The Boring Thing Workshop index · 11 free tools · 7 written guides, $19

The only person who knows if the price is fair is the one charging it.

The contractor writing the quote. The agent listing the house. The company that sold you the thing you are now trying to price. Everyone with the number wants something from the answer.

Eleven free tools that give you the number first. Seven written guides, $19, for what to say once you have it.

Property · what you are buying, or selling

01 Flood Zone Lookup Is this address in a FEMA flood zone, and which one? The answer decides whether a lender will require flood insurance before they close. Free 02 Seismic Risk Lookup USGS earthquake hazard for any US address, in plain language. No peak ground acceleration figures to decode. Free 03 Home Sale Capital Gains What federal tax is actually due when you sell, including whether the $250k / $500k exclusion covers you. Free

Heating and cooling · before you sign the quote

04 Is My HVAC Quote Fair? An independent sanity check on a furnace, AC or heat-pump price before the salesperson needs an answer. Free 05 HVAC Design Temperatures The ACCA outdoor design temperature a contractor's supposed to size your system to. Ask them which figure they used. Free

Self-employed · the tax nobody withholds for you

06 TaxQuarters Self-employment tax, federal income tax and the four quarterly payments, built on the published IRS and SSA figures. Free

Ground and sky · when to plant, what to expect

07 Frost Dates & Planting Calendar Average first and last frost, hardiness zone and a sowing calendar, by ZIP code. Free 08 GrowGuide Almanac The same thing written up city by city, if you'd rather read than type a ZIP. Free 09 Typical Weather What the weather's normally like at a place on a date. For choosing a wedding weekend, not for tomorrow's forecast. Free

Body and road · numbers, not advice

10 Thryve Health Tools Nine calculators: protein targets, electrolytes, sauna and marathon recovery, GLP-1 basics. Free 11 Volt Trails Public EV charging across every US state, down to the town. Free

What we do with your visit

We count which pages get opened and which links get clicked, on our own servers, so we can tell which tools are worth keeping. No ad network. No email wall. Nothing about you is sold to anyone, because we have nobody to sell it to. The tools take no account and ask for no address. Open your browser's network tab on any of them and watch.

What people do instead

Search it and open the first three results. Two are calculators wrapped in an ad network that wants an email before it shows a number, and the third is a company that sells the thing you're asking about, which is why the answer is always yes.

Ask the contractor. Reasonable, and they may be right. But asking the person quoting you whether the quote is fair isn't a second opinion, it's the first one repeated.

Ask an accountant or an agent. Correct, and worth it for anything that matters. For "roughly what will I owe in April" it's a phone call and a fee for a number you can have in forty seconds.

None of these replace a professional on anything that matters. They are for the ten minutes before you decide whether you need one.

The seven guides · $19 each

The tool gives you the number. The guide is what you say next, while the person across the table is waiting for an answer. Written for the ten minutes before you commit, not for afterwards.

G1Homebuyer's Inspection Red-Flag Kit The walk-through scorecard, and which findings are cosmetic versus expensive. G2Home Seller's Prep Kit Where prep pays, how to price to the comps, and your real net before you accept. G3HVAC Quote-Defense Kit The checklist and the scripts for walking through a padded quote with the salesperson still in the room. G4The 1099 / Self-Employed Tax Survival Kit Paying quarterlies on time, and the records to keep in case the IRS ever asks. G5Consultant Proposal & SOW Kit Proposal structure, a clear statement of work, and change-order scripts for solo consultants. G6Starting GLP-1 Guide A plain-English starter guide for the first weeks on a GLP-1 medication. G7The Boring Thing Starter Bundle The Realtor's AI Prompt Pack and the First-Apartment Field Guide together, $9 less than buying both.

Before you sign it

The quote is in front of you. The tool told you what the number should be. What you are missing is the sentence that gets it changed, and the two questions that tell you whether the person opposite is guessing.

That is the guide. $19, one payment, yours to keep.

The boring disclaimer

Everything here is educational. These aren't professional, legal, medical or tax advice, and none of them knows the first thing about your particular situation. Where a decision is expensive or irreversible, the tool's job is to tell you what to ask the professional, not to replace them.