How to pay for a book

General information about costs and fees, not financial or tax advice.

Spend in phases

Here is the calculator's freelancer example for a 50,000-word nonfiction book, $7,970 in total, laid out in the order the bills arrive:

Typical rates from the EFA 2026 chart, Reedsy, Bowker, the Copyright Office and Amazon KDP. See the costs page for each source.

Two things follow. First, the first commitment is about a quarter of the total. If the developmental edit tells you the book needs another draft, you have not yet paid for anything that would be wasted. Second, the later phases are the ones other people can help fund, because by then you have a cover and pages to show them.

Presales

A presale is a copy someone pays for before the book exists. You can sell signed copies on your own website, at talks, or to your email list, then fulfill them from author copies.

The margin is easy to work out. On Amazon KDP, a 140-page black-ink paperback costs $2.68 to print (KDP). Sell it directly for $20 and you keep $20.00 minus $2.68, or $17.32, before shipping and your payment processor's fee. Seventy such presales cover a $1,000 cover-and-layout bill with about $3 a book left over for shipping. Compare a sale on Amazon at $16.99, which earns about $7.51 (see the break-even guide).

Presales also tell you something money cannot: whether the people you wrote the book for will pay for it. If the presale stalls, that is information worth having before the print run.

Crowdfunding: what the platforms take

Kickstarter and Indiegogo both run all-or-nothing campaigns for books: backers pledge, and you collect only if you reach your goal. Their published fees, checked October 20, 2026:

The fees are the small part. The larger cost is the rewards. Work out what each pledge actually leaves you before you set the goal. Take a $25 pledge on Kickstarter that earns a signed paperback:

• Kickstarter's 5%: $1.25
• Processing, 3% + $0.30: $1.05
• Printing the paperback: $2.68
• Left for the book's costs: $20.02, minus what it costs you to ship the reward

Suppose your own shipping quote comes to $5 a book. Each $25 backer then nets $15.02, so raising $5,000 for production takes 333 backers, not 200. Set the goal from the net figure, add a margin for backers who never complete payment, and keep reward tiers simple: every extra item has a cost and a shipping weight.

Crowdfunding works best for authors who already have an audience to tell. A campaign is a launch in itself, so plan the time it takes as well as the money.

Bulk orders by your company

For business authors, the most common funder of the print run is the author's own company. The business buys copies at print cost to send to clients and prospects, hand out at events, or include in onboarding. The money that would have gone to brochures goes to books.

Michael Erath's firm mails his book to prospects; each copy goes out in branded packaging, and his Scribe Media story puts the result at "$16" "All-In Cost Per Book Placed" (his story). That is one firm's figure, not a benchmark, but it is a useful way to think: what does it cost to put the book in one right person's hands, and what is one new client worth?

Bulk orders also flow the other way. Organizations buy books for their members or staff. Chris Heivly's story reports "3 Years Later" "Still selling in bulk," with communities still buying it in quantity (his story). Again, one example, not a promise. If you expect bulk orders, two numbers matter: on KDP, author copies are print cost with no further discount; on IngramSpark, discounts on books you buy directly start at 100 copies (IngramSpark). For runs in the thousands, get offset quotes; see the printing guide.

How your company accounts for books it buys and gives away is a question for your accountant, not this site.

Payment plans

Most freelance editors and designers bill per project, and many take a deposit with the balance on delivery; ask each one. For larger contracts, Reedsy notes that ghostwriting clients can "expect to pay part of the fee upfront and the rest in installments" (Reedsy). Tie each payment to something delivered: an editorial letter, a set of chapters, final files.

Full-service companies often price by the month. Scribe Media, which makes this site, lists its packages that way: Scribe Publishing is $4,833 a month for 6 months ($29,000), and Guided Author is $2,933 a month for 15 months ($44,000) (published prices). A monthly price spreads the cost but does not reduce it; compare totals, not monthly figures.

If the numbers still do not work

Cut scope before you cut quality where it shows. In order of least damage:

1. Shorten the book. Editing is priced per word: 10,000 fewer words saves $900 to $1,200 across a developmental edit, copy edit and proofread at EFA nonfiction rates.
2. Lay it out yourself with a free tool, if it is mostly text.
3. Take the free ISBN if you will sell only on Amazon. See the ISBN guide for the trade-off.
4. Replace the developmental edit with an assessment and revise from the report yourself.
5. Skip the audiobook for now. You can add it later, or use royalty share for no upfront cost.

Keep the copy edit, the proofread and a professional cover. The calculator's do-it-yourself example, at about $1,900 for 50,000 words, shows the floor. Build your own version in the calculator, then see how many copies it takes to earn it back.