Build custom software or buy a ready-made tool — which is cheaper?
At first glance the answer is obvious: a ready-made tool costs a few euros a month, custom software sounds expensive. But the price on the website is rarely the price you actually pay in the end. Here is the honest calculation.
"Buying" software almost always means "renting": you subscribe to a ready-made tool for a monthly fee. That's cheap, instantly available and, for most cases, exactly right. Still, a second look is worth it — because the true costs aren't on the price tag.
The ready-made tool: cheap, until it isn't
The subscription price is only the visible part. On top come costs hardly anyone factors in beforehand:
- Per-user pricing that rises with every new employee — what was cheap with three people is a real line item with fifteen.
- The gap between "the tool can do this" and "I need that": for the missing 10% you build workarounds, export to Excel, type things twice. That time costs money every week.
- Several tools side by side, because none is enough on its own — and the manual labour of connecting them.
- Dependence: price doubled, feature dropped, vendor sold — you have no say in any of it.
The custom solution: higher per month, but tailored
A custom solution usually costs more per month than a standard subscription. In return you get something that maps your workflow exactly — no workarounds, no double work, no features you pay for and never use. The price doesn't hang on your number of employees, and the solution evolves with your needs — not the roadmap of a large vendor who doesn't know your business.
The calculation that really counts
Compare the total cost over three years, not just the monthly prices. On one side: the ready-made tool's subscription + the time its gaps cost you every week (hours × hourly wage × weeks). On the other: the monthly price of the custom solution. Often the calculation tips in favour of the custom solution earlier than you'd think — because the lost time never stops, while the fixed price stays predictable.
The honest rule of thumb: as long as a ready-made tool maps your workflow well enough, buy it. The moment you start building your business around the tool's weaknesses, the custom solution becomes the cheaper choice.
Two honest points so the calculation is complete. First: the monthly price of a rented custom solution also runs on, year after year — over a very long horizon, a one-off purchased piece of software that belongs to you can be cheaper overall, but then you carry the responsibility for operations and maintenance yourself. Which payment model costs least in the end therefore also depends on how long you use the solution (fixed price, hourly rate or subscription compared). Second: with a custom solution you also stay dependent on a provider, just like with the ready-made tool — the difference lies in whether their incentives match yours.
You don't have to know what's technically possible
This trade-off often feels as if you'd have to be a software expert to make it. You're not — and you don't need to be. You know where your ready-made tool slows you down; that's the information that matters. The rest — what's feasible and what it costs — I'll work out honestly for you before you commit.
And no fear of the big project budget: with me you pay no hourly rate, but a fixed monthly price and subscribe to the result — only once it runs. How it works in detail and what it costs →