Housecall Pro vs Nexa The Real Comparison for Skylight Installers
Housecall Pro
$79/mo ($948/yr)
VS
Nexa
$279 once — own forever
or 3 payments of $99
Break even: 3.5 months at Housecall Pro's current price.
Bottom Line
Housecall Pro costs skylight installers $948/year at today's list price. Nexa is $279 once for invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking and accounting in one suite — so it pays for itself in 3.5 months and you own it after that. What it is not: hosted-for-you software with a support desk and a roadmap you can lobby. That is the trade, and the rest of this page is the detail behind it.
The verdict for skylight installers: Housecall Pro is solid software, but at $79/month it costs $2,844 over 3 years. Nexa does most of what Housecall Pro does for $279 once. For solo skylight installers and small teams, Nexa is the better deal.
Choose Nexa if:
You're done paying monthly forever
You're a solo operator or small team (1-5)
You need time-tracker, Invoicing, task-manager in one purchase in one tool
You're tired of price increases
You want to own your tools like you own your equipment
Choose Housecall Pro if:
You have a large team (10+) needing enterprise features
You're deeply invested in Housecall Pro's specific workflow
You need a feature Nexa doesn't have yet
What Housecall Pro Actually Costs Skylight Installers
Today's list price is $79/month — $948 a year, from Housecall Pro's own pricing page. Every figure below is that price, multiplied. Nothing is projected.
Three years at today's price
Year 1$948
Year 2$948
Year 3$948
Three years of Housecall Pro$2,844
Nexa: $279 once (or 3 × $99). Over the same three years, that is $2,565 less.
If Housecall Pro raises its price, the three-year cost goes up; if it cuts it, the cost comes down. We don't guess which. Add-ons, extra seats and card-processing fees are not included, on either side.
Feature-by-Feature
Feature
Housecall Pro
Nexa
Invoicing
✓
✓
Scheduling
✓
✓
CRM
—
✓
Time Tracking
—
✓
Full Accounting
—
✓ (SIMPL)
Task Management
—
✓
Works offline
—
✓
Price
$79/mo
$279 once or 3 × $99
3-Year Total
$2,844
$279
You own it?
No — stop paying, lose access
Yes — forever
✓ and ✗ for Housecall Pro come from its own published feature list. — means the feature isn't in that list, which is not the same as Housecall Pro lacking it: check with them. Three years is at today's price.
What "$279 Once" Does And Doesn't Buy
It buys the software, not a service contract. You install Nexa and it runs on your machine. There is no seat count, and nothing stops working if you stop paying, because there is nothing to stop paying.
Housecall Pro's monthly fee is not only rent. It pays for their hosting, their support desk, and their engineers shipping changes every week. If those matter to how you work, that is a real thing you would be giving up.
Cross-device sync is the one optional extra — $4.99/month if you want your data mirrored between machines. Skip it and Nexa still works; you just sync manually.
The honest risk of buying once: you are betting on us still being here to improve it. The honest risk of renting: the price is theirs to raise, and the graveyard section below is a record of tools that did exactly that.
What Housecall Pro Does Better
Straight from Housecall Pro's own feature set. If one of these is the reason you pay them, that reason does not disappear because Nexa is cheaper.
Online booking for home services
GPS tracking
Postcard marketing campaigns
Professional invoicing
Review collection
A smaller bill up front: plans start at $79/month, against $279 paid once for Nexa.
Housecall Pro is the better call if you need online booking for home services specifically, or if your team is large enough that per-seat pricing still beats buying software outright.
Where business tools fit — for a skylight installer
Software doesn't do the actual work — it automates the business around it. And that part is the same for every skylight installer: find the work, manage it, bill for it, get paid. Each step has a tool — and the right single tool runs the whole loop, so the handoffs are automatic and you get back to the actual work. Tap a step to see what gets automated.
1
Find the work
Win the job
↓
A lead, a call, a referral — and a quote or estimate that turns it into a booked job.
CRM / contacts
Estimates & proposals
Booking / scheduling
then ↓
2
Manage the work
Do the job
↓
The part you actually get paid for — with the time, materials, add-ons, and tasks tracked as you go, not guessed at later.
Job / project tracking
Time tracking
Expenses, materials & add-ons
then ↓
3
Bill for it
Send the bill
↓
The work becomes the invoice — the hours, the add-ons, the materials, the deposit credited — totaled and sent, instead of re-typed at 9pm.
Invoicing
Deposits & credits
then ↓
4
Get paid
Collect payment
↓
Paid by card or link, the deposit credited, and what's overdue chased — without you doing it by hand.
Card / online payments
Automatic reminders
You can stitch four separate subscriptions across these four steps, or run one tool that does the whole flow so a booking becomes a job becomes an invoice becomes a payment without re-typing. Either way the goal is the same: less time on the business of the business, more on the actual work. (Nexa is built to be the one — but the honest options for each step are above and below.)
Watch a job become an invoice
This is the connection that makes the rest worth it. A skylight installer's job already holds the services, the hours, the add-ons, and the materials — so the invoice builds itself from the work instead of you re-typing it at 9pm. Toggle an add-on or nudge the hours and watch it recompute.
The job Vented skylight in a master bath, shingle roof
ServiceRoof cut-in and curb framing1 × $350$350
TimeLabor — tracked on the job
7 hrs× $95/hr$665
MaterialsVented skylight unit$780
MaterialsFlashing kit and ice-and-water shield$160
→
The invoice builds itself
Subtotal$0
Deposit credited−$600
Invoice total$0
You didn't write this invoice — the job did.
Calculate Your Full Stack
Housecall Pro plus whatever else you're paying for:
Email yourself this comparison?
Switching from Housecall Pro
1
Export your data — Go to Settings → export customers, job history, and invoices as CSV files.
2
Set up Nexa — 15-minute setup. Import your customer list and service categories.
3
Parallel run — Run both for 2 weeks. Transition dispatching and booking to Nexa.
4
Cancel Housecall Pro — Cancel subscription (check for early termination fees). Download all records.
✓ 30-day money-back guarantee. Zero risk.
Sound Familiar?
He's on a roof harness before he's anywhere near the edge, because skylight work is fall work and the whole day is spent on a slope. The first job is a vented skylight in a master bath on an asphalt shingle roof. He locates the spot between the rafters from inside, marks it, then cuts the opening up top, knowing he'll have to cut and header a rafter to make the unit fit, which means doing the framing right so the roof's structure isn't compromised. The cut is the easy, scary part; the flashing is the part that determines whether this thing leaks in five years. He builds the curb, lays ice-and-water shield around the opening, sets the unit, and works the flashing kit in the right order, step flashing up the sides, head flashing over the top, everything lapped so water sheds over and never under. Counter-flashing and sealant finish it, but he knows sealant is the backup, not the system; the lapped flashing is the system. The afternoon job is on a tile roof, a completely different flashing approach, lifting and cutting tile and weaving the flashing into the courses without cracking the surrounding pieces. The homeowner can't understand why a tile-roof skylight costs more than the shingle quote her neighbor got. He talks her through it, then logs the roof type, unit model, and flashing detail for the file before harnessing down.
A skylight is a hole cut in the roof, so the flashing is everything, and a curb flashed wrong leaks years later in a way that gets blamed on the skylight, not the install
Cutting the opening means working between rafters and sometimes cutting one, which is structural, so the framing and headers have to be right or the roof is compromised
Matching the new skylight to the existing roof type, asphalt, tile, metal, or low-slope, changes the entire flashing approach, and a tile roof or standing-seam install is a different job than a shingle one
Customers want the light without grasping that it's a roofing penetration on a slope, so they balk at the flashing, framing, and fall-protection labor that makes it not leak
Time tracking, invoicing, job tracking and the books are the pieces of that day. Some tools rent you each piece separately. A few — Nexa among them — bundle the lot into something you buy once. The sections below price both routes honestly.
None of that is a software problem you can buy your way out of in one click — it is why the tool you pick matters more than what it costs. Housecall Pro solves some of it. So does Nexa. The difference is what you are left holding in three years.
What This Means for Skylight Installers
The median skylight installer earns $55,000/year. At $948/year, Housecall Pro is a recurring slice of that — paid again every year, whether the year was good or not. Owning the same jobs outright is $279 once, and the slice stops.
Nexa is $279 once. Invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking, accounting — all connected, built for skylight installers. You own it like you own your Skylight units (fixed, vented, tubular) and flashing kits.
Is Nexa actually right for a skylight installer?
An honest fit check — because the wrong tool is worse than no tool.
Right for you if
You run solo or a small crew — like the 15,000 skylight installers in the US who do, and you wear every hat.
You're tired of paying every month for a monthly subscription stack and a pile of apps that don't talk to each other.
You want to invoice, schedule, and track from the field — not from a back office.
You'd rather own your software once, the way you own your Skylight units (fixed, vented, tubular) and flashing kits.
Look elsewhere if
You run a 20+ skylight installer fleet that needs enterprise dispatch and multi-crew routing — Nexa is built for 1–5, and a fleet platform will serve you better.
You need full payroll for a large team or deep, SKU-level inventory — that's not what Nexa is for.
You're genuinely happy paying monthly and don't mind stitching tools together. No tool fixes a workflow you already like.
The honest fit: if you're a solo or small skylight installers business that owns its tools and is sick of renting software, Nexa replaces your whole stack for $279 once. If you're scaling past a handful of crews, a fleet platform may fit better — and we'd rather tell you that now than sell you the wrong thing.
Skylight Installers by the numbers — by place
Tax, licensing & seasonality where you operate
1-13.3%income tax
CSLB (Contractors State License Board)licensing
Year-round construction in SoCal. Fire season (June-November) drives restoration demand. Drought impacts landscaping. Earthquake retrofitting is ongoing market.
DBPR (Dept of Business and Professional Regulation)licensing
Hurricane season June-November creates massive restoration demand. Snowbird season November-March boosts service volume 30-40%. Year-round construction. Pool service is year-round industry. Pest control peaks in summer humidity.
Harsh winters in upstate, moderate in NYC. Construction limited in winter upstate. NYC market is enormous but hypercompetitive. Brownstone/pre-war building maintenance is specialized trade. NYC licensing is notoriously complex.
Time tracking, invoicing, job tracking and the books are the pieces of that day. Some tools rent you each piece separately. A few — Nexa among them — bundle the lot into something you buy once. The sections below price both routes honestly.
What skylight installers actually deal with
A skylight is a hole cut in the roof, so the flashing is everything, and a curb flashed wrong leaks years later in a way that gets blamed on the skylight, not the install
Cutting the opening means working between rafters and sometimes cutting one, which is structural, so the framing and headers have to be right or the roof is compromised
Matching the new skylight to the existing roof type, asphalt, tile, metal, or low-slope, changes the entire flashing approach, and a tile roof or standing-seam install is a different job than a shingle one
Customers want the light without grasping that it's a roofing penetration on a slope, so they balk at the flashing, framing, and fall-protection labor that makes it not leak
A day in the life of a skylight installer
He's on a roof harness before he's anywhere near the edge, because skylight work is fall work and the whole day is spent on a slope. The first job is a vented skylight in a master bath on an asphalt shingle roof. He locates the spot between the rafters from inside, marks it, then cuts the opening up top, knowing he'll have to cut and header a rafter to make the unit fit, which means doing the framing right so the roof's structure isn't compromised. The cut is the easy, scary part; the flashing is the part that determines whether this thing leaks in five years. He builds the curb, lays ice-and-water shield around the opening, sets the unit, and works the flashing kit in the right order, step flashing up the sides, head flashing over the top, everything lapped so water sheds over and never under. Counter-flashing and sealant finish it, but he knows sealant is the backup, not the system; the lapped flashing is the system. The afternoon job is on a tile roof, a completely different flashing approach, lifting and cutting tile and weaving the flashing into the courses without cracking the surrounding pieces. The homeowner can't understand why a tile-roof skylight costs more than the shingle quote her neighbor got. He talks her through it, then logs the roof type, unit model, and flashing detail for the file before harnessing down.
The tools a working skylight installer actually owns
Skylight units (fixed, vented, tubular) and flashing kits
Roofing cutout saw and reciprocating saw
Ice-and-water shield and underlayment
Curb framing lumber and structural fasteners
Roof harness, anchors, and fall-arrest gear
Sealant, butyl tape, and counter-flashing tools
Local skylight installers on Nexa
Real skylight installers near you who run their business on Nexa — book directly, no platform fee.
Are you a skylight installer? Post your business and get found in your area — $2.99 one-time.
Or browse every skylight installer on Nexa →
The kit a working skylight installer owns
The tools of the trade — each a one-time buy that earns its keep for years.
Core kitEssential
Roofing cutout saw and reciprocating saw
$200–$700
Core kitEssential
Roof harness, anchors and fall-arrest gear
$200–$700
Core kitEssential
Skylight and flashing kit inventory
$600–$3,000
Core kitEssential
Impact driver and drill
$200–$450
Core kitEssential
Chalk line, square and levels
$50–$200
Core kitEssential
Extension ladders and roof jacks
$250–$900
Core kitEssential
Caulk guns and butyl tools
$40–$180
Core kitEssential
Tin snips and flashing brake
$40–$200
Core kitEssential
Tubular skylight hole-saw kit
$80–$400
The core kit, bought once$1,660–$6,730
Here's the bar that matters: you spent $1,660–$6,730 on tools that last for years, and never thought twice. So why should the software cost more than your whole kit — every single year? Hold it to the same standard as a good tool: $279, once.
Where Nexa wins for a skylight installer — and where it doesn't
The honest version. Nexa was built to beat the rented stack on the jobs that matter most to a skylight installer — here's where it wins, where the integration wins it anyway, and the things it genuinely doesn't do, with who to use instead. (No tool is best at everything; a guide that pretends otherwise is just an ad.)
Compare the essential business tools for skylight installers
The usual subscriptions vs. Nexa, side by side. Drag the time slider — every year you keep renting, the gap widens. Nexa is $279, one time.
The jobThe usual rentalThe verdict
The whole connected stack3 subscriptions · ~$1,044/yrNexa wins big One tool, $279 once — From cutting and headering the rafter to the roof-type-specific invoice to the books, one record follows each skylight so the framing and flashing that protect against a future leak are never re-entered. without re-typing. That handoff is the part separate tools can't buy at any price.
Job & project trackingJobber →Nexa wins When the skylight won't fit cleanly and you cut a rafter and frame in a header, that structural work and the flashing approach for the roof type all land on one job record, since the flashing is everything and gets blamed years later.
InvoicingFreshBooks →Nexa wins Because a tile or standing-seam install is a different job than a shingle one, the job carries the right flashing scope straight into the invoice so the roof-type work bills correctly without re-keying.
Books & accountingQuickBooks →Nexa wins Since the headering, framing, and curb flashing on every fall-work day flow from job to invoice to your books, the harness-and-slope labor you put in shows up in your margin.
If you run real payroll for a team—Not Nexa Use Gusto → — it's better at that, and we'd rather tell you than pretend.
If you run big email campaigns & automations—Not Nexa Use ConvertKit → — it's better at that, and we'd rather tell you than pretend.
Prefer to own a piece outright instead of renting? Free and open-source tools (GnuCash, Invoice Ninja and the like) each handle one job if you'll self-host them — a real option, listed because it's true.
These are affiliate links — if you sign up through one, we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you. We list them because they're the honest best pick for the job, Nexa included. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Competitor pricing verified 2026-06-12.
How To Read This Page
We make Nexa. It is one of the two options compared here, so read this with that in mind. We have tried to make Housecall Pro's case the way we would want ours made — their strengths above are their own published feature list, not our summary of it.
The prices are Housecall Pro's published list prices, checked on the date shown in the sources below. Plans change; check theirs before you decide.
No customer quotes appear on this page because we do not have any from skylight installers we can verify. For user testimony, read the independent reviews — Housecall Pro on G2 and on Capterra — where the reviewers are not selling you anything.
Some links on this page earn us money. Tool links may be affiliate links paying us a commission at no extra cost to you, including links to Housecall Pro itself. We list a tool when it is the honest pick for the job, not because of the payout.
Check the price yourself:Housecall Pro's own pricing page is the source for every figure above, read on the date shown in the sources section below.
We are not neutral about subscriptions, and that is the argument, not a hidden assumption: software you pay for once is cheaper over three years than software you rent, unless you need something only the rented one does.
How we put this guide together
We build a skylight installer's guide the same way every time, and we'd rather you trust it than take it on faith. Nexa is our product, so the test we hold ourselves to is simple: a tool only "wins" a job here when it genuinely does that job better for a skylight installer — and where something free, open-source, or buy-once does it better, we say so and link you to it. Where Nexa falls short (payroll is the honest example), we name the alternative outright.
Where the numbers come from
Vendor pricingJobber $588/yr, Housecall Pro $948/yr, QuickBooks $456/yr, Square — taken from each company's published plans, last verified September 2026. Pricing moves; each name above links straight to that vendor’s own pricing page so you can confirm it before you decide.
Income contextThe $55,000 median we cite for the typical skylight installer is occupational median annual pay from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (Occupational Employment & Wage Statistics), compiled April 2026. We use it only to show software spend as a share of real income — your own numbers will differ.
Three-year mathMulti-year totals are today's list price multiplied by the number of years. No price rise is projected, so the figure can be checked against the vendor's own pricing page; if they raise it, the real cost is higher.
Found something out of date? Prices change and we don't catch every move the day it happens. This guide is published and maintained by the Nexa team; if a figure here is wrong, tell us and we'll fix it — getting it right matters more to us than the sale.
FAQ
Is Nexa really a Housecall Pro replacement?
For solo skylight installers and small teams, yes. invoicing, scheduling, CRM, time tracking, task management, and full accounting — all for $279 once. Housecall Pro may be better if you have a large team (10+) or need enterprise-specific features.
What does Housecall Pro do that Nexa doesn't?
Housecall Pro has features like Online booking for home services and GPS tracking that some businesses rely on. For most solo skylight installers, these aren't dealbreakers.
How fast does Nexa pay for itself?
At $79/month, Nexa pays for itself in 3.5 months. After that: $948 saved every year.
Can I pay in installments?
Yes. Nexa is $279 as a one-time payment, or 3 payments of $99 ($297 total). Either way it's a one-time purchase — no subscription, no recurring fees ever.