To be able to calculate the costs in construction quickly and accurately requires a quality takeoff and estimating software program, or a full time employee dedicated to cost calculations.
When comparing the two, software verse employee, the software wins every time.
When using software the time it takes to complete an estimate drops by up to 90%, reducing what would have taken hours to only minutes. When compared with an employee they could easily take just as much time with questions, administrative issues and oversight.
Costs in Construction
The cost of the construction program wins again the cost of the employee by a lot. PlanSwift, the #1 construction takeoff and estimating software, can cost less than $100 per month. That is less than the fully loaded cost of most employee for a few hours.
“I just finished my online session with Patrick. I purchased this program right away. PlanSwift will save so much time in estimates. It is much easier to understand and use than the other program I was using, at 1/3 of the cost. No More dongle. I can use PlanSwift on any computer.”-Enterprise Tile and Stone / Mike Babbel
The costs of an employee are just too high to justify them over a program that will allow you to do the same work.
In addition to the easy to calculate costs there are also, the softer costs that need to thought of when looking at an employee. The costs to a construction company include the cost of hiring new workers, or recalling furloughed. The need to train the employee for the estimating tasks. All of these can be quite an issue especially in today’s economic times.
“I have used various estimating programs over the past years and I have found PlanSwift to be an extremely user friendly program. It was easy to get a new user up and running with minimal training down time. After I downloaded the program and with the excellent assistance of Matt Miller in tech support, I was doing takeoffs with plans the very first day. One exceptional feature it has afforded me that I have found invaluable is the ability to work on customer’s reproduced plans that are no longer to scale, which is something many of our sales force have come to rely on. Since that first day, the program and all its many facets have increased my efficiency and productivity in estimating and completing material takeoffs across the board. Add to this the economical cost factor of the program as compared to other programs which are much more expensive and require additional ‘hardware’ and much more training, it goes without saying this program pays for itself in short order. I would and do highly recommend this program to other estimators with large or small companies, you will be surprised and amazed at what it can do for your profitability and efficiency.”-Stock Building Supply / Bill Wise
Time after time, construction takeoff and estimating software wins the costs battle.
To see what the leader, PlanSwift, can do for you download a free copy today.