so ive been doing drone work on the side for about two years now, mostly real estate and some construction progress stuff, and honestly the side income has gotten to the point where im starting to wonder if i could actually do this full time. right now i work a pretty boring office job and the contrast is killing me lol.

my question is less about the technical side and more about the business reality of it. like what does your actual month look like? is it feast and famine constantly or does it eventually level out once you build up enough clients? i have my part 107 and im reasonably confident in the air but i have zero idea how to price myself properly or find consistent work beyond the one real estate agency that already knows me.

would love to hear from anyone whos actually jumped into this full time, not looking for the "follow your dreams" speech just want the honest version of what its like

honest version: the first year was genuinely stressful. not gonna sugarcoat it. i had maybe 3 solid clients and spent probably 40% of my time doing marketing stuff i hated — cold emails, updating my portfolio site, reaching out to contractors. the work itself was great but finding the work is almost a separate job.

what changed things for me was getting into the inspection side of things. roofing companies, solar installers, that kind of thing. real estate is fine but the margins are razor thin and everyone and their cousin has a drone now so it's a race to the bottom on pricing. inspection work takes more training and some people need specific software knowledge but the day rates are much better and clients tend to be repeat business rather than one-offs.

i'd say don't quit your day job until you have at least 6 months of expenses saved and a couple solid anchor clients. but yes it is absolutely doable, im going on year 3 now and things have smoothed out a lot.

following this thread because im in almost exactly the same position. did my 107 last spring and have been doing real estate on weekends. the real estate agent i work with keeps referring me to her colleagues which is nice but it still feels pretty fragile as a foundation.

one thing i've been told is that mapping and photogrammetry work is where the more stable contracts are, like agriculture and surveying companies. haven't broken into that yet but it seems like it requires a whole different set of skills and software so thats kind of intimidating to get into from scratch