so ive been flying for about two years now, mostly just for fun and some personal photography projects, but a few people in my area have started asking me if i do commercial work and honestly it got me thinking. like could i actually make money doing this? i live in a mid-sized city and theres a lot of real estate agents and construction companies around so the demand feels like it could be there.

the problem is i have no idea where to start with the legal side of things. i know i need a part 107 cert which i dont have yet, thats on my list. but what about insurance? do i need an LLC? how do you even price jobs when youre just starting out and dont have a portfolio of paid work? i dont want to undersell myself but i also dont want to quote someone $800 for a 20 minute real estate shoot when theres probably other guys in town charging $150.

any advice from people who actually went through this process would be super helpful. im not trying to quit my day job tomorrow or anything, just want to do this on weekends and see if it can grow into something.

honestly the part 107 is step one and everything else kind of flows from there. once you have that you can actually legally charge for flights so thats the foundation. for insurance i use Thimble, its month to month which was great when i was starting out and doing maybe one or two jobs a month ? no sense paying for annual coverage when youre just dipping your toes in. some clients, especially bigger companies or anything involving construction sites, will ask for a certificate of insurance before they even let you show up so dont skip this part thinking you can figure it out later.

the LLC question depends on your state and how serious you want to get. i waited probably too long to do mine but once i started doing regular work for a local property management company i set one up just for liability reasons. its not super expensive to file and it just makes the whole thing feel more legit to clients too. as for pricing, real estate around here goes for $200-350 for a basic package with edited photos, video walkthroughs are more. dont race to the bottom on price, it just attracts cheap clients who are a pain to work with anyway.

im kind of in the same boat as you so following this thread. one thing i did before i even had clients was put together a little portfolio from some free shoots i did for a friend who does house flipping. gave me something to show people and he got free content so it worked out. not sure if thats the right move for everyone but it helped me feel less like a fraud when i started reaching out to realtors lol