Room Specifications

What is Included in a Room?

The BidMagic construction estimating software lets you define rooms any way you'd like for your remodeling projects.

Normally a room will include one open volume of space within the building, with or without attached closets or other utility spaces. In some cases you may want to define a room as a slightly different space to handle unusual conditions, or to make the estimating process easier.

Closets

Normally closets are included as a part of the room into which they connect (with a partition wall between them). A closet that is getting very different treatment from the attached room can be entered as an independent room.

HINT: Since rectangular rooms are easier to compute, sometimes it's handy to treat a closet as an attachment to a different room that is touching the closet--even if there is no doorway between them--so you'll end up with simple rectangular spaces.

Splitting Rooms

A room that is getting drastically different treatments in different parts of the room can be split into two different rooms, to make it easier to specify what is being done to each surface. Sometimes it is also convenient to split a long hallway or other large room into more than one portion.

To split a room:

1. Enter part of the room on one room card. Since there is no wall one the side that connects to the remainder of the wall, don't give it any framing, wallboard, or other construction items.
2. Enter the remainder of the room on a different room card. Since there is no wall one the side that connects to the remainder of the wall, don't give it any framing, wallboard, or other construction items.

Combining Rooms

To cut down on the number of rooms in larger projects, you can consolidate two or more rooms into a single room card.

WARNING: Only combine rooms if they have similar ceiling heights, and if they are being worked on in a similar way.

To combine more one or more rooms:

1. Create a room card for the group of rooms.
2. Enter the overall dimensions of the group of rooms into the wall, floor and ceiling dimensions.
3. Enter the length of all walls between the rooms into Partition Walls.

Adding to an Existing Room

If you are enlarging an existing room with brand new construction, handle it as two different rooms by following these steps:

1. Put the old portion of the room into one room-- it will be considered an existing room. NOTE: Only three walls should be entered for this new 'room', since the fourth side is completely open.
2. Put the new portion of the room into a separate room-- it will be considered a new room. NOTE: Only three walls should be entered for this new 'room', since the fourth side is completely open.
3. Enter any demolition into the Structural Dimensions card.