Rich
12-21-2007, 01:24 PM
Just purchased this software a few days ago and wanted to give everyone my opinions - it may help someone.
I purchased the Premier version so I could have the change order management and few other features I thought might be helpful for the way I do business. The Pro probably would have worked just fine though.
The software is esentially made up of 2 seperate components - ConstructionNet and ConstructionOffice. The Net portion deals with contact management, to do lists, current summary, calendars/appointments, and the actual projects. The Office side deals with the actual files that make up the projects - estimating, contracts, specifications, schedules, etc. Then they are tied together with a document management system - that is actually pretty nice.
When first starting up the software it gives you a nice start-up page that is similar to many websites sitemap - giving you all the elements of the program with the ability to click on each one and go directly there. From there is goes to the Today tab which gives you an updated look for appointments, recent projects, recent files added, etc.
I'll start with the good. The program is pretty well laid out and for the most part pretty flexible. Allowing you to customize the templates they give you - of which there are quite a few. Everything from lien releases to design/build contracts as well as several different estimating and schedule templates for residential, commercial, remodeling, etc. It does come with the national estimator database - which has a ton of items already setup (you'll just need to change costs to fit you). It also gives you the option in the items database to provide a quote from a vendor which could allow for a direct request for proposal - I say could - more on that later. The estimating templates could be pretty useful too - if you take the time to completely set it up and don't have many changes to make down the road.
I honestly believe that it will decrease the time it takes to put together a complete proposal (it has a function that does that too), once it's setup.
Now for the not so good. I won't say bad as I'm sure it works for many people just fine. The estimating module is pretty old school. It doesn't have the ability to setup a crew rate, production rates, or material rates (I'll explain later).
The "quotes" system requires you to put in a lf or sf cost for all materials. If I had it my way I would rather input a cost for a 16' 1x4 and have it divide by 16 to come up with a lf cost. That way when first setting up or updating I don't have to divide by the length - just input the cost. By doing it my way it could output a true materials list (more later on the materials list).
As mentioned above, it doesn't have the ability to input a production rate which makes it difficult to update and doesn't give you number of manhours either. Even the national estimator does that. It should have an area that you can input an amount per manhour of whatever you are doing or, like national estimator, the manhours per quantity. This accomplishes 2 things - gives you the number of manhours based on the amount of work to perform and also allows you to assign different crews to that production rate at estimating time. The way they have it is a cost per unit. It really sucks if you have to go in and change a crew rate - as all items associated with that crew will need to be changed instead of just one.
The quotes system also completely seperates the labor, material, and equipment costs from one another. So if I have an item such as trusses I have to have 3 seperate entries in the estimate - one for the labor, one for materials, and one for the equipment. If most of your estimates are exactly the same you could setup a template that has all the items (labor, equip, material, etc in there) but you would still need to input the quantities 3 times.
The materials list is not all that great either. The software has the ability to filter by vendor and category of your estimate and outputs the quantities and items to an RFQ - which is nice. But it honestly doesn't do any favors for you. It only takes the actual quantity of whatever you put in there. Such as sf of drywall or whatever it is. For the most part that isn't so bad - but it would certainly be better if it directly output number of 12' pieces of drywall or 8' if I so desire. It would let there be fewer mistakes in the ordering process IMO. And also give me a list to help create the purchase order and then track what was actually delivered.
I know I hammered the estimating system for this software - but it's the only thing that I really had any hang-ups with. As mentioned before they use a similar system to the craftsman national estimator but by doing the things the way they did they actually create more work for the user. They should take a few suggestions from the way EasyEst has their system - much more flexible that works for more people.
Overall I give the software an 8 out of 10 - just because of the estimating portion of it. Feel free to ask questions about the other portions of the software - it actually does a really good job for most of it.
I purchased the Premier version so I could have the change order management and few other features I thought might be helpful for the way I do business. The Pro probably would have worked just fine though.
The software is esentially made up of 2 seperate components - ConstructionNet and ConstructionOffice. The Net portion deals with contact management, to do lists, current summary, calendars/appointments, and the actual projects. The Office side deals with the actual files that make up the projects - estimating, contracts, specifications, schedules, etc. Then they are tied together with a document management system - that is actually pretty nice.
When first starting up the software it gives you a nice start-up page that is similar to many websites sitemap - giving you all the elements of the program with the ability to click on each one and go directly there. From there is goes to the Today tab which gives you an updated look for appointments, recent projects, recent files added, etc.
I'll start with the good. The program is pretty well laid out and for the most part pretty flexible. Allowing you to customize the templates they give you - of which there are quite a few. Everything from lien releases to design/build contracts as well as several different estimating and schedule templates for residential, commercial, remodeling, etc. It does come with the national estimator database - which has a ton of items already setup (you'll just need to change costs to fit you). It also gives you the option in the items database to provide a quote from a vendor which could allow for a direct request for proposal - I say could - more on that later. The estimating templates could be pretty useful too - if you take the time to completely set it up and don't have many changes to make down the road.
I honestly believe that it will decrease the time it takes to put together a complete proposal (it has a function that does that too), once it's setup.
Now for the not so good. I won't say bad as I'm sure it works for many people just fine. The estimating module is pretty old school. It doesn't have the ability to setup a crew rate, production rates, or material rates (I'll explain later).
The "quotes" system requires you to put in a lf or sf cost for all materials. If I had it my way I would rather input a cost for a 16' 1x4 and have it divide by 16 to come up with a lf cost. That way when first setting up or updating I don't have to divide by the length - just input the cost. By doing it my way it could output a true materials list (more later on the materials list).
As mentioned above, it doesn't have the ability to input a production rate which makes it difficult to update and doesn't give you number of manhours either. Even the national estimator does that. It should have an area that you can input an amount per manhour of whatever you are doing or, like national estimator, the manhours per quantity. This accomplishes 2 things - gives you the number of manhours based on the amount of work to perform and also allows you to assign different crews to that production rate at estimating time. The way they have it is a cost per unit. It really sucks if you have to go in and change a crew rate - as all items associated with that crew will need to be changed instead of just one.
The quotes system also completely seperates the labor, material, and equipment costs from one another. So if I have an item such as trusses I have to have 3 seperate entries in the estimate - one for the labor, one for materials, and one for the equipment. If most of your estimates are exactly the same you could setup a template that has all the items (labor, equip, material, etc in there) but you would still need to input the quantities 3 times.
The materials list is not all that great either. The software has the ability to filter by vendor and category of your estimate and outputs the quantities and items to an RFQ - which is nice. But it honestly doesn't do any favors for you. It only takes the actual quantity of whatever you put in there. Such as sf of drywall or whatever it is. For the most part that isn't so bad - but it would certainly be better if it directly output number of 12' pieces of drywall or 8' if I so desire. It would let there be fewer mistakes in the ordering process IMO. And also give me a list to help create the purchase order and then track what was actually delivered.
I know I hammered the estimating system for this software - but it's the only thing that I really had any hang-ups with. As mentioned before they use a similar system to the craftsman national estimator but by doing the things the way they did they actually create more work for the user. They should take a few suggestions from the way EasyEst has their system - much more flexible that works for more people.
Overall I give the software an 8 out of 10 - just because of the estimating portion of it. Feel free to ask questions about the other portions of the software - it actually does a really good job for most of it.