Thinking · money
How much does custom AI cost a Brisbane SMB? Real numbers, plainly.
Fixed-price bands, what's included, what's not, and the honest maths on how long it takes to pay back.
The most-common first question after a Leak Check is: how much does this cost? The most-common second question is: and what's the catch? This piece answers both, in plain English, with the actual bands we quote.
01The three build-size bands
Single-app build — $6k to $14k
This is the most-common size. One specific job automated end-to-end. Examples:
- Invoice-chase drafter reading Xero and drafting personalised chases in your voice.
- Quote follow-up assistant that spots quotes going cold and drafts the 'still there?' email.
- Daily brief generator that reads voice notes from the field and produces a formatted job log.
- Owner's Weekly — the four-minute Monday brief on money owed, quotes cold, and staff hours vs coverage.
Time to live: 3–6 weeks from signed brief. Fixed price, agreed before work starts. Includes hosting on your own infrastructure for the first 12 months, all the code, and full documentation.
The Desk — $14k to $22k
A single-screen operational picture reading your existing tools (Xero + CRM + inbox + calendar). Same day-one screen showing money owed, jobs at risk, what your team promised, what needs you today.
This is the flagship Kindra Desk product. Time to live: 5–8 weeks. Includes the connectors to your existing tools, the daily-refresh engine, and a mobile-friendly view for when you're on-site.
Multi-app suite — $18k to $28k
Two-to-four apps commissioned as a set, working together. Example: invoice-chase + quote follow-up + Owner's Weekly. Time to live: 6–10 weeks.
This is the Multiplied series. Bundled pricing beats commissioning each app individually by 15–20% and the shared infrastructure means the second and third apps ship faster.
02What's included in every build
- Fixed price, agreed upfront. No hourly billing.
- The code, in your GitHub or ours (your choice).
- Documentation — how it works, how to change it, what happens when something breaks.
- Hosting on your own infrastructure (server or your cloud) — not our platform, not our lock-in.
- First 30 days: unlimited tweaks. If it's not fitting your workflow, we adjust it.
- First 12 months: standard support. Bugs fixed, small changes accommodated.
03What's not included
- Third-party tool subscriptions (Xero, HubSpot, HighLevel, whatever you're using).
- AI usage costs for high-volume workflows — usually $10–$80/month for a small business, we quote exact numbers before we start.
- Major scope changes after week 4 — those are quoted separately.
- Ongoing feature development after the 12-month warranty period — that's a separate light retainer, roughly $200–$600/month, or you can pick up your own developer.
04How long the payback takes
Rough numbers we've seen for a $10k invoice-chase build in a business carrying $40k in aged receivables:
- Recovery of ~30% of the aged receivables in the first 60 days: $12k back.
- Owner's time saved on invoice-chasing: ~2 hours/week × 50 weeks × $80/hr owner-value = $8k/year.
- Total year-one return: ~$20k on a $10k build. Payback: ~4 months.
Numbers vary. That's a typical case, not a guarantee. Some businesses see faster payback; some see slower. The one common factor is that the payback is measurable — you can point at the money and say that came back because of the tool.
05What we won't quote for
- Businesses under $150k/year turnover — the maths doesn't work.
- Businesses in acute cash-flow stress — don't spend money you don't have on automation.
- Vague briefs — 'we want to use AI more' isn't a project. A specific pain point is.
- Anything that isn't legally clean (dark-pattern collections, unlicensed advice, etc.).
If any of these apply, I'll tell you at the Leak Check. Straight read, no charge, no pitch.
06How to get to a firm number
The Leak Check is where we go from 'roughly' to 'exactly'. Twenty minutes, free, ends with a straight read that includes:
- What we'd build.
- Fixed price to build it.
- Realistic time-to-live.
- The payback maths for your specific situation.
- What we'd not build (usually more valuable than the yes list).
You leave with the report either way. Whether you engage us or not, you have a real document on what would be worth building — and what wouldn't.
If this is the leak you recognised, twenty minutes with us finds out what it actually costs.
Before you ask.
Do you take a deposit?
Yes — 40% on signed brief, 60% on go-live. No milestone billing in between.
What if the build takes longer than quoted?
That's on us. Fixed price means fixed. If we're slower than we thought, we absorb the extra time — that's the deal.
Can we do a smaller test first?
Yes — sometimes we build a small proof-of-concept for $2–$4k before committing to a full build. Not always necessary but always available.
What if we want to hire you on-retainer instead of a fixed build?
Only for businesses we've already delivered a build for, and only for ongoing feature work. We don't take on retainers for businesses we haven't built for — the risk of scope drift is too high on both sides.
