Routes for home services startups
| Route | Max credits | Who qualifies | Status |
|---|---|---|---|
| AWS Activate Founders | $1,000 | Self-funded, live website, no prior Activate credits | Open |
| Activate via a Provider | Up to $100,000 | Backed by an accelerator, VC or incubator in the Activate network | Open |
| Our partner match | Same as AWS | Any home services startup; we suggest the best route | Open |
Amounts are programme ceilings, not what every company gets. Approval is never guaranteed.
What credits cover, and what they don't
- Compute: EC2, Lambda, ECS, Fargate
- Databases: RDS, Aurora, DynamoDB
- Storage: S3, EBS
- AI models: Amazon Bedrock on-demand usage
- Networking: CloudFront, data transfer
- Most first-party AWS services
- AWS Marketplace third-party software
- Route 53 domain name registration
- Upfront Reserved Instances and Savings Plans
- Business or Enterprise Support plans
- Taxes added to your bill
- Mining or other prohibited use
Does a home services company qualify?
- Product startups (software or hardware you sell) qualify for Activate. Agencies, consultancies and dev shops that bill by the hour usually don't, unless they're building their own product.
- Your company is usually under 10 years old, pre-Series B for the Provider tier, and hasn't had Activate credits before.
- Past the startup stage? Established home services companies can look at business and migration funding instead.
- Nonprofit or researcher? The AWS Imagine Grant and Cloud Credit for Research are separate from Activate.
Before you apply: readiness checklist
Most rejections come from fixable paperwork. Tick what you have ready: 0 of 7 done.
What credits buy for a home services product
ECS app, RDS, S3 for plans and photos, Location Service for listings
MVP
$250/mo
RDS$90
S3$55
Location Service$35
IoT Core$25
CloudFront$15
Data transfer, logs & support$30
Runway
$5,00020 mo
$25,000100 mo
$100,000400 mo
Seed
$1,500/mo
RDS$540
S3$330
Location Service$210
IoT Core$150
CloudFront$90
Data transfer, logs & support$180
Runway
$5,0003.3 mo
$25,00017 mo
$100,00067 mo
Growth
$8,000/mo
RDS$2,880
S3$1,760
Location Service$1,120
IoT Core$800
CloudFront$480
Data transfer, logs & support$960
Runway
$5,0000.6 mo
$25,0003.1 mo
$100,00013 mo
Planning estimates based on us-east-1 On-Demand list prices for the typical stack above, including storage, data transfer and support. Not an AWS quote; your bill depends on region, traffic and commitments. Credits usually expire after 12 to 24 months.
Estimate your home services bill
Enter your numbers to see the monthly AWS bill and how long credits last.
Active properties / projects$60
Documents processed (pages)$75
File storage (GB)$12
Portal users$30
Base stack (network, monitoring, backups)$80
Monthly total$257
Credits last
$1,0003.9 mo
$25,00097 mo
$100,00099+ mo
S3, CloudFront, Textract and Aurora list prices, approximate. Estimates, not an AWS quote. Credits usually expire in 12 to 24 months.
Where home services startups burn credits fastest
Drone scans and point clouds in S3 Standard
Site scans run to tens of gigabytes per flight and are rarely revisited.
Fix: Lifecycle completed projects to Glacier.
Re-processing photos on every view
Generating thumbnails on each request repeats work.
Fix: Generate renditions once on upload and cache in CloudFront.
Staging that never sleeps
Copies of production for staging, QA and demos often run 24/7 at full size, doubling or tripling the bill.
Fix: Schedule non-production environments to stop at night and weekends with Instance Scheduler, or use smaller instance sizes.
Unbounded CloudWatch logs
Debug-level logs from every request are ingested at about $0.50 per GB and kept forever by default.
Fix: Set log retention to 14 or 30 days and lower log levels in production.
How a home services request flows through AWS
- 0Your users
- 1S3
- 2Amazon Location Service
- 3Amazon Textract
- 4Amplify
- 5IoT Core
Reference AWS setup for home services
- FilesS3 + CloudFront · Plans, photos and documents
- MapsAmazon Location Service · Listings and site maps
- DocumentsAmazon Textract · Reads leases, invoices and permits
- AppAmplify + Aurora · Portals for owners, tenants and crews
- SitesIoT Core · Sensors for buildings and equipment
Accelerators and investors for home services
The bigger credit tiers usually come through a programme or investor. These are active in home services; check each one's current AWS offer directly.
- VC
Proptech and built-world technology
- VC / accelerator
Proptech
- VC
Construction and built environment
- Accelerator
Has run real-estate-focused programmes
AWS vs Google Cloud vs Azure for home services
AWS Activate
$1,000 to $100,000+
Widest service range, largest partner and provider network
Google for Startups Cloud
Up to $200,000 ($350,000 for AI)
BigQuery, Vertex AI and Gemini
Microsoft for Startups
Up to $150,000 Azure
Azure OpenAI, Microsoft 365 and enterprise sales channels
Credits from different clouds can usually be held at the same time. Most founders pick one main cloud to avoid paying for data moving between them.
Ceilings are programme maximums and change often. Check each provider before applying.
Rules and gotchas for home services
- Tenant screening data is regulated
- Credit and background checks fall under FCRA (US) and similar rules.
- Property transactions are not cloud costs
- Credits only cover AWS, not listing fees or third-party data.
Related niches
Questions
Is there a special AWS credit programme for home services startups?
No dedicated AWS programme for home services is listed right now. Standard AWS Activate applies: $1,000 (up to $5,000) for self-funded startups, up to $200,000 through an Activate Provider.
How much in AWS credits can a home services startup get?
Up to $200,000 through an Activate Provider, or $1,000 through Activate Founders.
Do AWS credits cover what a home services product runs on?
Usually yes. A typical setup (ECS app, RDS, S3 for plans and photos, Location Service for listings) is covered by promotional credits. Marketplace purchases, support plans and taxes are not.
How long will credits last for a home services startup?
At about $250/month (MVP), $25,000 lasts around 100 months, though credits usually expire after 12 to 24 months.
What if AWS rejects my home services application?
Try a different route: an Activate Provider, another niche programme, Google for Startups Cloud Program or Microsoft for Startups Founders Hub, or our partner match.
Find your best route for home services
Answer four questions and we'll match you with a partner who knows home services. Free, and the credits are the same as going direct.
Cloud Credits is independent and not affiliated with, endorsed by or sponsored by Amazon Web Services. AWS and AWS Activate are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates. Data last checked 3 October 2026; check AWS for current terms.