A few weeks ago an email from Squarespace landed in our inbox. It was about one of a handful of sites we built years ago, back in our early days when we still used hosted builders, and that we still look after for clients who have been with us since the start. The price is going up by 26 percent, with the new rate applying from the renewal on 12 August 2026. The renewal bill still reaches us, which is how we saw the increase at first hand. These days we build websites people own and no longer take on hosted-builder work, though we happily keep those early sites running for the people who trusted us back then.
That is how renting works. The provider sets the terms, and when the price changes it lands on you, with nothing to negotiate. Squarespace is not doing anything wrong here. It is simply the nature of a rented website, and it is what this piece is about.
What does it mean to only rent your website?
On a hosted builder like Squarespace you rent your presence. The design, the pages, and the running site live inside the provider’s system, and the pricing and the rules are set by the provider. When something changes, you are told and you carry it. There is nothing to negotiate at that point.
Day to day this barely registers, because a builder is convenient and mostly just works. It becomes visible in the exact moment a bill comes in a quarter higher, or a term shifts that you never chose. That is when you notice the decision was made somewhere else and you only received the notice.
Are builders like Squarespace a bad choice?
No. For plenty of businesses Squarespace and builders like it are genuinely fine: quick to set up, cheap to start, with clean templates and a professional result. If it works for you, there is no reason to move. The question here is a different one, which is who owns the website in the end and who sets the terms.
A builder is honest about what it offers, a rented setup at a convenient price. For a small site that rarely changes, a builder can be perfectly fine for years. The catch only shows up when the missing control costs you something concrete, the way it did with the one increase this piece opens on.
What changes when you own your website?
When you own the website, you set the terms. A provider’s price increase stops being something you simply absorb, because your presence is not sitting inside someone else’s system. You keep your content and your domain, and you decide where the site runs and what it costs.
The full argument for why ownership keeps you independent is in the piece on who owns your website on a subscription. For comparing the two worlds, the split is enough:
| Rented on a builder | On a website you own |
|---|---|
| The provider sets the price | You decide the cost and the provider |
| A rule change applies to you | Changes are yours to make |
| Your presence lives in the provider’s system | Your content and your domain sit with you |
| Moving often means starting over | You take the website with you |
The left column is why an increase lands on you with nothing you can do about it. The right column is what shifts the moment the website is genuinely yours.
What comes with you when you move off Squarespace?
The things that matter move with you: your content and page copy, your images, your domain in your name, and the intent behind your presence, meaning your brand and your design direction. All of it lands on a website you own. The move takes weeks, and your current site stays online until the new one is ready.
In concrete terms:
- Your content. Your page copy, images, and prices, along with your company story and the knowledge behind it.
- Your domain. Registered in your name and portable to any provider.
- Your brand. Logo, colours, and the design direction, rebuilt on a website you own.
- Your data. Enquiries and contacts that came in through the site.
The new website is built on a foundation you own, so everything ends up with you and a later move stays possible any time. That is the real difference from a rented setup, where the next switch means starting over again.
How does a move with Essential Web work?
We handle the move for you and then run the website on a subscription. Building, EU hosting, maintenance, and updates sit together in one monthly fee, and the technical side is not something you have to think about. What you are left with is a website you own and that we keep running for you.
For a European business it also matters where the site and the data live. Both stay in the EU while the website runs with us, and your domain is in your name in any case. Whether a subscription is the right model for you, or a builder or an agency fits better, is weighed up in website builder, agency, or subscription. What sits in each plan is on the plans.
Renting or owning: what this is really about
The 26 percent on that one site was the trigger, and the real subject runs deeper. As long as you rent your presence, someone else sets the terms and you receive the notice. Own the website and that decision is yours, including where it runs and what it costs.
If you have just had a price increase or a change you did not choose, this is a good moment to work out the move to a website you own. Look at the plans, or ask us directly about a move.