Has anyone else built any websites or apps for friends or family for free? Is it just me, or is free work always the least appreciated? The demands are also unrealistic. Meanwhile my full-time employers charges over $6000 for a week of work for the client which on some weeks is things like adjusting some styles and changing some config, and they are appreciative every time.

Money represents effort. If you don't charge, it feels like you didn't make an effort. People neglect efforts made by everyone else, unless there's some kind of price involved.

I haven't and I won't without some sort of compensation.
It's essentially like: "Hey Ranchu, please sacrifice many hours and sleepless nights for me, and guess what, you ain't getting nuthin out of it, sounds great eh?".

Free work is always under appreciate. That is why I only have a small list of people that I will work for free. I think free work as both as a charity and a way to help out a close friend.

I have a principal of never loaning out money to friend. Loaning create debt and debt is not good for both receiver and giver. I either give them money for free or not.

I put doing free work in same category. I either do free work for them (even though you are underappreciated) or you don't do free work for them.

I made a system for my father store a while ago for free 🙆🏻‍♂️ .. other than that I always charge money

Never do any work for your friends and family that you would normally charge others for. I lived by that rule when I did IT support and I still do as a developer. I've done small favors, but never anything related to my actual work. No coding, almost no tech support, no remote support over the phone, etc. It never goes well.

The less they pay, the more they expect.

Yeah, it gives me something to do and typically I learn how to do something by the end or have a new program I can use for myself as well so it’s a win win to me.

Although never anything that’s ridiculous.