Just say no and move on. You'll make more money going after sensible clients than negotiating with a bad prospect to get the price up to something reasonable.
Counter with a realistic timeline of deliverables and justify your quote.
When you tell people your rate is 60/70/80 pound an hour they laugh because they themselves most probably earn less as a full time employee. What they don't know is that this money has to cover the likes of sickness, holidays, hardware etc. you need to let them know that.
Every hour you spend meeting a potential client, send emails, and writing justifications is an hour you could have sold to someone else.
A client that comes in with such a low estimate (£3k for a £100k job) is going to take days of negotiations before agreeing to a sensible price ... if they ever will. There's no way that time will be recouped by winning the job. Ergo, say no and walk away because it will cannot be profitable to persue it.
Time spent pitching for work is lost time. Choose your battles wisely.
People should know this though. My auto mechanic (in the US) charges $90/hr plus costs. I don't think he's making $180K/yr and even if he were, it's the market rate.
Counter with a realistic timeline of deliverables and justify your quote.
When you tell people your rate is 60/70/80 pound an hour they laugh because they themselves most probably earn less as a full time employee. What they don't know is that this money has to cover the likes of sickness, holidays, hardware etc. you need to let them know that.