Getting Started with Estimate
Estimate allows you to set up your estimating methodology once globally and then apply it to any plan to instantly compute the plan-specific takeoffs.
In order to meet your bespoke estimating needs, Estimate gives you the flexibility and control to define the following:
The rules of how to count and measure each entity. This is called a measure group.
How to associate each count and measure to an item and cost code including waste factors and rounding. This is called a resource mapping.
Both of these are defined within a workbook, which is used to house the estimating methodology.
You can view these plan-specific takeoffs on either an Active or Master view.
On Active view, you can see the takeoffs for the selected options. Use the Options dropdown to toggle between options to see their impact on the quantities.
On Master view, you can see the impact of each Option individually applied as a delta from the base home.
Accessing Estimate
Estimate can be accessed by any of the following methods:
From the builder dashboard, choose Estimate. Open a Masterplan or Studio file to get started.
From any Studio file, in the Studio menu at the upper left corner, choose View in Estimate.
From any Masterplan or configured location plan, in the three-dot menu, choose View in Estimate.
Site Navigation
There are two main sections within Estimate: Takeoffs and Integrations.
The Takeoffs section is where you work with workbooks and plans to create estimates.
The Integrations section is where you set up cost codes and item codes so that they can be used to set up workbooks.
Takeoffs
To start, open a plan and a workbook.
Within the Takeoff section, there are three main tabs in Estimate that work together to allow you to extract measures from plans and map them to the item and cost codes to form a bill of materials.
Components Tab: This is where you can see a tabular representation of all the individual components that come from the plan.
Measures Tab: This is where you set up and view measure groups and resource mappings. Here, you can set up queries that define how to count and measure the entities on the plan and how these counts and measures relate them to an item and cost code.
Bill of Materials Tab: The bill of materials is a view that aggregates all the resource mappings in one view to show the total items and associated quantities organized by cost code.
Components
The components are a direct translation of what is in the building model, and contains attributes and measurements that describe that specific entity. These are automatically populated when you open a plan.
To keep the information organized, the entities are organized by category in the left side bar. Each category represents a different type of entity that could be measured, for example, doors, roofs and windows are all separate categories.
Example of what you can see on the Components tab. Here, you can see that each row corresponds with a single entity in the building.
Measures
The measures tab is where you set up the way you count and measure entities in Estimate. This where we have all the measure groups, which are queries that have been set up to filter and aggregate the components together so that each count and measure is meaningful and can be used to map to items.
Example of what you can see on the Measures tab. Here, you can see that each row is an aggregated measure such as the summation of all the areas that have the material concrete.
Creating Measure Groups
To see some sample measure groups, simply click on the create sample measures button.
To create your own measure groups,
Click on a category and then the
Add Measure Groupbutton to define a measure group.
Name the measure group.
Select which outputs to use.
Select how to breakdown the data by choosing any amount of attributes as a way to group the measure. It is okay to not select anything in the breakdown by to get an overall total.
Optionally, add any filters you want to apply to the measure group.
Click save to save the measure group.
Note: resource mappings will be saved to each unique combination of the columns selected in the breakdown by. Thus, it is advised to use as few breakdowns as possible to achieve your desired grouping of a measure to avoid creating too many resource mappings in the future
Creating Resource Mappings
Resource mappings are the relationship of how various counts and measures relate to a item and cost code. In order to set up a resource mapping, make sure you have at least one item and cost code in the Integrations tab.
To create a resource mapping,
Expand any row in the measure group to add a resource mapping to it
Select the item code, cost code and output to create a resource mapping. To add an item or cost code to Estimate, see the Integrations tab.
Optionally, use the formula builder below to perform any operations on the output including unit conversions and waste factors.
Multiple resources can be added for each measure to build out an assembly. For Example: one resource (cost code) could be for material costs and another resource could be for labor.
Note: resource mappings are defined globally across the entire account so any plan that has the same measure definition will receive the same resource mapping.
For example, once a price is applied to a door, that price only needs to be added to the specific door once and will auto populate to every instance of that door in every model in the account.
Exporting Measures
Click export and then select export CSV to download a copy of the measures.
Bill of Materials
The Bill of Materials (BOM) tab will show the aggregated BOM per cost code once you have associated resources with the measures in the Measures tab.
If multiple measures map to the same item code and cost code, the BOM will show the aggregation. To view what measures are mapped to that item, click on the row to expand and view the mapped measures.
Exporting Bill of Materials
Click export and then select export CSV to download a copy of the bill of materials.
Integrations
To get started, import Cost Codes and Items via the Integrations tab. These can come from an existing ERP system or your Customer Success Manager can provide existing lists to get started.
Cost Codes
There are two ways to add Cost Codes to Estimate. Under the Integrations interface:
Click the Upload .CSV button use the Bulk Upload Template.
Or add Cost Codes individually via the + Add Cost Code button.
Item Codes
Item Codes add subsections to Cost Codes to further organize and add cost to separate activities. For example, Cost Code 37.00 could be used for Excavation and Items Codes could be:
37.01 - Excavation and Backfill
37.02 - Stone
37.03 - Hauling
37.04 - Final Grading