Contractor Estimating & Proposal Engine

The contractor was losing jobs because proposals took too long. A typical quote meant an estimator typing into spreadsheets, copying numbers into a Word doc, manually formatting, saving to PDF, and emailing. Four hours minimum per proposal, sometimes a full day. Pricing was also inconsistent — different estimators used slightly different markup rules, so the same job could get two different quotes depending on who was on it.

We built an input-driven estimating engine. The estimator answers a series of questions about the job — square footage, material choices, site conditions, optional add-ons — and the engine applies the firm's pricing rules to produce a line-item estimate. Margin and overhead are baked in at the rule level, so pricing is consistent across the team. A PDF generator renders the output as a branded, professional proposal. The same record also creates a lead in the CRM with status tracking, so nothing gets lost between 'sent' and 'signed'.

Proposal time cut from four hours to about twenty minutes. Pricing is consistent across every estimator. Leads flow into the CRM with no manual step. The client tells us their close rate went up — not because proposals got better, but because they went out the same day the customer called.