Why contractors choose LaraKeyMost contractors who track job costs look at one number: how much has been spent. It’s useful, but it’s history. A job can be “under budget” on spending and still be headed for a loss.
The four numbers that matter
- Budget, by category: labor, materials, subs, equipment, other
- Spent to date: what’s actually been paid or committed
- Cost to finish: your best estimate of what’s left to spend
- Projected final cost = spent + cost to finish
Compare projected final cost to budget and you know, today, whether each category will come in over or under, and what the job’s profit will really be.
An example
Labor budget: $14,200. Spent so far: $9,860. Looks fine, with $4,340 left. But the crew lead says there are five more days of work at about $800 a day. Cost to finish: $4,000. Projected final: $13,860. You’re fine. If it were ten days, you’d be $3,660 over, and you’d know it now, not after the final invoice.
Keep costs flowing in automatically
A forecast is only as good as the costs feeding it. The more that flows in on its own (crew time, approved receipts, material orders, sub payments) the less you rely on someone remembering to enter it.
In LaraKey
Job costing starts from the approved estimate as the budget. Time logged becomes labor cost right away, approved expenses and material orders land on the job, and sub payments are recorded as subcontractor costs. Update the cost to finish per category and LaraKey shows projected final cost and profit, and warns you when a category is over budget with no forecast.