Rate hike... Lord, I need a glass of water.

[jcmiami1]

It's a "cost of living increase" as a client I'll pay more for a decent escort I really like. In my job, I work hard to get a salary increase cause let's face "living costs" are increasing for all of us and we need to make more money to keep a roof over our heads and food on the table.

[Amoco]

About half of which is eaten up by inflation. ($1 in 2002 = $1.32 today.) http://data.bls.gov/cgi-bin/cpicalc.pl

 

Not making any specific point, just throwing my 2¢ (3¢ in 2015 dollars) out there.

 

Kevin Slater

 

Kevin...exactly where are you getting your data from? If I'm understanding you correctly, you're suggesting that what cost $1 in 2001, now costs $1.35, right? If so, which report and in what city? Including taxes, or not, because we all know that one of the great financial benefits of escorting and/or personal training is the ....hmmm, how should I say this, the limited tax exposure. Not making any accusations and I assume that everyone will say they pay their full tax bill, but really....and BTW, many commodities have gotten dramatically cheaper with technology and competition. These numbers that everyone throws around as justification for fee decisions are often self serving and easy to manipulate. And don't forget that the cost of doing business is minimal - a Rentboy ad and some lube seems to be all you need. Everything else, like a place to live, is an expense everyone has. No extra insurance, professional association fees, etc. And unless I'm missing something, Devon is not living in a major city.

 

Don't get me wrong - everybody can charge whatever they want, and if they get it, more power to them. But for me, I have a full dance card with many great guys that charge between $200-$300 an hour and are comfortable with $500 + good tip for my usual 3 hour appointment. No, they are not porn stars, though at least 2 of them should be, and none of them are the young starlets, but from my limited vantage point of heavy hiring for more than three years, they're fantastic!

 

Maybe I'm being naive, but I noted that RB exceeded the "500" escort advertising in Manhattan in recent weeks. Add CL, Backpage, Rentmen, etc., and I think everyone is looking at much more competition and that over time, prices will move down. Not for everyone - generalizations are always unfair to individuals, but for the overwhelming majority. Devon may be the exception, but Im trying to imagine my reaction of I was a regular and the fee went up 2/3 overnight....that's a tough pill to swallow.

[Kevin Slater]

Kevin...exactly where are you getting your data from?

 

See the link to the link I included in my post and you copied in your reply.

 

Kevin Slater

[Amoco]

Respectfully, Kevin, that's a number taken out of context....we have long term historically low inflation, dramatically lower unemployment, a stock market at all time highs and bonds paying essentially nothing. Ask the Wall Street guys if there bonuses are 35% higher or lower over the past 10 years? Sure, over 20 years, stuff is bound to go up, but you can't look at statistics in a vacuum. Especially when taxes are involved. When someone wants to factor in the greater number of clients due to higher employment, the lower interest rate returns, and the higher taxes that may or may not be getting paid, I'm all ears....

 

And in regard to BSR, let me do the math for you because it's not quite as bad as you think...

 

If an escort charges only $200 an hour, and works only 2 hours a day - again, just 2 hours a day! - they get $400 in cash per day. If they work six days a week, they'd still be only working 12 hours a week, and earning $2,400 for what amounts to a typical day and a half of full time work. Multiply that X 52 weeks a year, and voila, they're earning Approximately $125,000/year. Admittedly, not a fortune for NYC, but not a pauper's salary either. More importantly, expenses are minimal and they have the incredible value added of having days free to do whatever they want. Depending on how much taxes they're paying, $125,00 gets close to a real salary of z$200,000 per year, and again, that's just working 2 hours a day!

[+ Chris Eisenhower]

The increase in cost here is imaginary and hypothetical. Devon wasn't charging $180/hr—so his fee didn't increase by 67%. It increased by 20%—and that was over a five year period. That actually works out to $10/yr, or between 3-4% annually. Considering that travel costs over the past five years have definitely outstripped that pace, he's actually making the same or less now.

[devonhunter]

For reference's sake, here's a screen grab from a file I keep. In many ways, I have actually simplified everything (though it may not appear that way, given the new options leading up to the overnight flat fee). In all these years, I have booked some three-hour appointments, only ONE four-hour appointment, and ZERO five-hour appointments. I incentivized jumping directly to the overnight flat fee. People generally want 1-, 1.5-, 2-hr, 3-hr, or overnights (which I had always treated as a flat fee for 6-18 hours, and which generally turned into 19-24 hours, because I'm not a clock watcher). If you look closely, all I have really done is tried to offset the flights/hotels with the shorter appointments, while also making sure my lack of clock watching is no longer working against me for the overnights. Because I'm not a clock watcher, I allow for very wide flat rates that encompass broad blocs of time. It's easier this way, and keeps me engaged (instead of looking at clocks).

 

I would be gobsmacked if anyone ever chose the 4-, 5-, 6-, or 7-hr options. I just haven't experienced that. Ever. Essentially, I am just trying to start confirming upfront the fee schedule I have always had in place, but rarely actually collected (if I quoted you $1200 for 6-18 hours, and I allowed the appointment to go to 19-24 hours, then that's that). In this sense, the "new" 2015 overnight rate isn't an increase at all (and a huge portion of my business is based on overnights). Part of what I specifically want is to discourage as many "fence straddlers" as possible from contacting me. Between keeping my phone number out of my ads, requiring a deposit from new clients, and raising the rate, I am trying to insulate myself as much as possible from people who aren't serious about their inquiries. By the time someone even says hello, I feel he is already more engaged and prepared to move forward.

[Kevin Slater]

For reference's sake, here's a screen grab from a file I keep. In many ways, I have actually simplified everything (though it may not appear that way, given the new options leading up to the overnight flat fee). In all these years, I have booked some three-hour appointments, only ONE four-hour appointment, and ZERO five-hour appointments. I incentivized jumping directly to the overnight flat fee. People generally want 1-, 1.5-, 2-hr, 3-hr, or overnights (which I had always treated as a flat fee for 6-18 hours, and which generally turned into 19-24 hours, because I'm not a clock watcher). If you look closely, all I have really done is tried to offset the flights/hotels with the shorter appointments, while also making sure my lack of clock watching is no longer working against me for the overnights. Because I'm not a clock watcher, I allow for very wide flat rates that encompass broad blocs of time. It's easier this way, and keeps me engaged (instead of looking at clocks).

 

I would be gobsmacked if anyone ever chose the 4-, 5-, 6-, or 7-hr options. I just haven't experienced that. Ever. Essentially, I am just trying to start confirming upfront the fee schedule I have always had in place, but rarely actually collected (if I quoted you $1200 for 6-18 hours, and I allowed the appointment to go to 19-24 hours, then that's that). In this sense, the "new" 2015 overnight rate isn't an increase at all (and a huge portion of my business is based on overnights). Part of what I specifically want is to discourage as many "fence straddlers" as possible from contacting me. Between keeping my phone number out of my ads, requiring a deposit from new clients, and raising the rate, I am trying to insulate myself as much as possible from people who aren't serious about their inquiries. By the time someone even says hello, I feel he is already more engaged and prepared to move forward.

 

An escort posting data and charts? This be my corner, bitch!

 

Kevin Slater

[devonhunter]

Amoco - this +500 escorts issue in NYC is exactly why I just came home yesterday from my last trip there. I broke even, but I don't work to break even. I travel for only 3-4 days at a time. There's no way (outside of luck) to do well in those places anymore as someone who has the burden of all this overhead. If I lived in NYC/SF/Chicago/Miami/LA/etc, I can see how it could still work to have an ad in such a large market. I will no longer go to the biggest cities, unless I have an overnight included in the itinerary (or am hired by a single client to be in whatever saturated market for him alone). I am not interested in competing in that type of chaos, and I have never yet buckled to pressure to lower my rate. When I have been to NYC/SF/Chicago and other huge markets, I have done well (and avoided burnout) specifically because I was not "competing" in a race to the bottom. But now there are areas that are just too saturated with ads (and I don't like big cities as a general rule anyway). San Diego is a particularly terrible example of what happens with "competition." Those silly people have underpriced each other to the point that it would be inconceivable for me to travel there. No way: They're charging 1995 rates in 2015.

 

I will completely transition out of this and do something else when the time comes to lower my rate. It will happen in time, but I have been graceful thus far (in terms of aging, if nothing else). I've already started the transition process, in fact. I realized that one of the reasons Charlotte has never supported me well is because I was often somewhere else when someone sent a local inquiry. My intent going forward is to focus on traveling mostly for those who wish to see me for weekends, being more available for the generally inconsistent (but occasionally substantial) Charlotte appointments, and taking a monthly/quarterly trip to supplement my income by going to one of my bastion cities (DC, Little Rock, Kansas City, etc.). But this traveling every weekend and being at a different airport every three days has gone on long enough. I'm going to get re-certified to be a personal trainer (I did it for six years, so I know what to expect), and I want to learn more about the process of becoming certified to stage houses for realtors (I had to shoot 70 scenes for Anteros Media in a house with only seven rooms, and I had to make each scene look like a different location, so that's an example of an adult entertainment skill/experience translating to a totally different type of work).

 

By 2011 I had already accomplished what I had set out to do: 1) pay off a massive fraud debt, 2) stabilize financially, and 3) amass enough savings to not feel threatened all the time. Since then I have been planting seeds (and hoping they grow). I don't need or want to work as hard as I have been since 2006. I realized (after my grandmother died recently), that I have been meeting or exceeding an external, artificial goal that I defined arbitrarily as "success." It is a nice, round number. Easy to remember, easy to gauge as a barometer of progress. But I don't need to put that kind of pressure on myself anymore.

[Mocha]

Devon, I'm with you in the big market avoidance. LA, Chicago, Miami....never been to New York because I'd rather go to my home state of Florida and meet a New Yorker. Maybe a person will do good in a big market, but I'm not trying to sex myself to death to afford it (exceptions being DC and San Francisco) With the big markets, I have to wonder how many of these ads are genuine escorts, or suspect?

 

Someone mentioned how could an escort in Podunk Iowa feel good about $200 an hour? Well I'm one of those escorts who have gone to Podunk Iowa (and every other Podunk state west of the Mississippi). An advertised price is just that, an advertisement. I often fared better in Podunk versus Megatropolis, but many Podunk places aren't worth flying to and staying in a hotel. You have to know someone.

 

However, it can be hard to command a decent rate in some medium sized and growing markets. Those are the worst. I know a masseur who charges $60 for incall massage, told me guys that will sometimes say, "can you do it for $40/50?" Even tryin to charge $150 in Denver is like moving mountains (pun intended). Matter of fact, the ideal rate is $0 an hour.

 

However, instead of increasing my hour rate, I find it better to workout arrangements with clients where we spend a certain amount of time together. To me, it's harder to get $300 an hour versus my evening rate. Therefore, I'm actually willing to do an hour for as low as $150, but it's been awhile since I've actually done 1 hour appointment.

[TruHart1]

Amoco - this +500 escorts issue in NYC is exactly why I just came home yesterday from my last trip there. I broke even, but I don't work to break even. I travel for only 3-4 days at a time. There's no way (outside of luck) to do well in those places anymore as someone who has the burden of all this overhead. If I lived in NYC/SF/Chicago/Miami/LA/etc, I can see how it could still work to have an ad in such a large market. I will no longer go to the biggest cities, unless I have an overnight included in the itinerary (or am hired by a single client to be in whatever saturated market for him alone). I am not interested in competing in that type of chaos, and I have never yet buckled to pressure to lower my rate. When I have been to NYC/SF/Chicago and other huge markets, I have done well (and avoided burnout) specifically because I was not "competing" in a race to the bottom. But now there are areas that are just too saturated with ads (and I don't like big cities as a general rule anyway). San Diego is a particularly terrible example of what happens with "competition." Those silly people have underpriced each other to the point that it would be inconceivable for me to travel there. No way: They're charging 1995 rates in 2015.

 

I will completely transition out of this and do something else when the time comes to lower my rate. It will happen in time, but I have been graceful thus far (in terms of aging, if nothing else). I've already started the transition process, in fact. I realized that one of the reasons Charlotte has never supported me well is because I was often somewhere else when someone sent a local inquiry. My intent going forward is to focus on traveling mostly for those who wish to see me for weekends, being more available for the generally inconsistent (but occasionally substantial) Charlotte appointments, and taking a monthly/quarterly trip to supplement my income by going to one of my bastion cities (DC, Little Rock, Kansas City, etc.). But this traveling every weekend and being at a different airport every three days has gone on long enough. I'm going to get re-certified to be a personal trainer (I did it for six years, so I know what to expect), and I want to learn more about the process of becoming certified to stage houses for realtors (I had to shoot 70 scenes for Anteros Media in a house with only seven rooms, and I had to make each scene look like a different location, so that's an example of an adult entertainment skill/experience translating to a totally different type of work).

 

By 2011 I had already accomplished what I had set out to do: 1) pay off a massive fraud debt, 2) stabilize financially, and 3) amass enough savings to not feel threatened all the time. Since then I have been planting seeds (and hoping they grow). I don't need or want to work as hard as I have been since 2006. I realized (after my grandmother died recently), that I have been meeting or exceeding an external, artificial goal that I defined arbitrarily as "success." It is a nice, round number. Easy to remember, easy to gauge as a barometer of progress. But I don't need to put that kind of pressure on myself anymore.

 

Much like your blog, you are succinctly cogent and clear in your above post, Devon. I always wish you nothing but success in all your endeavors, whether escorting, personal training, house stager (is that a term?) or anything else you decide to pursue! You'll always be one of the best as far as I'm concerned!

 

TruHart1

[Decatur Guy]

Devon, you have a very good head on your shoulders.

[Decatur Guy]

The increase in cost here is imaginary and hypothetical. Devon wasn't charging $180/hr—so his fee didn't increase by 67%. It increased by 20%—and that was over a five year period. That actually works out to $10/yr, or between 3-4% annually. Considering that travel costs over the past five years have definitely outstripped that pace, he's actually making the same or less now.

 

I used to travel a good bit but had to cut way back on it for several reasons in the past 10 years. I'm in a position where I can travel more again, and I've gotten major sticker shock at how much hotel rooms have gone up.

[mike carey]

Devon, you have a very good head on your shoulders.

He does, Decatur. I'm glad that he does, as clients we need to understand the financial pressures on escorts and not make selfish judgments about them.

[Decatur Guy]

He does, Decatur. I'm glad that he does, as clients we need to understand the financial pressures on escorts and not make selfish judgments about them.

 

Yeah, I understand where they are coming from. I'd raise my rates as well.

 

But my understanding that doesn't change my monthly cash flow either. My budget is my budget, and like many Americans, that raise pool is looking sparse these days.

 

It's like buying cars. Now I think a BMW is worth the money, but next time I buy a car, I'm still going to have to get a Mazda. I just can't outlay for a BMW no matter how much of a value it may be.

[+ Chris Eisenhower]

I used to travel a good bit but had to cut way back on it for several reasons in the past 10 years. I'm in a position where I can travel more again, and I've gotten major sticker shock at how much hotel rooms have gone up.

 

Right? And don't forget about airfares. It was $700 to fly from DCA to Palm Springs the first year I went. Before 9/11 you could fly to London or Amsterdam for under $400. The most expensive flight Southwest offered (and they advertised this) was $189. Chicago to Nashville round trip was $42. And the first time I ever flew to BWI was under $50.

 

Now you pay that for a freakin' suitcase.

[mike carey]

*looks up fares to IAD/DCA/BWI*

[MiamiLooker]

Clients will pay what they think the service is worth. Hopefully, the escort’s fees are in line with the escort’s services. The escort has to be careful not to confuse their business service with personal ego when determining their fees.

[Decatur Guy]

Right? And don't forget about airfares. It was $700 to fly from DCA to Palm Springs the first year I went. Before 9/11 you could fly to London or Amsterdam for under $400. The most expensive flight Southwest offered (and they advertised this) was $189. Chicago to Nashville round trip was $42. And the first time I ever flew to BWI was under $50.

 

Now you pay that for a freakin' suitcase.

 

You're right. I went to Portugal in the '90s -- all expenses total -- for about the same amount of money it costs to just fly there now.

[curiousnomore]

An escort posting data and charts? This be my corner, bitch!

 

Kevin Slater

I have my own "corner" at work too, Kevin. Guard it jealously LOL!

[+ Chris Eisenhower]

*looks up fares to IAD/DCA/BWI*

 

Yeah, cause I ain't coming to Sydney what with the evil devil shit that lives there that will kill you as soon as you walk off the plane (spiders, great whites, irukandji).

[devonhunter]

The escort has to be careful not to confuse their business service with personal ego when determining their fees.

 

 

I disagree with this portion of your comment, but I don't know why exactly. I don't think I understand your perspective on quality. I also can't tell if you are conflating high fees with bloated egos. If an escort doesn't charge what his ego demands, then how is the quality of the encounter improved by him settling for less than he thinks he's worth? Are you considering, not only the value of the ego, but also the value of the compromised ego? And, regardless off all these deeper philosophical points, it's all moot when milk costs $5/gallon. The price of life is what it is. Businesses that don't adjust upward cannot survive. Such is "progress."

[TruHart1]

I disagree with this portion of your comment, but I don't know why exactly. I don't think I understand your perspective on quality. I also can't tell if you are conflating high fees with bloated egos. If an escort doesn't charge what his ego demands, then how is the quality of the encounter improved by him settling for less than he thinks he's worth? Are you considering, not only the value of the ego, but also the value of the compromised ego? And, regardless off all these deeper philosophical points, it's all moot when milk costs $5/gallon. The price of life is what it is. Businesses that don't adjust upward cannot survive. Such is "progress."

 

Hear, hear! Devon!!! ...and have you seen how much eggs have skyrocketed in price since avian flu has decimated the chicken population? Get the man that glass of water for those vapors!!!

 

TruHart1

[devonhunter]

Child... don't bring me one of those $2 bottles of water either... I'll give you a nickel for a sip.

[mike carey]

I find it interesting that some comments have been along the lines that their salary hasn't gone up so an escort's fee shouldn't go up either. Also that there are few specific expenses for escorting (travel expenses for trips to other cities aside). An escort has to make enough money to live, so if that is their only business they have to adjust their fee to enable them to pay rent and buy food. If they need to put up their fee to do that, then that is what they have to do. If some of their clients haven't had a pay rise and can't afford to hire, or to hire so often, that's life. Now there may be other economies that some escorts can make but not all. Devon is doing this by looking at the cities he travels to. Others may have other ways to reduce their cost of living. In the end, any escort can only charge what the market will bear. If people will pay, they can keep escorting, if they won't they have to find another source of income. If an escort still has clients and some of us as clients don't want to pay his new fee it's our problem not his.

[MiamiLooker]

IMHO: Charge whatever you want but don’t go into detail trying to justify your fees.