Every calibration figure in the book, on one page. Costs are the only content here that spoils — so this is the book's perishable page, kept current on this site.
| Loop | Item | Figure (2026) |
|---|---|---|
| Problem | Manual delivery — tooling | $0–60 a month |
| Problem | Disposable no-code prototype — subscriptions | $25–180 a month |
| Problem | Lean first build | $3,500–30,000 |
| Problem | Testing the risky core alone (freelance harness) | $0–1,800 |
| Solution | Prototype budget before a freelancer beats your hours | 20–40 founder-hours, then $500–1,800 |
| Solution | AI building tools — subscriptions | $25–100 a month |
| Solution | Independent inspection (keep-and-harden road) | $300–1,500 |
| Product | Agency build (lean scope) | $10,000–48,000 |
| Product | Freelancer build (lean scope) | $1,800–9,500 |
| Product | You, continuing with AI tools — tooling | $120–600 |
| Product | First technical hire (premature in this loop) | $18,000–54,000 a year |
| Product | Independent scoping engagement (Split-Rule-clean) | $300–1,200, one to two weeks |
| Product | Skill escalation — any single quote above | $25,000 |
| Product | Mainstream-stack engineer, global-remote | $30,000–70,000 a year; niche stack +30–50% |
| Product | Backup-restore ritual — storage | $0–25 a month |
| Product | Uptime monitoring (the smoke alarm) | $0–35 a month |
| Market | Off-the-shelf analytics | $0–50 a month |
| Market | Builder retainer at MVP scale | $100–480 a month |
| Market | Infrastructure at 10 / 100 / 1,000 users | $25–120 / $100–360 / $300–950 a month |
| Fit | Skill escalation — concentration in one customer above | 40% |
| Fit | Rented expert interviewer | A few hours at $60–180 per candidate |
These are calibration figures, not quotes. Story figures from the book (real quotes, real invoices) are not repeated here — they are history, not calibration. Individual decision guides carry their own dated cost ranges, some in INR.
Revisions to this page are announced in the newsletter — cost updates, AI-era revisions, and new decisions, weekly. The framework beneath them doesn't move.