NOTE-- We
retired the MacNail estimating program in 2000, and replaced
it with Goldenseal construction estimating
software. There are still a significant number of die-hard MacNail
users, so we keep the manuals online for them! Goldenseal
is an integrated program that also includes accounting,
scheduling and contract writing. It has good integration
between estimating and job costing functions.
You should be a little more careful than usual when job
costing projects that you plan to feed back to your 'price
book'. You don't want careless data entry mistakes to throw off all your future bids!
In order to get the
best accuracy, watch out for the following things:
1. Job cost serious mistakes and disasters as contingencies
rather than as hard costs. There is already a contingency percentage in MacNail Estimating designed
to handle the unexpected, and your unit prices will
end up a little too high if you don't use it to job cost your actual disasters.
2. Job cost your change orders and allowances separately. Actually, this will also help you while you're running
the job, since having them documented makes it much easier for you to collect all the money that is fairly coming
to you!
3. Job cost sales tax separately if at all possible. The price book in the MacNail construction estimating
software should be for the actual purchase
cost only (not including sales tax), since sales tax is itemized separately in the actual estimate.
4. Take special care when dividing up lumber and hardware purchases. You may want to write on the delivery
tickets the intended purpose of each material, or save a computer worksheet when you put together the order.
Otherwise it's not always easy figuring out just where all those 2x4's and 2x8's were used!
5. If possible, track cost subcategories as well as the main cost categories. To do so, put a check next
to 'include Clearinghouse subcategories' when you make a new Cost Control worksheet. It's a lot more
useful to know the cost of wall, floor, roof and stair framing separately, instead of guessing how to divide up overall
framing costs.
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