A senior Next.js developer one hour ahead of Berlin
€380 a day, no agency between you and the person writing the code
You get one developer, not a rotating team with an account manager in front of it. Sofia is CET plus one, which means a full working day of overlap with Europe and a morning handover with the US East Coast. Normal EU invoice, reverse charge between VAT registered businesses.
Short answer
What exactly does €380 a day buy?
One senior developer for a working day, in your repository and your tooling, with a deployed preview at the end of the week. Eastern European senior rates in 2026 run 25 to 70 dollars an hour; this sits in the middle of that band and about a third of a Western European agency day rate.
What this is for
Your agency quotes 120 to 180 an hour and every status meeting is billable.
You need one competent pair of hands for six weeks, not a five person team for six months.
Your in house team is strong on backend and has nobody who ships App Router, Server Components and streaming properly.
A launch date is fixed and you are one developer short of it.
You tried a marketplace freelancer and got code you had to rewrite.
You want the person who writes it to still be reachable in a year.
How working together actually looks
One person, named
Steven. The same developer in the kickoff call, in the pull requests and on the phone in month six. No handover to a junior after the sale.
Your repository, your cloud
I work in your GitHub, your Vercel or AWS, your ticket system. Nothing lives on my side and nothing needs migrating when we are done.
Real overlap, not a night shift
Sofia is one hour ahead of Berlin, two ahead of London and seven ahead of New York. Stand ups in your morning work without anybody sacrificing an evening.
Next.js the way it is in 2026
App Router, Server Components, server actions, edge runtime, streaming. Plus Supabase or Postgres, Stripe, and the AI assistant layer when a product needs one.
Weekly demo, not a weekly report
Every Friday there is something running you can click. Progress is a deployed preview, not a percentage in a spreadsheet.
Stop whenever you like
Two weeks notice on the retainer, no minimum term, no exit fee. The only thing holding the arrangement together is that it is working.
Rates, in euro, without a sales call first
Fixed scope project
- A defined build with a written scope
- Fixed price and fixed date in the contract
- Half at start, half at launch
- Typical range €2,500 to €15,000
- Best when the requirement is already clear
Retainer, two days a week
- 8 days a month, booked in advance
- Your repo, your stack, your tickets
- Weekly deployed demo
- Two weeks notice to stop
- The usual way ongoing work runs
Full time, one month minimum
- Roughly €380 a day
- Effectively an embedded senior developer
- Daily stand up in your working hours
- Code review and documentation included
- Compare with 12,000 to 20,000 for the same month in Western Europe
Code you can inspect before you call
provend.bg
B2B catalogue with filters, cart and quote requests. Lighthouse 100 out of 100, first byte under 0.4 s, page one of Google for its main product term inside six months on a new domain.
See a live siteThe assistant on this site
A production AI assistant built on the Vercel AI SDK with tools, structured quotes, lead capture straight to email and an abuse guard. Open it in the corner and try to break it.
See a live siteA booking demo that sends real email
A conversational appointment flow with signed expiring confirmation links and no database behind it. Built in a day, working in production.
See a live siteWhat a developer costs, by where they sit, in 2026
- Senior hourly
- $120 to $200
- A month, roughly
- $20,000 to $32,000
- What you also pay for
- account management, sales, office
- Senior hourly
- €90 to €160
- A month, roughly
- €15,000 to €26,000
- What you also pay for
- project manager, process, overhead
- Senior hourly
- €60 to €100
- A month, roughly
- €10,000 to €16,000
- What you also pay for
- nothing, but availability is scarce
- Senior hourly
- €40 to €80
- A month, roughly
- €7,000 to €13,000
- What you also pay for
- account management, a rotating team
- Senior hourly
- €48
- A month, roughly
- €6,400
- What you also pay for
- nothing between you and the code
| Where | Senior hourly | A month, roughly | What you also pay for |
|---|---|---|---|
| US agency | $120 to $200 | $20,000 to $32,000 | account management, sales, office |
| UK or German agency | €90 to €160 | €15,000 to €26,000 | project manager, process, overhead |
| Western European freelancer | €60 to €100 | €10,000 to €16,000 | nothing, but availability is scarce |
| Eastern European agency | €40 to €80 | €7,000 to €13,000 | account management, a rotating team |
| Me, directly | €48 | €6,400 | nothing between you and the code |
Rate bands from published 2026 offshore and nearshore rate guides. My number is fixed and quoted in euro rather than converted at an internal rate.
Why Bulgaria, in plain terms
It is in the EU and in the eurozone since the start of 2026, so contracts, invoices, VAT and data protection are the same legal frame you already work in. No import paperwork, no currency surprises, no GDPR transfer questions, because the data never leaves the union.
The time zone is the practical part. CET plus one gives you a full overlapping day with Europe and a working morning with the US East Coast, which is why a lot of Western companies staff here rather than further east.
And the arithmetic is unromantic: living costs here are a third of Amsterdam, so a rate that is comfortable for me is a saving of 60 to 70 percent for you, with no drop in the stack, the tooling or the review standard.
What I am not the right call for
- A team of five. I am one person and I will tell you so rather than subcontract quietly.
- Native mobile apps, iOS or Android. I build web applications that work well on a phone, which is not the same thing.
- Enterprise Java, .NET or a legacy PHP monolith that needs maintaining rather than replacing.
- Work that needs an on site presence more than a few days a quarter.
- A project where the requirement is still an argument inside your company. Settle it first, then hire.
How to start
Write what you need, when you need it, and which stack it has to live in. The form is three fields and reaches me directly, or write on Viber or WhatsApp at 087 727 5750. You get a real answer within 24 hours: yes with a date, or no with a reason.
If what you actually have is an old site rather than a team gap, the other doors are here: WordPress to Next.js migration, Core Web Vitals and speed, accessibility compliance and AI search visibility.
The questions procurement asks
What exactly does €380 a day buy?
How do you invoice, and what about VAT?
What about a contract and an NDA?
Who owns the intellectual property?
What are the working hours?
What happens if you get sick or disappear?
Can you work with our existing team?
Do you do design as well?
How do we start without risk?
Tell me what you are building
An answer within 24 hours, from the developer, not from a sales team. The first call is free and there is nothing to sign.
Check availabilityI take one main engagement at a time, so a date I give you is a date I can keep.