors at thirty cents each, through two new apartment complexes and a townhome block. Two jobs at the $249 average bring back $498, which clears the $300 by $198. Three make it $747, a gain of $447. So the only question worth asking is whether a thousand doors of new move-ins can produce two TV mounts. If they can, run it again next month one neighborhood over.

Local partnerships beat ads early on. Furniture stores, TV retailers, moving companies, apartment leasing offices, and interior designers all meet people who just bought a 65 inch and have nowhere to put it. Leave photos of your own walls, a card, and a flat price sheet at each counter.

• Google Business Profile with 15 to 20 photos of your own work, not stock images.
• Answer local Facebook group posts within the hour. Speed wins these jobs more than price does.
• Text a review link the same day, while the customer is still standing in front of a clean install.
• Offer a repeat rate to movers and property managers who can send you several TVs a month.
• Photograph every finished wall from the same angle. That library becomes your entire ad account.

What tools and equipment do you need for TV mounting?

A cordless hammer drill, a multi-scan stud finder, a cross line laser level, socket and lag driver bits, snap toggles, fish tape, and drop cloths. Budget $500 to $1,200 for the kit.

Spend the money on the drill, the stud finder, and the level. Everything else is replaceable in an afternoon. A cheap stud finder is how a 70 inch ends up hanging on drywall alone, and that is the failure that ends a business, not a scratched baseboard.

What should the first 90 days look like?

Weeks one and two: register, insure, and set prices. Weeks three to six: get paid jobs and reviews. Weeks seven to twelve: raise prices, add wire concealment, and start repeat commercial work.

Do not move to the next phase until the current one produces its proof. If a customer texts you a photo of a brick fireplace wall and you stall on the number, you are still in weeks one and two no matter what the calendar says.

What mistakes kill new TV mounting businesses?

Quoting before you know the wall type, pricing by the hour instead of flat, promising a price that secretly excludes the bracket, skipping liability insurance, and racing the $89 platforms to the bottom.

Three of these will cost you a TV or a wall once. The rest bleed you every single week until you rewrite the price sheet, which is why the quoting mistakes are the expensive ones.

• Quoting sight unseen. Brick, stone, concrete, metal studs, and above-fireplace jobs all take longer. Get a photo before you name a number.
• Not confirming the mount is rated above the TV weight and that the VESA pattern matches. That check takes 30 seconds off the two boxes and prevents the worst outcome in this trade.
• Drilling into a cavity without checking for electrical, plumbing, or gas first. The wall above a fireplace and the wall behind a kitchen are the two that bite.
• Hanging heavy TVs on drywall anchors instead of lagging into stud centers.
• Quoting a flat price and then surprising the customer that the bracket costs extra. Say it in the first message, the way the big platforms do.
• Running a standard power cord inside a wall instead of in-wall rated cable and a proper recessed power kit.
• Charging by the hour. You get punished for getting faster, which is exactly backwards.
• Competing with $89 entry prices from national platforms. You cannot win there and you do not need to.
• Working without general liability at $40 to $80 a month. One cracked screen costs many times a year of premium.
• Leaving dust and packaging behind. In a referral trade, cleanup is marketing.

Is a TV mounting business worth it?

The average job is about $249 and the flat rate excludes the bracket, so a ticket is nearly pure labor. Costs are low, but volume depends entirely on how well you market.

Do the arithmetic yourself instead of trusting an income claim. Two jobs a day at the $249 national average is $498 a day. Four working days a week is $1,992 a week. Against that sit real costs: $40 to $80 a month in liability insurance, $50 to $100 a year for the local license, fuel, and tool replacement. The costs are small and mostly fixed, which is the whole appeal of this trade. The hard part is not the margin, it is booking those two jobs every day.

No reliable published figure exists for first-year owner-operator revenue in this trade, so treat any number you see as a guess. The ticket is the part that holds up: $150 to $348 typical, about $249 average, and $150 to $400 flat for a standard install with the bracket billed separately.

The growth path is add-ons and repeat accounts, not more mounts. Wire concealment adds $150 to $300 to a visit you already drove to. Above-fireplace work adds the same. Bars, gyms, and offices put several screens on one trip, which is where a second installer starts to make sense.

How do you price against Geek Squad and HelloTech?

Do not match their price. Geek Squad charges $179.99 for a 56 to 90 inch basic mount and bills separately for weekends, brackets, and wire work. Sell speed, tidiness, and no surprises.

The national players anchor the low end, from $89 at HelloTech to $179.99 at Geek Squad for larger sets, while independents sit at $150 to $400 flat. Independents price above the platforms on purpose. The platforms hit that entry number by stripping out the bracket, wire concealment, and non-drywall surfaces as upcharges, and they add about $25 for weekends and holidays.

So your pitch is not cheaper. It is one person who shows up when he said, quotes the whole job up front including the wall type, hides the wires, and leaves nothing behind. Geek Squad backs its workmanship 90 days, so say your own warranty out loud and say your total out loud before you start. That alone beats a booking flow that surprises people at the door.