Commercial painting estimating software built on your rules
What's commercial painting estimating software?
Estimating software is any tool that turns job details into a price you can send. For painting, those details are wall area, ceiling height, surface condition, number of coats and the hours you're allowed on site.
Classic estimating tools work from a takeoff. You measure drawings or walk the building, type in quantities, and the tool multiplies them out. That's worth it on a large bid with a full set of drawings. It's too slow for the steady trickle of smaller commercial requests: a dental office, a retail unit between tenants, a church fellowship hall.
The other kind of commercial painting estimating software works from the written request. The customer answers the questions on your form, the answers run through your price rules, and a quote comes out. You set every rule, so nothing guesses at your rate.
That second kind is what this post covers. The same approach works for home service crews that quote from written requests, whether they paint, wash siding or clean gutters.
How much should you charge for commercial painting?
Nobody can hand you a fair commercial rate, and you should be wary of anyone who tries. Your number depends on your labor cost, paint, prep standard, overhead and the margin you need. A rate that keeps one crew healthy can sink another crew across town.
Start from your own finished jobs. Pick a few recent commercial repaints and add up labor hours, materials and a share of overhead. Divide that by the wall area you painted, and you've got your cost per sq ft. Add your margin on top, and you have a base rate you can defend.
Next, list what made those jobs harder than the base rate. Tall ceilings, night shifts so the business stays open, heavy patching and a second coat all eat time. Each one becomes an if-then rule that adds a set amount.
Say you wrote these sample rules for interior commercial repaints. The figures are an example of how a rule sheet looks, not a rate to copy.
| If the request says | Then the price adds |
|---|---|
| Walls, one coat | $1.10 per sq ft of wall |
| A second coat | $0.60 per sq ft of wall |
| Ceilings over 12 feet | $0.40 per sq ft of wall |
| Work at night or on weekends | $250 per shift |
| Heavy patching in a room | $150 per room |
| Any job | $1,200 minimum total |
Say a dental office asks for 4,000 sq ft of wall, one coat, done over 3 night shifts with standard ceilings. The walls come to 4,000 times $1.10, or $4,400. The nights add 3 shifts times $250, which comes to $750. The total comes to $4,400 plus $750, or $5,150, well above the $1,200 minimum.
Notice what the rules don't do. They don't guess at prep nobody described, and they don't price a lift. Those requests wait for you, and you sort them by hand.
How to write your painting price rules in one sitting
You don't need software to start. You need an hour at the kitchen table with your last few invoices. Work through it in this order:
- List the commercial jobs you want more of, such as office repaints, retail turnovers or warehouse walls. Leave out the ones you'd rather not do.
- Pick one unit for each job. Wall area in sq ft works for interior walls, while doors and railings price better per piece.
- Set a base rate from your finished jobs, with your margin already inside it.
- Write an add-on for each thing that changes your labor: height, night hours, extra coats, heavy patching.
- Set a minimum so a single small room still pays for the drive, the setup and the cleanup.
- Write down what makes a request wait for you: a lift, an exterior above two stories, missing wall area, or a building old enough to need lead-safe prep.
- Decide which quotes go out on their own and which you approve first.
Copy this sheet and fill in your own numbers:
Interior repaint, one coat: your rate per sq ft of wall. Second coat: add your rate per sq ft of wall. Ceilings over your height limit: add your rate per sq ft of wall. Nights or weekends: add your rate per shift. Heavy patching: add your rate per room. Minimum job: your floor, no matter how small the request. Wait for my OK if: a lift is needed, the request has no wall area, or the building is old enough to need lead-safe prep.
Step seven is the one to think hardest about. Use this decision order:
| Request | What to do |
|---|---|
| Interior repaint, every answer filled in, inside your rules | Let it go out on its own |
| Your first few weeks on new rules | Approve each quote before it goes |
| Occupied medical or food space with tight hours | Approve, then confirm the hours |
| Missing wall area or ceiling height | Wait for your OK and ask for it |
| Lift, scaffold or exterior above two stories | Wait for your OK and walk the site |
This is the work Workely does. It prices each inbound lead from your own rules and gets the quote ready with a link to book. You approve it, or you turn on auto-send and it goes out on its own. Leads that don't fit your rules wait for your OK, and follow-ups go out automatically until the lead books.
You can see how lead capture and pricing from your own rules fits together, and how approving each quote before it goes out works when you're not ready for auto-send.
Screen out the jobs you don't want before you quote
A fast quote on the wrong job still costs you. Commercial requests come in mixed. Some are real jobs that fit your crew. Others want a free site walk, a bond you don't carry and a price by Friday.
Some need a lift you'd have to rent, or sit two hours outside your area. Decide what disqualifies a request before you write a single price. Then put those questions on the form, so the request tells you on its own.
Ask for the address, the type of space, the wall area, the ceiling height, the hours the space is open and the date they need it done. A good online quote request form for owners does this sorting before you ever read the request.
Then reply to the requests that pass inside the first minute when you can. Harvard Business Review reported in 2011 that when researchers sent a web lead to US companies, only 37% replied within an hour and 23% never replied. The same Harvard Business Review study found the companies that did reply took 42 hours on average.
Harvard Business Review's analysis of 1.25 million leads found that reaching out within the hour made a company about 7x more likely to qualify the lead than waiting even one hour more. Say a request lands mid-afternoon while you're cutting in a stairwell, and the office manager sent it to two other painters too. If your reply waits until dinner, the first real number may already be on her desk.
How much does estimating software cost?
Prices vary with what the tool does. A takeoff tool for big bids, a full job management suite and a quote tool for inbound requests are built for different work. Compare each tool to the work you'd actually use it for each week.
When you compare commercial painting estimating software, ask four things:
- Does it price from your own rules, or from its own averages?
- Can you approve each quote before it goes, and turn on auto-send later?
- What happens to a request that doesn't fit your rules?
- Does it follow up until the lead books or says no?
Our own price is plain. Workely's Speed to Lead plan is $149 a month, billed monthly, with no per-lead fees, and you can cancel anytime. It starts with a 30-day free trial, and we set it up with you. The first ten owners on the founding offer lock in $99 a month for life.
Say the $5,150 dental office repaint from the example is the one extra job you win in a year. Divided by $149 a month, that single job comes to about 34 months of the plan.
Your next step
Fill in the rule sheet above this week, even if you never buy anything. It'll make your quotes consistent, and you'll know your minimum by heart before the next request lands.
When you want commercial painting estimating software that runs those rules on every written request, start Workely's free trial from the Speed to Lead plan and pricing page.