Storing Material Unit Costs

NOTE-- We retired the MacNail estimating program in 2000, and replaced it with Goldenseal construction estimating software. There are still die-hard MacNail users, so we keep the manuals online for them! Goldenseal also includes accounting, job costing and payroll, plus some project management features. It also uses construction assemblies, but they are much easier to understand than the ones in MacNail!

Storing Material Prices and Assemblies

To use the material price updating features in the MacNail construction management software, you'll enter price information into a set of three files: a Price Sheet, a Comparisons file, and an Assemblies file. All three types of files are stored in the Current Prices folder inside the Customizing folder.

A Price Sheet is a list of all the material items you use in your business, with the latest price and other information about each item. When prices change, you'll type the new prices into this file (see pages 100-101).

A Comparisons file lets you compare the price of common materials from several suppliers. All of the items in a Comparisons file will also show up in the matching Price Sheet with 'compared' as the source. See pages 103 and 181-183 for more about Comparisons files.

An Assemblies file stores the actual material items that are used in each construction line item in the Specifications portion of MacNail estimating worksheets. The quantity of each item and a waste factor are also included. See pages 117-121 and 184 for more about Assemblies files.

When you choose Update Material Prices from the Data menu, these three files calculate the latest material unit prices for each construction line item. These new unit prices are stored in a Unit Costs file, located inside the Master Files folder. Use the Move Prices command to move these new material unit prices to a Price Master or to an estimating worksheet in the MacNail construction estimating software.