One of my missions as the co-host of Freelance Success is to take away some of the confusion and uncertainty that comes all too easily to those of us working for ourselves.

As part of that effort, I decided to do a very transparent look at my year in freelancing. Here is a breakdown of what happened in my freelance business last year: the good, the bad, and the bloody.

Quick Figures

💰 Total Revenue: $101,212.26

📈 Compared to 2024: -$56,374.28

📜 Invoices Sent: 40

💸 Average Days to Get Paid: 9

👨‍💼 Number of Clients: 11

🔁 Repeat or Retainer Clients: 9 of 11

Monthly by Month:

🔵 Money in (revenue)

🟠 Money out (expenses)

🟢 Profit (take-home pay and savings)

Context: What happened in 2025

This was a big year of transition for my business, which explains why my income was a bit all over the place. Most but not all of these transitions were intentional. I won't bore you with the details, but here are the most important milestones and contributing factors:

Sabbatical

I am in the midst of a self-directed MFA in an effort to finish and publish a full-length memoir. As part of that, I took a sabbatical in January and February, using money I've saved to support myself while I worked on my book. This meant I wasn't doing as much marketing or freelance work as I normally would, which is why in February I was at 0 income.

The Expenses

Looking at the orange line on the chart, you might think I'm spending wildly on expenses. While I probably have some cutting I could do, I also work hard to make sure I can claim as much as possible for my business, and reduce my taxes. My biggest expense categories were:

Taxes: I pay quarterly taxes, and you can see those bumps in the orange line when I submitted payments to the IRS.
Rent: I rent a room in Boston with a small office, and I claim taxes on the office portion.
Travel: I occasionally travel to meet with clients and collaborators, and will claim expenses when I'm on the road.
Software Subscriptions: I use a multitude of mostly affordable tools to run and market my business, but it adds up.

Slow Summer

This summer was dreadfully slow for me, and in general, like many freelancers, I found 2025 to be particularly challenging in terms of landing new clients and convincing them to pay the right price. There are a lot of factors at play here: economic and political uncertainty, the rise of AI, and my own attempts to transition my business in new and exciting (but less lucrative) directions.

End of Year Boon

You can see a big spike at the end of the year, which is a result of several of my trusted clients giving me some big retainers for the end of the year. I see the end of the year as the best time to bring in cash, and this chart proves it. FLX members can read about the tactics I used to pull in that income in my End of Year Income Boost post here.

So that's it — that's how my 2025 was. This year, I hope to recoup a lot of that income I lost, especially since I'm not taking any sabbaticals. More on how I plan to do that in future posts.

Now, how was your 2025? If you feel comfortable, share some stats from your year, and together we can draw a picture of the year gone by.

#freelance #finance #freelancing

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Transparent Freelancer: An Honest Look at 2025