Hey everyone - for those of you who have hosted multi-day shoots in your home, how are you setting your rates? Especially if you need to be put up in a hotel, so you’re being inconvenienced by not living in your house during that time – are you basing your rate on the number of hours they’re shooting each day? Or the number of hours they actually have your house (e.g. 24 hours/day for X days)? We have a couple of potential multi-day shoots coming up and I want to be sure we’re not going too low but also being reasonable. Thanks!
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I’m a business. For multi-day bookings where they leave their stuff overnight, we charge up to 11 pm when we close, then start charging again based on what time they want to begin shooting again in the morning.
Since this is your house, figure in the cost of a hotel and meals since you can’t cook at home, and make that your overnight rental surcharge.
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I only charge for the hours they’re on-site, but I run a studio.
If it was my home, I would charge a fee to cover the inconvenience of being put out. However, I think a lot of producers might balk at that. Depends on the scale and quality of the production company.
I run a studio like Geoff and am in total agreement with what he said. We’re also a production company ourselves and if we rented someone’s actual house overnight and not a studio, I would absolutely expect to pay a fee to cover their expenses. I’d wouldn’t even really balk at a studio that wanted to add-on a storage/overnight fee for housing my gear… they’re not a warehouse. Plus, generally a home is cheaper to rent than a studio so even with the add on, it still might not cost them as much as a studio for 2 days. I’d be a little leery of a crew if they tried to fight that.
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Then there is reality…
I also have a house, it’s rare that I can’t sleep at home, even when there is a shoot, but that’s my personal choice. I usually charge for the time the crew is in the house, and if it’s a generous fee, then I don’t necessarily charge to leave equipment. HOWEVER, I do ask that equipment gets organized, and not left randomly, and I usually ask that camera equipment gets taken off property, so as not to deal with the possibility of theft. Sometimes I ask that the guests sign a waiver for whatever they leave, as you would not want to be responsible for their equipment. Crews tend to leave lighting ballasts and chargers plugged in, this can lead to an overload of power, and even a fire hazard, so I do ask that most equipment gets unplugged, and with the exception of some battery packs, I prefer the house is treated like a house, and not a photo, or film studio.
I do charge fairly high fees for my house, so if crews are doing 12 hour days, I don’t think surcharges are always necessary…but there are occasions when documentary shoots have multiple days, but short hours, in that case I do ask for a day rate, as opposed to an hourly rate. I think a hotel is appropriate, if you need one.
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