How to quote a carpentry job (so you actually make money)

Most carpenters quote off gut feel - a number that sounds about right and that you reckon the client will say yes to. It works often enough that you keep doing it, right up until the job that should have made $8k makes $900 and you can't work out where it went. Here's a repeatable way to quote so that doesn't happen.

1. Nail down the scope before you price anything

You can't price what you haven't defined. Walk the job and write down every task, not just the obvious ones - set-out, demo, disposal, the fiddly bits around windows, the second trip for the handles. The tasks you forget are the ones that eat your margin, because you still have to do them, you just won't have charged for them.

2. Price materials off a real take-off, then add a buffer

Do a proper take-off from the plans or your measurements, get current supplier pricing (not last year's), and add 5-10% for waste and offcuts. Timber prices move, so a quote you copied from three months ago is already wrong.

• Frame and structural timber, sheet goods, fixings and consumables
• Hire (scaffold, props, tools you don't own)
• Tip fees and disposal
• A waste/contingency allowance so one bad length doesn't come out of your pocket

3. Cost your labour honestly

Labour is where most quotes quietly lose money. Estimate the hours each stage really takes (including the slow first morning and the clean-up), then multiply by your true hourly cost - not just the wage. Your real cost per hour includes super, insurance, tool replacement, the ute, fuel, and the unbillable hours spent quoting and chasing payment.

4. Add overhead and a real margin

Overhead is everything that keeps the business running whether or not you're on the tools - phone, accounting, software, advertising, registration, insurance. Spread a share of it across each job. Then add your margin on top: this is your profit, the reward for taking on the risk, not your wage.

5. Present it like a professional

A clear, itemised quote wins more work than a number scrawled on the back of a receipt - and it protects you. Spell out inclusions and exclusions, set payment stages for bigger jobs (deposit, frame, lock-up, completion), and put a validity date on it so a three-month-old price isn't held against you.

The mistakes that cost you the most

• Forgetting consumables and small fixings - they add up fast across a job
• Not pricing variations as they come up (do it in writing, on the day)
• Round-number guessing instead of a real take-off
• No contingency, so the first surprise wipes out the profit
• Quoting the price you think they'll accept instead of the price the job actually costs

Do this consistently and two things happen: you stop winning jobs that were always going to lose money, and you can see your margin before you commit, not after the last board's down. The carpenters who do this reliably tend to work off a saved template and track each job's real costs against the quote as they go - which is exactly what TrackYaTradie is built for.