
Offer HN: I will build your MVP for $2,500 in two weeks - rankam
Hi HN - this has been a number a times and I thought I&#x27;d give it a shot as I love developing web apps and would like to build up my portfolio. I will build a fully functional MVP in two weeks for $2,500. I&#x27;m experienced in flask, django, rails, and meteor and will let you choose which framework I use if that is important to you. On the front-end, I will use either Bootstrap or Materializecss - again your choice if you have a preference.<p>Here&#x27;s the catch (there&#x27;s always one), I don&#x27;t have any work to show you, but I will mitigate your risk by delivering your MVP before expecting any payment. Prior to beginning work, we will agree upon a due date and functionality - when I meet both of these requirements, only then will I expect payment.<p>Linkedin and email info are both in my profile. Hope to hear from you!
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kellros
Some words of advice:

\- Watch this video: [http://creativemornings.com/talks/mike-monteiro--
2/1](http://creativemornings.com/talks/mike-monteiro--2/1)

\- Have a contract that stipulates what will be delivered and when, when
payment is due etc. See this: [http://www.docracy.com/topic/1e6bi5l90z/open-
source-legal-do...](http://www.docracy.com/topic/1e6bi5l90z/open-source-legal-
documents-for-developers?startPdfDownload=false)

\- Ask a hefty _penalty_ amount for signing non-disclosure agreements (NDA's)
- this is crucial for short term contract work

\- Charge more. Figure out your hourly rate and average hours per day and
extrapolate that out to a weekly rate. I reckon a fair amount is $50 an hour,
while still staying very competitive with other software shops. See:
[http://internationalfreelancersacademy.com/why-you-should-
ch...](http://internationalfreelancersacademy.com/why-you-should-charge-
more-2/)

\- Be honest in what you can and can't do. Advise your client to contract out
such work, whether it's designing the look and feel, designing logos or write
content. Figure out or develop an advantage over other service offerings.
Specialization is of key importance in consulting/freelancing work.

\- Beware of overly stingy or difficult clients - it's sometimes necessary to
fire them!

~~~
cgabios
Working with clients that are savvy enough to do _milestone based-work_ rather
than _hourly work_ is another filter that hasn't failed me yet.

~~~
kellros
I guess it depends on how averse you are to risk and how long you can go
without getting paid.

Never forget that a contract is meant to be negotiated - a contract's first
draft typically contains a bunch of unreasonable or vague requests and wishes
from the party that created the contract. Don't sign a contract until the
vagueness has been clarified or defined.

It's up to you to negotiate the contract in your favor. To put it plain and
simple; unless you negotiate a contract in your favor, you're going to have a
bad time. Like the video said; if you have no contract, you're left with the
sympathy card and that rarely works.

Another bit of advice: Keep track of all communications and have all word-of-
mouth agreements put on paper (before you commit to anything, like signing the
contract). I keep a projects folder per client containing communications,
documents received etc.

Hourly billing only works when you keep a detailed log of what was done. It's
definitely a lot easier to get paid for work if you provide a breakdown on
what was decided and done. The descriptions should prove as motivations of why
the work was necessary.

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gxespino
I'm doing this right now and am on project #2. I'm charging $3k for an MVP
also delivered in 2 weeks. My number one regret is not charging more. Even
after negotiating feature sets and getting things down to bare minimum, $3k is
not enough.

~~~
rankam
Yeah, I kind of assumed this, but it's something I'm willing to deal with once
or twice. Luckily, I have other sources of income that have very flexible
hours so it's not necessarily about the money. But, thanks for the heads up!

------
ganarajpr
It would be great if you could include your github profile as well.

On a side note : I have seen similiar posts before and I am intrigued. But
there is a question of definition here. What exactly would an MVP be ? The
reason I ask is - different people will have different projects in mind. One
clients project might be a simple mobile ecommerce site - another might be
building a search engine , or an Operating System ?

What exactly could you do for projects like these in 2 weeks ?

~~~
rankam
Great question - It would be a web app so operating systems are off the table.
Think along the lines of a project management app, users could log in, create
projects, assign tasks, join projects & invite others to projects, assign each
other tasks, and track each projects' budget. Something along the lines of
that.

I would my link github, but it has nothing worth showing because all of my
finished projects have been for work and are not available on github. I
usually learn new skills by simply building out the functionality of that
skill and then scrapping the toy project and moving on - I don't see a reason
to spend time building stuff out I've done in the past and is not going to be
used in this project (allowing users to sign up/in for instance). That may not
be the best approach, but it allows me to have fun learning new skills and
keeps it interesting.

------
mgav
If this approach doesn't work, consider one or more small volunteer projects
(maybe for non-profits) so you have a portfolio to share. Good luck!

~~~
rankam
Appreciate the advice, but I don't think I'm willing to work for free. If I
really _needed_ to build my portfolio, I could replicate the project
management and inventory management web apps I built at work. However, I'd
like to try something different, get some freelance experience, and maybe help
someone grow their idea or business.

------
rankam
Hey Everyone - OP here. I've gotten several inquiries from people about my
offer and they have all been great. I just wanted to thank everyone for their
comments and upvotes that made the post visible as well as everyone who
offered advice. I really appreciate it!

-Aaron

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drallison
When did MVP become synonymous with some sort of web/mobile product?

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richardknop
If you could do iOS app, this would be very interesting.

------
diegottg
Are you doing mobile apps?

~~~
rankam
Meteor has the ability to turn a web into an iOS and Android app quite easily.
I've never used it, but would be willing to give it a shot. However, I would
not be able to guarantee that it would work 100% correctly so there would be
some (possibly significant) risk to the client.

------
sander2
What's the MVP?

~~~
ColinWright
I haven't down-voted you, but I see that others have. I appreciate that
sometimes the fastest way (although not always the best[0] way) to get an
answer is simply to ask, but in this case a Google search[1] turns up the
answer[2] as the second hit.

The great thing about that is that there are often extra, ancillary[3] things
that turn up that are related and also useful.

[0] The best way to get an answer on the internet is to be loud, arrogant, and
wrong. Then people will fall over themselves to correct you, and you can
filter through the crap to find the right answer.

[1]
[https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=MVP](https://www.google.co.uk/search?q=MVP)

[2]
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_viable_product](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minimum_viable_product)

~~~
cgabios
Alternatively, if someone prefers privacy:

[https://duckduckgo.com/?q=MVP](https://duckduckgo.com/?q=MVP)

