The Level Index, by trade
Mechanical contractor financial benchmarks
Mechanical references from Comfort Systems, EMCOR and Limbach, whose consolidated results include different work mixes. Filing margins and separately labeled Level calculations retain FY2024-2025 periods. Level pooled contractor metrics provide context, with trade variation unmeasured.
19-28%
Gross margin
across three selected public contractors with substantial mechanical operations (FY2024-2025)
6-11%
Net margin
Comfort Systems, EMCOR, Limbach (FY2024-2025)
~$324-401K
Revenue / employee
Level calculation from SEC filings, FY2024-2025; employee definitions differ
~90-118 days
DSO
retained public receivables/revenue ratios; no isolated billing or retainage cause
Match the segment before comparing margins
Mechanical has useful public comparables, but consolidated EMCOR and Comfort Systems include electrical and other work. The segment definitions distinguish customer relationships and mixed business lines; use those scopes rather than a mechanical pure-play label.
The public references use different segment definitions. EMCOR reported 6.0% US Building Services and 12.8% US Mechanical Construction operating margin in FY2025. Building Services includes facilities contracts, HVAC retrofits, automation/controls projects and repairs, so it is not a pure recurring-O&M comparison. Limbach reported 31.2% ODR and 21.1% GCR gross margin in FY2024, grouping customer relationships rather than diagnostic service alone. Compare these scopes separately; gross and operating margin cannot be ranked interchangeably.
Read each segment definition, then compare revenue and complete direct cost for equivalent work. Customer relationships and business-segment categories are not interchangeable.
Source: EMCOR FY2025 filing and separately identified FY2024 Limbach comparison
How to read this: Level research pools HVAC, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, refrigeration and fire protection. Roofing and general contracting are outside that pool. The sources below are selected for relevance to mechanical contractors; some are proxies or all-contractor references (SEC filings, BLS, CFMA, industry research), each tagged by confidence tier. Level's research below combines those trades. Some older figures have not been checked again against their original sources. Each value explains the time period, businesses included and what was measured.
Public contractors with substantial mechanical operations, with each scope stated.
Public mechanical contractor gross margin, FY2024-2025
Source / sample: FY2024-2025 10-Ks (LMB, FIX, EME)
The retained FY2024-2025 references show 19-28% gross and 6-11% net margins at large diversified contractors with substantial mechanical operations. Consolidated results include other work. They are comparison points, not a measured private-shop range or attainable upper bound; match segment and margin definition first.
Reported margins differ across customer relationships and mixed business segments; the categories do not isolate a cause.
Two public segment cuts with different definitions (gross vs operating margin)
Source / sample: Limbach FY2024 (gross margin); EMCOR FY2025 (operating margin)
EMCOR FY2025 operating margins and Limbach FY2024 gross margins compare different definitions. EMCOR Building Services includes both facilities and project/repair work. Limbach ODR groups owner relationships, not exclusively diagnostic service. These observations motivate a matched-scope check; they do not isolate a pricing, bidding, scale or overhead mechanism.
Selected public mechanical receivable ratios run 90 to 118 days; net financing cost needs its own calculation.
Implied DSO from FY2024-2025 receivables (days)
Source / sample: Computed from SEC 10-K receivables / revenue
Public receivable-to-revenue ratios describe balances, not a measured invoice-payment cohort. Financing depends on net working capital: eligible receivables, contract assets and retainage less payables, retainage payable and billings in excess. Calculate net financed balance times annual rate times actual days/365. A high gross receivable ratio does not by itself prove financing loss.
Source: Computed from Comfort Systems, EMCOR, Limbach FY2024-2025 10-Ks
Mechanical benchmarks, by source
5 source-verified rows (Tier A to E)Expand all 5 source-verified mechanical benchmark rowsEvery metric is tagged by confidence level, from Tier A through Tier E, with direct SEC filing, BLS wage, and CFMA source links.
Public mechanical gross margin
Tier A19% to 28%
Comfort Systems 21-24%, EMCOR 19%, Limbach 26-28% (FY2024-2025).
Source: SEC 10-K filings (FIX, EME, LMB)
Public mechanical net margin
Tier A6% to 11%
Comfort Systems 7-11%, EMCOR 6.9% (retained FY2024), Limbach 6.0% (FY2025).
Source: SEC 10-K filings
Revenue per employee
Tier D~$324K to $401K
Comfort Systems ~$401K (FY2025); retained EMCOR ~$386K and Limbach ~$324K references span FY2024-2025, with individual headcount denominators requiring verification before a current-company comparison.
Source: Computed from SEC 10-K filings
Mechanical DSO (implied)
Tier D~90 to 118 days
EMCOR ~91, Comfort Systems ~103, Limbach ~118, computed from FY2024-2025 receivables. Reflects retainage and progress billing.
Source: Computed from SEC 10-K filings
CFMA specialty-trade net before tax
Tier B6.9% (all-respondent Best in Class reference 11.9%)
Historical 2023 specialty-trade central reference. The 11.9% value describes the all-respondent Best in Class group, top 25% ranked by performance metrics, not a specialty-trade net-margin percentile; these are different populations.
Source: CFMA 2024 Construction Financial Benchmarker (n=1,290)
Tier A = stated public-company SEC or BLS observations; verify the exact period and scope. Tier B = trade-association survey or research-firm report (CFMA, IBISWorld). Tier C = industry publications or planning references, directional only. Tier D = Level calculations from filing inputs. Tier E = Level pooled research. Public-company figures describe large operators, not typical private firms or attainable upper bounds. Where sources conflict, both are shown, never averaged.
What the public mechanical contractors actually earn
These contractors have substantial mechanical operations and different other business lines. FY2024-2025 segment definitions separate customer relationships or business scope; they do not isolate a single service-pricing effect.
| Company / scope | Gross | Operating | Net | What it tells you |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Comfort Systems USA (FIX)Consolidated, FY2025 | 24.1% | 14.4% | ~11.2% | Large public commercial mechanical contractor. |
| EMCOR (EME)US Mechanical Construction segment, FY2025 | n/d | 12.8% | n/d | The mechanical-construction arm. |
| EMCOR (EME)US Building Services segment, FY2025 | n/d | 6.0% | n/d | Mixed facilities, retrofit, controls and repair work; operating margin, not gross margin. |
| Limbach (LMB)ODR vs GCR gross margin, FY2024 | 31.2% / 21.1% | n/d | n/d | Owner-direct vs general-contractor relationships; not service-only. |
EMCOR segment operating margins exclude corporate administration; they are not consolidated operating margins. n/d = not disclosed at that cut. EMCOR FY2025 consolidated operating margin (10.1%) includes an 85 bps one-time UK-ops-sale gain; the reported US segment margins exclude the separately presented sale gain. Limbach discloses gross margin by segment only.
The Level lens: cost-completeness scenario (fictional)
Fictional mechanical service contract: a 40% incomplete contribution estimate becomes 22% after three separately identified costs.
Illustrative cost-completeness bridge, percentage of revenue
Source / sample: Fictional scenario; assumed cost percentages, not a measured cohort
Illustrative assumptions on $100 of revenue: an initial incomplete contribution estimate of $40, then separately omitted costs of $9, $4 and $5, leaving $22. This is not measured gross or net margin. Check your ledger before each adjustment: subtract only cost missing from the starting estimate. Fully burdened direct labor already included in gross profit must not be subtracted again. Allocate shared overhead once, distinguish economic contribution from financial-statement margin, and do not treat a rounded scenario as a trade benchmark. Financing is balance × annual rate × actual days/365, divided by revenue to express percentage points. The assumed final reduction is not derived from the public-company DSO range; build it from your own financed balance, rate and holding period.
Public-company anchors used
Comfort Systems USA (FIX), EMCOR (EME), Limbach (LMB). These are large, publicly traded operators. Filing observations and Level calculations labeled Tier D are separately scoped reference points, not a stand-in for a typical private mechanical shop, which runs on different economics.
Level's pooled contractor references
These are pooled references from Level's 2,242-contractor research universe, with a separate eligible sample for each metric. Trade variation is not measured here. The pool covers HVAC, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, refrigeration and fire protection; it has no roofing or GC segment. Match your definitions and work mix before comparing.
Expand all 4 pooled cross-trade contractor reference metrics (n=2,242 universe)Includes blended gross margin, net profit, labor share, AR days, and cash reserve references across mechanical and specialty trades.
n=464 (blended). Cash collected divided by billed revenue across the six-trade pool; top decile 96.0%. The benchmark window is not published. Timing, credits and write-offs need separate reconciliation.
n=733 total; post-completion subset count not published (blended). 1 day with progress billing included; 7 days among post-completion invoicers. Subset and bottom-decile populations are not separately counted.
n=794 (blended). On decided quotes; 38.1% across all quotes.
n=1,747,089 jobs / 1,791 companies (blended). Blended across trades. Compare only jobs where revenue and direct costs are assigned to the same job.
How AI performs on Commercial Mechanical WIP cutoffs, AR delays & cash covenants (LevelBench-100)Why raw AI chatbots miss working-capital cash signs and unbilled WIP, and how Level Playbooks from 2,200+ past experiences prevent bad QuickBooks entries.
Commercial mechanical contractors operate with longer DSO cycles (~90 to 105 days in public SEC filings), progress billing, and multi-trade subcontractors. In LevelBench-100 (v3.0) (modeled on synthetic entity CompanyCo Apex Mechanical & Landscaping LLC at $4.85M annual revenue and cross-entity covenant workflow WF09 across 100 binary checks), unassisted AI models scored 31.0% to 71.0% and failed on three close controls:
- 13-Week Cash Covenant & QuickBooks Debt Grouping (WF09): Starting from $141,580.45 cash and $216,580.45 base ending cash, when a $135,000.00 commercial Accounts Receivable collection slips past week 13, downside ending cash drops to $81,580.45, breaching the $100,000.00 bank line-of-credit covenant floor by $18,419.55. Unassisted models frequently invert working-capital cash signs (-Delta AR, +Delta AP) or miss `Current Portion of Term Debt` grouped under QuickBooks `Other Current Liability`.
- Completed-But-Unbilled WIP, Unsigned CRM Options & Subcontractor Proration (WF06, CompanyCo Apex): Omitting $28,500.00 of completed September field jobs while recognizing unsigned CRM estimate options or $19,000.00 of November customer deposits early, and failing to prorate cross-month subcontractor bills on Monday-to-Friday business days ($3,600.00 September share).
- Missing Check Stubs & Prior-Bookkeeper Manual JEs (WF01, CompanyCo Apex): Guessing categories on $20,200.00 of unverified paper checks without check images, double-counting `Uncategorized Expense` rows already adjusted by a prior bookkeeper's manual Journal Entry, and failing to separate $235.00 of Intuit merchant fees from $19,450.00 settlement batches.
AI paired with Level Playbooks (built from 2,200+ past SMB experiences) and operator review reaches 100.0% accuracy and a 0.0% bad book-entry rate, pairing accrual-gap diagnostics with historical QuickBooks subledger cleanup.
Frequently asked questions (5)Answers on mechanical contractor profit margins, data sources, and safe QuickBooks automation.
What is a good profit margin for a mechanical contractor?
It depends on whether you mean gross or net, and on commercial vs residential work. The best hard reference points are public-company actuals: Public mechanical gross margin: 19% to 28%. Comfort Systems 21-24%, EMCOR 19%, Limbach 26-28% (FY2024-2025). This is a scoped reference, not a measured distribution of private mechanical firms.. The retained CFMA 2024 Benchmarker (2023 financials, 1,290 valid financial respondents) reports 6.3% net income before tax for all respondents and 11.9% for its Best in Class group, the top 25% ranked by performance metrics rather than a net-margin percentile. These are historical all-contractor references, not a measured mechanical-only cohort or a current target. Small private shops vary widely, so use the tiered sources on this page rather than a single number.
Where does this mechanical benchmark data come from?
Named sources selected for relevance to mechanical contractors, including separately labeled proxies and all-contractor references: public-company SEC 10-K filings, BLS wage data, CFMA's Construction Financial Benchmarker, and industry research, each tagged by confidence tier with a source link. Level's pooled research covers HVAC, plumbing, electrical, mechanical, refrigeration and fire protection; it excludes roofing and general contractors. It includes mechanical operators among these segments, but Level does not publish a separately measured mechanical-only cohort. Collection, billing and quote metrics are pooled cross-trade references; the broader 2,200+ research universe is not the contributing sample for each metric.
How does Level verify commercial mechanical QuickBooks ledgers, WIP cutoffs, and working-capital covenants?
In LevelBench-100 v3.0 (38 AI models and setups evaluated across 100 binary checks), the primary contractor benchmark entity is CompanyCo Apex Mechanical & Landscaping LLC ($4.85M annual revenue). Across all 27 unassisted foundation models, raw takeover accuracy ranged from 31.0% to 71.0% and every model posted a 14.3% to 57.1% bad book-entry rate (out of 28 safety and subledger checks) when reconciling contractor ledgers: double-counting expenses already adjusted by a prior bookkeeper's manual Journal Entry or failing to exclude prior-period and voided checks from $54,925.00 of in-period outflows (WF01), recognizing unsigned CRM estimate options or omitting $28,500.00 in completed-but-unbilled September WIP (WF06), or missing a $100,000.00 debt covenant breach under a $135,000.00 commercial AR collection delay (WF09, where downside ending cash falls to $81,580.45 for an $18,419.55 covenant shortfall). Pairing AI with Level Playbooks (built from 2,200+ past SMB experiences) and operator review achieves 100.0% accuracy and a 0.0% bad book-entry rate across all 100 checks.
Are the public mechanical contractors a good benchmark for my shop?
They offer useful, separately scoped public references. Comfort Systems, EMCOR and Limbach include substantial mechanical operations alongside different business mixes. Their retained FY2024-2025 figures (19-28% gross, 6-11% net) are not a measured private-shop distribution or a promised upper bound. Match customer relationship, work type, scale and margin definition before applying a comparison.
Why is my mechanical DSO so high?
Retainage and progress billing affect public-company receivable ratios, but do not explain your own aging. Match the ratio definition, then trace billed, unbilled, disputed and retainage balances. Carrying cost depends on net financed working capital after payables and contract liabilities, not gross receivables alone.
Tier A and B rows name their source and link the record or source index where available. The full tiered dataset for all six trades (public-company actuals, BLS wages, CFMA and market figures, each with its source URL) is downloadable and free to cite with attribution. Download the per-trade benchmark facts (JSON).
See where your mechanical numbers land
We pull your margin, labor economics, and collections and compare your matched-scope figures with public references and the pooled Level Index, with each sample identified, then show you the first leak to fix.
No commitment. Real numbers, not generic advice.