Retreat Budget Builder

How to use this

Enter every cost you can think of, and for each one decide a single thing: does it still exist if a guest cancels? Fixed costs do. Per-guest costs do not. That one classification is what turns a list of expenses into a budget you can make decisions with.

The lines people forget

The default lines cover the obvious costs. These are the ones that show up later:

• Your own fee. Included by default here, because leaving it out is the most expensive habit in retreat budgeting.
• The teacher's flights and accommodation, which are fixed and often forgotten because the fee was negotiated separately.
• Cleaning fees, tourist tax and damage deposits, which sit outside the headline venue price.
• Payment processing, 2–4% of every ticket, plus currency conversion on foreign cards.
• Your own travel to and from the retreat.
• Photography, which for a first retreat is often the largest marketing line.

The contingency is not spending money

Ten percent, held separately and treated as gone. It exists so that a broken boiler or a cancelled teacher's flight does not turn a profitable retreat into an unprofitable one. If it survives the week untouched, it is profit — but budget as though it will not.

Cost per guest is not your price

The cost-per-guest figure divides everything across the headcount you entered. It is what the retreat costs to deliver at that number, and it is the floor beneath your price, not the price itself. Your fee, your profit and the risk of a smaller house all sit on top.

The full cost checklist, with what each line commonly hides, is in the planning guide.