An honest comparison

Lead sites vs owning
your own funnel

Angi, Thumbtack and Google Local Services Ads all deliver real jobs. The honest questions are what each booked job costs, who else is bidding on it, and what you are left with the day you stop paying.

Credit first

What the lead sites do well

Angi's pitch is real: you can start receiving leads almost as soon as you sign up, and you borrow the visibility of an established brand with verified reviews. Industry reviewers note it can work especially well in rural or low-competition markets, for brand-new businesses that need exposure, and for emergency work.

Thumbtack puts real cost controls in your hands. Its own help center is clear: you set your exact lead price, you pay when a matched customer contacts you, its Opportunities listings show prices upfront, and there is a published refund policy for pros.

And Google Local Services Ads shows the strongest economics of the three in tracked data. Across $6.72M in spend for 888 contractors in February 2026, one analytics firm measured a $53 average cost per lead, a 43.9% book rate, and $233 per paying customer.

The numbers

  1. 01

    What a lead costs

    Angi does not publish official per-lead pricing, so the honest numbers are contractor reports: two independent industry sources put it at $15 to $85 per lead, with high-value trades over $100, plus an annual membership commonly around $300. Angi's own pro FAQ says only that "you pay a nominal fee for each lead you match to." On Thumbtack, one agency's analysis puts leads at $15 to $150 and up, and you choose the exact price you are willing to pay.

  2. 02

    Who else gets your lead

    Industry analyses report that Angi typically sells the same lead to 3 to 8 contractors at once. Angi's own FAQ confirms it connects each customer with multiple pros, without naming a number. One industry guide adds that since January 13, 2025, nearly all homeowners actively choose which contractors to match with, which helps, but you are still one of several names on the list. Thumbtack, to its credit, markets limited competition as part of its Quality Commitment.

  3. 03

    What a booked job costs

    One agency's 2026 analysis divides average lead cost by close rate and lands at $168 per booked job on Google Local Services Ads, $250 on Thumbtack, and $542 on Angi. The close-rate assumptions are theirs, so hold the exact dollars loosely. But the much larger tracked LSA dataset, at $233 per paying customer, lands in the same neighborhood, and the order of the three platforms holds.

The other side

Renting leads vs owning the asset

Every one of those platforms rents you demand. The day you pause the budget, the phone goes quiet, and the ranking, the reviews and the customer relationship stay on their site, not yours.

A funnel you own works differently. Your website, your Google Business Profile and your review base compound, so the money you spend this year is still working for you in three years. And when a homeowner finds you directly, you are the only contractor in the conversation. No lead fee, and no race to reply before five competitors do.

That is the whole trade in one sentence: lead sites are fast and rented, your own funnel is slower and yours.

Questions

Lead sites, answered plainly

Should I quit Angi or Thumbtack?

Not necessarily. If you track your cost per booked job and the math works, keep it running. The mistake we see is not using lead sites, it is having nothing of your own underneath them, so every job forever carries a platform fee.

Which lead platform has the best economics?

In the data we could verify, Google Local Services Ads. A tracked dataset of 888 contractors in February 2026 measured $233 per paying customer, and one agency's analysis ranked LSA ahead of Thumbtack and Angi on cost per booked job. Your trade and your market will move those numbers.

What does owning your own funnel actually mean?

A website you own, a Google Business Profile that ranks, a review base under your name, and a fast way to answer. Leads that arrive there are yours alone, and the asset keeps its value whether or not you are paying anyone that month.

See what your own funnel is doing today

If you are brand new and need jobs this week, a lead site is a fair answer. If you want the next five years to cost less per job, start with the funnel you already own. The free scan reads your site and profile and shows where leads are slipping, in about a minute.

Run a free scan

Sources