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Finder's Fee Calculator

Companies pay finders to save money. A fee makes sense when it's a small slice of what the problem costs the person who has it, and that's easier to say in a letter if you've worked the number out first.

This page does three pieces of arithmetic from The Un-Broker: the savings math behind a single fee, the comparison between a one-time fee and a continuing one, and a fee paid on every unit delivered. The defaults are the book's own illustrative numbers, not rates anyone should expect. Put in your own.

Step 1 · Chapter 3

The Savings Math

What does the problem cost the client, and how big is your fee next to it?

Kind of saving

Cost per week ($)

Weeks it lasts

Fee offered or asked ($)

Sale amount, optional ($)

What the problem costs$80,000

Your fee as a share of the problem

Your fee equals this many weeks of the problem1.0

What the client still saves after your fee$75,000

The client pays $5,000 to get out of an $80,000 problem.

The savings math behind Straw's bearing story, by his account. A production line is down for 16 weeks, and each idle week costs $5,000 in lost production, so the problem costs $80,000. The finder's fee offered was one week's loss, $5,000, about 6 percent of the problem. On the same dollar scale, the $80,000 bar towers over the $5,000 fee. Of the four kinds of savings (downtime, search labor, price and risk), this deal is downtime. The worn part turned out to be in stock, so Straw was never paid, but the offer still made sense. — The defaults above are Straw's bearing story, by his account: a line down for sixteen weeks at $5,000 a week, and a fee of one week's loss. The part turned out to be in stock, so he was never paid. The offer still made sense.

Step 2 · Chapters 13 and 21

One-Time Fee or Continuing Fee

The same introduction paid once at the first sale, or paid every month the customer stays.

One-time fee ($)

Continuing fee per month ($)

Months to compare

Customer leaves at month (0 = stays)

Customers introduced on these terms

One-time fee$1,200

Continuing fee, customer stays 24 months$2,400

Continuing fee, customer leaves at month 15$1,500

Continuing fee catches up at Month 12

One-time fee Continuing, customer stays Continuing, customer leaves

A continuing fee is only worth as much as the customer's staying, so it needs written terms: which customers count, what counts as revenue, the percentage, how long, how it's reported, and your right to see the numbers. Price it smaller per transaction than a one-time fee. Ask for it every time.

Cumulative income over 24 months from one introduction paid three ways, using illustrative round numbers rather than a projection. A one-time fee of $1,200 is paid at the first sale and stays flat. A continuing fee of $100 a month rises steadily to $2,400 by month 24, passing the one-time fee at month 12. The same monthly fee stops at $1,500 if the customer leaves at month 15. A continuing fee is only worth as much as the customer's staying, so it needs written terms; ask for it every time. — The book's version of this chart. The defaults are its round numbers, chosen to illustrate the shape, not to project anything.

Step 3 · Chapter 21

A Small Cut of Every Delivery

A fee per unit, paid for as long as the deliveries keep coming.

Fee per unit ($)

Units per day

Days per month

Years the contract runs

Per month$75,000

Per year$900,000

Over the contract$4,500,000

The defaults are the oilman from Straw's success stories, by his account: a quarter a barrel on ten thousand barrels a day, which he collected every month for five years. He'd spent his career in the oil business and knew exactly who to call. Crude oil is one of Straw's "exotics," a field for insiders and a favorite of advance-fee fraud. The arithmetic travels. The deal doesn't, unless you know the field cold.

Before You Use the Number

Who pays. Usually the seller, who receives the money and is used to paying commissions. Ask the seller, and accept what a buyer offers. Take money from both sides only with written disclosure to both.
Less than a commission. You introduced a buyer; the seller still has to sell. If a client asks you to name a fee, ask what sales commission is customary in their trade and let them offer something in line with it, less their own sales cost.
Mostly, the client sets the fee. They offer. You accept, decline to make the introduction, or counter with a reason you can say in one sentence.
Pin it down in writing. A dollar amount or a percentage, and a percentage of what (gross sale, net of shipping, first order only), plus the trigger, the period, and whether repeat business pays again. All of it before you disclose the name. The fee-letter checklist is in the reader kit.
Take the small fee. When the contact is already in your file, the next introduction costs a letter. A pound of feathers weighs as much as a pound of lead.

Where no fee is possible

Some fields need a license to be paid for introductions, and calling yourself a finder won't change that. The book treats these as off-limits: securities and raising money, loans and mortgages, real estate (get licensed or refer to a licensed agent and expect no fee), insurance, healthcare referrals (off-limits for everyone), real-estate settlement services, and government purchasing. Business brokerage and staffing depend on the state and the deal. Never take a secret commission on your own employer's purchases.

This is not legal advice. The rules vary by state and by the facts of a deal, and this calculator only does arithmetic. Near any of these fields, talk to a lawyer licensed where you live before you accept a dime. Fees are taxable income, too; ask a tax adviser how to handle them.

From The Un-Broker

This calculator follows The Un-Broker: A Finder's Playbook for the Age of AI by Bill Eisenhauer, from Toll Stack Press. The savings math is Chapter 3, who pays and how much is Chapter 13, the fee letter is Chapter 11, and the move from one-time fee to continuing fee is Chapter 21.

Get it on Kindle → Reader kit →

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