Do they not have you prepare designs for "pseudo" clients as part of your school work? This was a common practice when I attended design school. The instructor would provide us with a live client that provided a design brief for us to address as well giving us access to the property to measure and take photos. While we would each generate a design master plan (initially it was with a partner), the designs were never actually installed but critiqued by the rest of the class and the instructor. An excellent learning process!!

If this is not available - and it should be - you could do the exact same thing with family or friends to create a pretend design for practice.

I'm taking online courses. I'm 20% done and I just get bored with text work. I did a mock design for my moms property though. I just need to get better markers to tighten up the rendering and actually draw in the finished design on vellum. 

I was hoping that there was perhaps a site with public domain site surveys of properties maybe on the market.

Some cities will provide property site maps for a small fee, usually based by property legal description (so formally surveyed). But they are small scale and provide minimal detail. You really cannot prepare a meaningful design without a site visit and the taking of necessary measurements. This is something that even comes up as a big fail with online design services - nothing can effectively replace an onsite presence to evaluate the site and take all necessary measurements, including topography.

I guess I need to pull some favors from some family then because I have to be able to do this work and do it correctly.

I'd love to have a young whippersnapper designer-wannabe offer her services for my 746SF condo. It was a rental when I bought it two years ago and I haven't gotten around to changing a thing.

You'd get the practice and portfolio and I'd get a way out of all this purple.

Im a male. I'll give you a design for $100. All drawn to scale and rendered.

Don't sell yourself too cheaply!! Even a newbie, inexperienced designer's time is worth money so start now how you mean to continue.

And just so we are all on the same page, this IS landscape/garden design we are talking about.

What would be a fair price for an inexperienced designer to do a condo?

First, a fixed price is not the way to go, especially for a job that is sight unseen. You have no idea how big or complicated a job it may be and how many hours of your life it might eat up. A condo may have a tiny garden to be sure but you still don't know any details. And I'd suspect the 746sf, heavily purple one in question is referring to the interior of the condo, not the garden/exterior. 😐

So at the very least you'd want to charge minimum hourly wage (here $15/hr and I wouldn't consider a penny less!). And even with many years experience, it is hard to generate a comprehensive, to scale and rendered landscape design plan in 5 hours or less, regardless of size.

I never charged for "practice designs" while still a student. They were just a necessary part of the learning experience. But I did start charging a moderate hourly rate as soon as I got a real, paying client. And 30 years ago, that hourly rate was significantly more than today's minimum wage!!

Determine what value you bring to the transaction and the time involved and charge accordingly.

So how would an hourly rate work when youre at the studio getting the design done? Do you just charge the hours you work and assume the client will trust you?

" Do you just charge the hours you work and assume the client will trust you? "

Yes. But you have already met the client, seen the scope of the project and provided a verbal rough estimate of the time you anticipate it will take to complete. Once you get a few of these under your belt and gain some experience, you'll become pretty good at hitting the mark. I always estimate just a skosh on the high side so the client will be pleased when you come in under target.

There any solid advice you could give? I appreciate all the insight. I think I gotta knack and itll be mostly just getting practice and experience.

Other than to generate and complete as many practice designs as you can, I think I've provided good advice relevant to the issue at hand. 🤗

tbh, IMO you are working at a disadvantage with an online course of study. There are some applications of successful landscape design that need an in person, hands-on approach that this process lacks. And online only study eliminates the personal interaction with fellow students and instructors and participation in design critiques that are essential in developing and refining your problem solving and design skills. I realize that many do not have the opportunity or economic wherewithal to attend a brick and mortar design school but it is really the much preferred route.

Best of luck with your endeavors.

You are not close to ready to take on a client yet. You need at least a year or so doing those FULL practice designs, with Concepts, Development, Plans, Sourcing, and Installation done. That means the full specs and architectural plans that will be needed to communicate with any client or trade that has to take the ideas and make them concrete.

Charging is a whole other ball of wax. You aren't doing 80 hours of work for $100. You're not doing a render for $100. A design is an idea that can be made concrete by the documentation to make it concrete. So keep on keeping on, and then get a job under an experienced designer to teach you the 85% of design that isn't taught in school.