Industry & Market Data
Home Service Trades Compared (2026)
We compared 6 home-service trades on business count, employment, pay, and solo share using U.S. Census data, about 2,403,673 businesses and 4,297,143 jobs in all. Electrical pays the most; Cleaning has the most solo operators; HVAC & Plumbing employs the most people.
By Ihor Lavrenenko · Founder, Smarfle CRM
Published June 24, 2026 · Data current as of 2023
6
Trades compared
2,403,673
Total businesses
Electrical
Highest paying
Cleaning
Most solo
Key findings
- Electrical pays the most at about $76,545/year, roughly 2.5x what Cleaning pays ($30,089). The skilled, licensed trades sit at the top.
- Cleaning is 94% solo operators, the most of any trade, while Pest Control is only 49% solo (the most employer-based).
- Cleaning has the most businesses (1,163,726), but HVAC & Plumbing employs the most people (1,214,761) because it has fewer but larger firms.
- Across the 6 trades there are about 2,403,673 businesses and 4,297,143 jobs.
- Pattern: higher pay tracks with lower solo share. Trades that require licensing and crews (Electrical, HVAC & Plumbing) pay more; easy-entry trades (Cleaning, Carpet Cleaning) pay less and are far more crowded.
The trades, side by side
Sort by any column. Trade names link to the full state-by-state study where one exists.
| Electrical | 243,035 | 66% | 1,015,983 | $76,545 | $63,190 |
| HVAC & Plumbing | 289,870 | 62% | 1,214,761 | $73,693 | $62,405 |
| Pest Control | 32,672 | 49% | 139,150 | $53,466 | $45,250 |
| Landscaping | 634,541 | 81% | 802,899 | $51,286 | $39,150 |
| Carpet Cleaning | 39,829 | 83% | 36,157 | $40,900 | $44,040 |
| Cleaning | 1,163,726 | 94% | 1,088,193 | $30,089 | $36,840 |
Which trade pays the most?
Census industry average pay (payroll divided by employment across all roles at firms in the trade), by trade.
Two ways to read pay. The chart above is the Census industry average (everyone at firms in the trade). The table also shows the BLS occupation median wage, the pay for that specific job. The two can differ a lot: cleaning’s Census average ($30,089) sits below the BLS janitor median ($36,840) because part-time payroll drags the industry average down, while electrical runs the other way. HVAC and Plumbing is shown as the average of the plumber and HVAC occupation medians.
Which trade has the most solo operators?
Share of businesses that are one-person firms with no employees, a proxy for barrier to entry and competition.
Which trade has the most businesses?
What this means if you are choosing a trade
The clearest pattern in the data is a trade-off between how easy a business is to start and how much it pays. Cleaning and Carpet Cleaning have the lowest barrier to entry, which is exactly why they are the most crowded and the lowest paid. The licensed trades, Electrical and HVAC & Plumbing, pay close to double, but they require training, certification, and usually a crew.
Whatever the trade, the businesses that pull ahead are not the ones that work the most jobs, they are the ones that run cleanest: estimates that go out the same day, scheduling and dispatch that keep crews moving, and invoicing with online payment so the cash does not sit in accounts receivable. That is where a CRM built for the trades earns its keep.
CRM for home services
Scheduling, dispatch, recurring billing, and online payments, built for the trades, whichever one you run.
See howBest states for home services
See where these trades are concentrated, ranked across all 50 states.
Read the studyGo deeper on a single trade
Full state-by-state breakdowns: Electrician, Landscaping, Cleaning, and Pest Control.
Methodology
For each trade, total businesses = employer establishments (County Business Patterns) plus nonemployer firms (Nonemployer Statistics). Average pay = annual payroll divided by employment at employer firms (an industry average across all roles, not a single occupation wage). National (U.S.) totals. Each trade is a NAICS where the CBP 6-digit code maps 1:1 to the NES 5-digit code. HVAC and plumbing share NAICS 238220 and cannot be separated in this dataset.
Employer vs. nonemployer: County Business Patterns counts businesses with paid employees; Nonemployer Statistics counts owner-operator firms with none. We sum both for total businesses, and solo share is the nonemployer portion.
Pay: average annual pay is Census employer-firm annual payroll divided by employment, an industry average across all roles at each kind of firm, not a single occupation wage. Caveats: figures are establishments and firms, not companies. We include only trades whose CBP 6-digit code maps one-to-one to the NES 5-digit code; HVAC and plumbing share NAICS 238220 and are reported together. Roofing, painting, and flooring are excluded because the two datasets aggregate them differently.
Occupation wage: alongside the Census industry average we show the BLS Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) median wage for each trade’s representative occupation (e.g. Electricians 47-2111, Pest Control Workers 37-2021). HVAC and Plumbing is the average of the plumber (47-2152) and HVAC (49-9021) occupation medians, since Census reports those two trades together.
Source
U.S. Census Bureau County Business Patterns (2023) and Nonemployer Statistics (2023).
Programs: Census County Business Patterns, Nonemployer Statistics, BLS OEWS.
Frequently asked questions
Which home-service trade pays the most?+
Electrical has the highest average pay at about $76,545 per year, followed by HVAC & Plumbing ($73,693). The skilled, licensed trades pay the most; Cleaning pays the least at about $30,089. These are industry averages across all roles at each kind of firm, not single-occupation wages.
Which trade has the most solo operators?+
Cleaning is the most solo-dominated at 94% one-person firms, followed by Carpet Cleaning (83%). The lowest is Pest Control at 49%, meaning it has the most businesses with employees. High solo share signals a low barrier to entry and heavy competition.
Which is the biggest home-service trade?+
By number of businesses, Cleaning is the largest at 1,163,726. By number of jobs, HVAC & Plumbing employs the most at 1,214,761 (it has fewer but larger firms). Across the 6 trades we compared, there are about 2,403,673 businesses and 4,297,143 jobs.
Which home-service business is best to start?+
It depends on your goal. For the lowest barrier to entry, Cleaning and Carpet Cleaning need little capital and no license in most states, but pay is low and competition is fierce. For the highest earning potential, the licensed trades (Electrical, HVAC & Plumbing) pay far more but require training and certification. In every trade, the operators who win are the ones who systematize estimating, scheduling, and getting paid.
Why are roofing, painting, and flooring not included?+
We only include trades where the Census employer code (County Business Patterns) maps cleanly one-to-one to the solo-operator code (Nonemployer Statistics), so the totals are apples-to-apples. Roofing, painting, and flooring aggregate differently between the two datasets, so they are excluded to keep the comparison accurate. HVAC and plumbing share one Census code (238220) and are reported together.
Where does this data come from?+
U.S. Census Bureau: County Business Patterns (2023) for employer establishments, employment, and payroll, and Nonemployer Statistics (2023) for solo firms. National totals. See the methodology below.
Cite this study
Free to reference with a link back. Please credit Smarfle Research as the source.
Ihor Lavrenenko (2026). Home Service Trades Compared. Smarfle Research. https://www.smarfle.com/small-business-statistics/home-service-trades-compared
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