As far as doing it intelligently goes, I’d like to quote what a gentleman who started as a service tech and eventually opened his own company has to say about it. “A person needs to be so intelligent to correctly and legally operate an hvacr company that I can’t understand how anyone intelligent enough to do so would be unintelligent enough to want to!”
The vast majority of contractors were at one time service techs themselves and started their own company under the misguided premise that, since the company’s service rates are six to eight times their hourly rate, they could quit their job, charge half of what the company charges, and still make a killing. That is exactly why 80% of the companies started close within three years and about one-half of the service contractors go out of business every five years.