Construction estimate template and checklist: every line from permit to overhead

Published November 3, 2026 · Template and sources checked November 2026

• Free. The files come by email.
• Deepsel is our product: free estimate, invoice and scheduling software for contractors (scheduling, quotes, invoicing, card payments). One section, the one before the FAQ, says what it does with an estimate and what it doesn't.
• Not legal or tax advice. The deposit rules and payroll figures below are general information checked in November 2026; your state's rules and your accountant have the last word.

A construction estimate template is the sheet you price a job on before the number goes to the customer: every cost line, a markup, then overhead, profit and contingency at the bottom. The lines new owners forget are mostly the ones that aren't a trade: permits and plan fees, the dumpster, protection and cleanup, an allowance for what's behind the wall, waste and delivery on materials, rental equipment, the burden on top of wages, your own supervision and supply runs, insurance and a warranty reserve, then overhead, profit, contingency and the payment schedule. This template lists them in the order you'd walk a remodel or a small build, and does the math as you type.

Get the spreadsheet two ways: make your own copy in Google Sheets or download the Excel version (.xlsx). It has a blank Estimate tab, a Customer copy tab that shows prices and never your costs, a filled-in bathroom remodel, and a Notes tab. The one-page checklist for the site visit is a separate file: PDF, Word (.docx) or a Google Docs copy. Pick a format, enter your email and I'll send the links.

Owners who've been at it for two decades still miss lines. "After 21 years I still underestimate at least one job a year," an owner wrote on r/Contractor in September.¹ The ones who get better at it tend to build their own sheet. One small family remodeler: "We created our own master spreadsheet in Google sheets. We call it our quote master."² This is a starting version of that sheet, so you don't have to build it from scratch after your first bad job.

I opened the free templates on page 1 of Google first. Jobber's Excel file is ten rows of quantity times unit cost, a subtotal and a tax cell set to 5%. Its page tells you to factor in markup, profit margin and a 5 to 10% contingency, but the file has no row for any of them.³ Joist's work estimate file is laid out for retail (part numbers, shipping and handling), and its total cell adds the discount to the tax and leaves out the subtotal, so the sample comes to $99.88 instead of $286.88.⁴ ProjectManager describes its file as labor costs, material costs and a profit margin.⁵ Neither file I downloaded has a row for the permit, the dumpster, labor burden or overhead. That's the gap this one fills.

What should a construction estimate include?

A construction estimate should include your company and license number, the client and job address, the scope and exclusions, every cost line from permits to the warranty reserve, overhead, profit and contingency, the total, the payment schedule with the deposit, how long the price holds, and signature lines. Here are the cost lines in the order the template and the checklist use, which is roughly the order you meet them on a walk-through.

The construction estimate checklist, line by line

1. Permits and plan fees

Permit fees are set by the town, so read the building department's fee schedule or call. No national number is worth printing here. Then ask who pulls what. If your plumber and electrician pull their own permits, the fee should be in their quotes, and the template's Basis column is where you write that down. Add plan review, drawings or an engineer's letter if the town wants them, any HOA or condo approval, and a re-inspection fee in case one fails. Pass permits through at cost or mark them up like everything else. The template lets you type 0% markup on the permit line, and the profit line shows what that costs you.

2. Dumpster and disposal

Get the hauler's price for the size, the days on site and the swap fee, then ask about weight. Tile, plaster and old cast iron are heavy, and the overage per ton is a separate line on the hauler's bill. If you haul it yourself, the dump fees and the trip are still a cost. Appliances, old fixtures and anything hazardous may need their own disposal.

3. Protection and cleanup

Floor protection, a runner down the hall, a zip door, daily sweep-up and a final clean. Small numbers, until there are six of them. On older houses this line gets bigger. EPA's lead Renovation, Repair and Painting rule applies to paid work that disturbs paint in homes built before 1978: more than six square feet per room inside or 20 outside, and window replacement or demolition of painted surfaces at any size. The firm needs EPA certification, "even sole proprietorships."⁶ Containment, cleanup and cleaning verification cost time and supplies, so the checklist asks for the year the house was built before anything else.

4. Demo

Demo is labor, so it gets crew hours times the wage plus burden, the same as any other labor line, plus blades and bags. Count what comes out, and check how many layers of flooring are under the one you can see.

5. The hidden-condition allowance

This is the line that keeps a $150 job from turning into a $3,500 argument. On r/HandymanBusiness, someone asked about a door frame with rot, and the answer was blunt: "there's no 150 dollar fix," with the real job put at "between 3500 and 15000."⁷ In a thread about pricing a first house for a client, one builder had added $20,000 for unseen costs and "used up the entire $20,000 contingency because I underestimated the foundation."⁸

Owners handle it two ways, often both. The contract says what happens: "Mine specifies any unknown conditions that arise trigger a change order if the scope of work changes."⁹ And the estimate carries a named allowance, sized in units (up to 20 square feet of subfloor at the tub drain), billed only if it's found, with the unused part credited on the final invoice. The template puts the allowance in its own section, and the customer copy shows it as its own line, so nobody's surprised when you open the wall.

6. Subcontractors

One written quote per trade, with its number and date in the Basis column, and read what it excludes. A plumber's quote without the permit, or without the trip back to set the toilet, is a hole in your estimate. On markup, owners are all over the place: "If I have a sub come do work on a job I'm doing I usually mark it up 15%," says one; another puts it at "Usually in the range of 1.2x - 2x the sub costs."^{10, 11} In the template every line starts at the markup your overhead and profit settings produce. Type a different number on a sub line if you need to, and watch the profit line.

7. Materials, with waste and delivery

Do the take-off, then add waste. A tile retailer's guide puts it at about 10% for a straight lay in a simple room, 12 to 15% for a bathroom with lots of cuts, and 15 to 20% for a diagonal lay.¹² Drywall, flooring and trim get a percentage too. The template has a Waste % column on every line, so the cost already includes the spare box. Then the small stuff (fasteners, adhesive, caulk) and the supplier's delivery charge. If your state has you pay sales tax at the supplier, it belongs in the unit cost. Forgetting materials entirely happens more than you'd think: "Just lost out on ~$300 because I forgot to bill for materials on a job last week."¹³

8. Equipment rental

The air scrubber, the floor sander, the lift or scaffold, the bigger tile saw. Rental days, plus the delivery and pickup fee if the yard brings it. If you own the tool, it lives in overhead instead.

9. Labor, with burden

An employee costs more than the wage. In 2026 you pay 6.2% Social Security and 1.45% Medicare on wages, and FUTA at 6.0% on the first $7,000 per employee, which drops to 0.6% with the full state credit.¹⁴ State unemployment, workers' comp for your trade class and paid time off come on top, and those vary by state and by class. Owners call the total labor burden and put it at 25 to 35%: "he's not covering labor burden (25% of labor cost," one reply on r/GeneralContractor pointed out, and a handyman showed the math as "32% x $400 = $128."^{15, 16} The template applies the burden you set to every crew-hour line.

If you do the work yourself, price it anyway. "If you self perform always bid it as if you were having to pay someone else."¹⁷

10. Supervision and trips

Your hours on site, the permit application, three inspections, and the supply runs. A handyman put it this way: "I don't get paid for my admin time, supply runs, etc."¹⁸ Builders call this group general conditions, the job-wide costs that aren't one trade. In a thread about billing for it, the replies included "Supervision was in there at the top, then they applied 20% overhead, 5% profit" and "I put it in general conditions with permits, chem toilet, consumables, etc."¹⁹ Price it in hours at what you'd pay a lead to run the job.

11. Insurance and the warranty reserve

Your general liability policy is overhead. This line is for what one job adds: a certificate naming the customer, HOA or condo association as additional insured, builder's risk on a build, a bond if the town wants one. Then a small warranty reserve for the callback that will come. There's no good public number for it, so start with a small amount per job and set it from what your callbacks actually cost once you've tracked a year of them.

Overhead, profit and contingency: the bottom of the estimate

Overhead is what the company spends that no single job pays for: the truck, insurance, phone, software, accounting, advertising, and the hours you spend estimating jobs you don't win. It's the line owners ask about most. One owner on r/GeneralContractor was "struggling to figure out how to account for overhead (salaries, tech, insurance, admin...) when estimating a job."²⁰ The template's way: take last year's overhead, or this year's plan, and divide it by the direct job cost you expect to run in the same year. $60,000 of overhead on $300,000 of job cost is 20%. The Overhead line is the job's direct cost times that percentage.

Profit sits on top. Set a profit percentage and every line's markup starts at (1 + overhead) x (1 + profit) - 1, so 20% and 10% give 32%. The Profit line then shows what's actually left after overhead, which drops when you pass a permit through at cost or shave a sub markup to win the job.

Markup isn't margin, and the gap is where new owners lose money. "10 and 10" (10% overhead, 10% profit) compounds to a 1.21 markup, a 17.4% gross margin. NAHB's 2024 Remodelers' Cost of Doing Business Study put the average remodeler's gross margin at 29.9% and net margin at 6.3%, the highest net since 1996.²¹ A 29.9% gross margin takes a markup of about 1.43 on cost (my arithmetic). That's an average across the firms NAHB surveyed, and a one-truck shop's overhead looks different, but it shows why owners drift away from 10 and 10. "I recently changed the 10 and 10 to 10 and 25. The 10 is still profit but the 25 is all the overhead," one owner wrote.²² A retired GC gave his whole picture: "Markup on subs 50%. My markup on my work - 67%. Sound extreme but that amounts to a 38% gross profit. Overhead was 28%, net profit 10%."²³ The template shows the markup on cost and the gross margin under the total, so you see both numbers before you send.

Contingency comes last, as a percentage of the price, for the things you can't name yet. Owners' numbers depend on how much they know: "You should have 2-5% built in for extras. Every client asks for extra"; "Build a 10% contingency or additional work allowance in"; and on a budget written before design, "plus 15% contingency for unforeseeable conditions."^{24, 25, 26} Jobber's page says 5 to 10%.³ Whatever you pick, say in the contract whether the customer sees it and what happens to the unused part.

Payment schedule and deposit

The last line of the estimate is when you get paid. The schedules owners post on r/Contractor run from three to six payments, each tied to something the customer can see. One of them: "35% deposit, 20% upon start of demo, 20% upon start of drywall, 20% upon start of finish carpentry & MEP trim-out, 5% upon completion of punch list." The same owner tries "not to go more than 2 weeks without a draw."²⁷

Check the deposit against your state before you copy anyone's numbers. In Massachusetts a deposit before work starts can't exceed the greater of one-third of the contract price or the cost of special-order materials ordered in advance, and no final payment can be demanded until the contract is completed to the satisfaction of both parties.²⁸ So that 35% deposit would be over the line there unless special orders justify it. Connecticut's Department of Consumer Protection tells homeowners that legitimate contractors "won't ask you for more than one-third of the project cost up front."²⁹ The template flags any deposit over one-third. Keep the final payment small and tied to a definition of done, or you end up like the r/Contractor owner whose thread title says it all: "Client withholding $6,000 over a small crack in a concrete patio."³⁰

A remodeling estimate example, filled in

The Example tab prices a hall bathroom gut, about 5 by 8 feet, in a 1962 house: new tub with a tiled surround, tile floor, vanity, toilet, a new bath fan and GFCI circuit, drywall and paint, with lead-safe work practices. Every number is made up to show the math, not a benchmark. Settings: 20% overhead, 10% profit (so 32% markup per line), 30% labor burden on a $32 wage, 5% contingency, and the permit passed through at cost.

Two things stand out. The lines that aren't a trade, a material or crew labor (permits, dumpster, protection, the allowance, rental, supervision, insurance) come to $4,556.05 of the $21,379.44 price, about a fifth of the job. And burden alone is $902.40 of cost across 94 crew hours. Leave those out and the estimate looks competitive right up until the job is done. The example's markup on cost comes out at 1.31, a 23.8% gross margin, under the NAHB average. That's what 20 and 10 gets you.

The payment schedule is 30% at signing ($6,734.52), 25% when demo is done and the rough inspections pass ($5,612.10), 25% when tile is done ($5,612.10), 10% when the vanity, toilet, fan and trim are in ($2,244.84) and 10% at final inspection and punch list ($2,244.85). The customer copy shows the scope, $20,825.04 for the work, the $554.40 allowance, the contingency and the schedule. No costs, no markup.

How to use the construction estimate template in Excel or Google Sheets

1. Copy the Google Sheet or open the .xlsx. On the Estimate tab, fill in your company block once and set the five yellow settings: overhead, profit, labor burden, contingency and any sales tax you collect. The ones in the file are example starting numbers; the Notes tab shows how to work out your own.
2. Print the one-page checklist and walk the job in its order. Write down the year the house was built, take photos, and note anything soft, wet or patched.
3. Back at the desk, fill each section: quantity, unit and unit cost, and a waste percentage on materials. Labor lines pick up the burden on their own.
4. Leave each line's markup at the default, or type over it (0% to pass a cost through). Write the quote number or source in the Basis column.
5. Check the bottom: overhead, the profit that's left, the markup and gross margin. If the margin's thin, fix it here, not after the job.
6. Fill in the scope, exclusions and terms, then the payment schedule. The check column flags a deposit over one-third and a schedule that doesn't add to 100%.
7. Print the Customer copy tab or save it as a PDF to send. Delete the two example tabs before you start your first real one.

Need more rows in a section? Insert them above the section's subtotal row and copy the formulas down from the row above.

When the spreadsheet stops being enough

The cost build-up stays in a sheet like this one for most small shops, and that's fine. What gets old is retyping the customer's version into a document, emailing it, chasing a signature and then asking for the deposit. That part can go out as a quote in Deepsel. An estimate there holds line items with a quantity and a price, and each line can carry an internal unit cost that the owner sees and the customer never does. The price book keeps a cost and a price for items you reuse (the dumpster, floor protection, the permit-handling line) and shows the markup and gross margin between them. You can send two or three options with one marked recommended, add optional lines the customer can tick, and every quote gets your shop-wide terms and a valid-until date, 30 days unless you change it. The customer approves on screen with a signature and, if you've turned on card payments, pays a deposit by card, set as a percentage or a dollar amount, which then shows as a credit on the final invoice.

What it doesn't do: it has no sections or section subtotals, no waste or burden percentages, and no overhead, profit or contingency lines, so keep the build-up in the spreadsheet and put the customer-facing lines on the quote. On Free it also bills one deposit and one invoice per job. A five-payment remodel schedule needs Pro, where progress billing puts the schedule on the estimate, carries it to the job and bills each payment when it's due, with the final invoice billing what's left. Free covers 30 estimates and 30 invoices a month for your whole team, with no card to start; Pro is $29 a month for unlimited estimates and invoices. Every plan is on the pricing page, and how a finished job turns into an invoice is on how to invoice as a contractor in Deepsel.

More free sheets for the field are on the checklists page.

Frequently asked questions

What should a construction estimate include?

Your company, license or registration number and contact details; the client and job address; an estimate number, date and valid-until date; the scope in plain words and what's excluded. Then every cost line: permits and plan fees, dumpster and disposal, protection and cleanup, demo, a hidden-condition allowance, subcontractors, materials with waste and delivery, equipment rental, labor with burden, supervision and trips, insurance and a warranty reserve. Then overhead, profit and contingency, the total, a payment schedule with the deposit, your terms and signature lines. The customer sees the scope, prices and terms. The costs and markup stay on your copy.

How do you write a construction estimate?

Walk the job with a checklist in the order the work happens, take photos and measurements, and write down what might be behind the walls. Get written quotes from your subs. Do a take-off for materials and add waste and delivery. Count crew hours by task and multiply by the wage plus burden. Add your own supervision and supply runs. Total the direct cost, add overhead and profit, add contingency, and set a payment schedule tied to stages the customer can see. Send the customer a copy with prices and terms, not your costs.

What's the difference between a construction estimate, a bid and a quote?

People use the three words loosely. In practice an estimate is your best number for the work, a bid is a price you submit in competition, often against someone else's plans, and a quote is a price you offer to hold for a set time. What matters more than the word is what the contract says: whether the price is fixed, what the allowances cover, how hidden conditions and changes are handled, and when the offer expires. The same template works for all three.

Is there a construction estimate template in Excel or Google Sheets?

Yes. This workbook opens in Excel as an .xlsx file or copies into your Google Drive as a Sheet. The Estimate tab has the 15 sections with live formulas for cost, waste, labor burden, markup, overhead, profit, contingency and the payment schedule. A Customer copy tab fills itself with prices only, and there's a filled-in bathroom remodel example and a Notes tab. The one-page checklist for the site visit comes as a PDF, a Word file or a Google Doc.

How much contingency should a remodeling estimate have?

It depends on how much you know when you price. Owners on r/Contractor mention 2 to 5% for the extras every client asks for, 10% as a contingency or additional work allowance, and 15% for unforeseeable conditions on a budget written before design. Jobber's template page suggests 5 to 10%. A named allowance for the risk you can see (rot at the tub, an old subfloor) is easier to explain than a bigger percentage, so the template has both.

How much overhead and profit should a contractor add?

Overhead is your own number: what the company spends in a year that no single job pays for, divided by the direct job cost you expect that year. Profit sits on top. Watch the difference between markup and margin: 10% overhead plus 10% profit compounds to a 1.21 markup, which is only a 17.4% gross margin. NAHB's 2024 study put the average remodeler at a 29.9% gross margin and 6.3% net, and a 29.9% gross margin takes a markup of about 1.43 on cost.

Sources

1. r/Contractor - "After 21 years I still underestimate at least one job a year." reddit.com, September 7, 2026.
2. r/Contractor, a small family remodeler - "We created our own master spreadsheet in Google sheets. We call it our quote master." reddit.com, September 9, 2025.
3. Jobber, "Free Construction Estimate Template" - the estimate should factor in "labor costs, material costs, and quantities, markup, profit margin, any special discounts or rates, and sales tax"; "Add a contingency percentage (like 5%-10%) to cover any unexpected costs"; "Add how long the estimate is valid (like 30 days)". The linked Excel file (Free_Excel_Estimate_Template_from_Jobber.xlsx) has ten line rows of Qty x Unit Cost, a subtotal, a 5% tax rate cell and a quote total. getjobber.com, read and downloaded November 3, 2026.
4. Joist, "Free Estimate Templates for Contractors" - simple, detailed, service and phased templates in Word and Excel. In the Work Estimate Template Excel file the total cell is =F37+SUM(F40:F44), where F37 is the discount and F38 the subtotal after discount; with the sample lines that gives $99.88 against a correct $286.88. joist.com, read and downloaded November 3, 2026.
5. ProjectManager, "Construction Estimate Template for Excel (Free Download)" - "This construction estimate template lets you add labor costs, material costs and a profit margin for the contractor." projectmanager.com, read November 3, 2026.
6. U.S. EPA, "Renovation, Repair and Painting Program: Contractors" - the rule "applies to work in houses, apartments and child-occupied facilities ... built before 1978"; "anyone who is paid to perform work that disturbs paint in housing and child-occupied facilities built before 1978 must be certified. This includes all firms, even sole proprietorships"; minor repair and maintenance that disturbs "six square feet or less of paint per room inside, or 20 square feet or less on the exterior" is excepted, but "Window replacement and demolition of painted surfaces are always covered regardless of square footage." epa.gov, read November 3, 2026.
7. r/HandymanBusiness, on a door-frame rot job - "there's no 150 dollar fix"; "rotten trim, rotten walls... job will range between 3500 and 15000". reddit.com, August 7, 2026.
8. r/Contractor, on a first house for a client - "I used up the entire $20,000 contingency because I underestimated the foundation." reddit.com, June 24, 2025.
9. r/Contractor, on lead pipes found behind a wall - "Mine specifies any unknown conditions that arise trigger a change order if the scope of work changes." reddit.com, August 20, 2025.
10. r/Contractor - "If I have a sub come do work on a job I'm doing I usually mark it up 15%". reddit.com, June 26, 2025.
11. r/Contractor, "How much to mark up subcontractors" - "Usually in the range of 1.2x - 2x the sub costs. 20% is reasonable on a huge house renovation." reddit.com, October 27, 2025.
12. Tile Outlets, "How Much Tile to Order: A Florida Homeowner's Waste Factor Guide" (September 20, 2026) - straight grid in a simple rectangle 10%; bathroom floor or walls with many fixtures and niches 12 to 15%; diagonal (45°) layout 15 to 20%. A tile retailer's guide. tileoutlets.com, read November 3, 2026.
13. r/Handyman - "Just lost out on ~$300 because I forgot to bill for materials on a job last week". reddit.com, May 20, 2026.
14. Internal Revenue Service, Publication 15 (2026), Employer's Tax Guide - "The rate of social security tax on taxable wages is 6.2% each for the employer and employee"; "The Medicare tax rate is 1.45% each for the employee and employer"; "For 2026, the FUTA tax rate is 6.0%. The tax applies to the first $7,000 you pay to each employee as wages during the year"; "If you're entitled to the maximum 5.4% credit, the FUTA tax rate after credit is 0.6%." irs.gov, read November 3, 2026.
15. r/GeneralContractor - "he's not covering labor burden (25% of labor cost". reddit.com, March 17, 2025.
16. r/Handyman - "Labor burden (varies by trade) 32% x $400 = $128". reddit.com, November 8, 2025.
17. r/GeneralContractor - "Flat GC fee of 20%. If you self perform always bid it as if you were having to pay someone else". reddit.com, February 14, 2025.
18. r/Handyman - "I charge/make about $80/hr, which sounds great. But I'm only paid when I work, I don't get paid for my admin time, supply runs, etc." reddit.com, September 18, 2025.
19. r/GeneralContractor, replies on billing for supervision - "Supervision was in there at the top, then they applied 20% overhead, 5% profit"; "I put it in general conditions with permits, chem toilet, consumables, etc". reddit.com, April 30, 2026.
20. r/GeneralContractor - "struggling to figure out how to account for overhead (salaries, tech, insurance, admin...) when estimating a job". reddit.com, July 31, 2026.
21. NAHB, "Home Remodeling Profit Margin Jumps on Demand and Business Practices" (April 10, 2026) - "In 2024, the average net profit margin for remodelers was 6.3%, the highest since 1996"; "Remodelers' 29.9% average gross profit margin in 2024 was a solid five percentage points higher than in 2021". nahb.org, read November 3, 2026.
22. r/GeneralContractor - "I recently changed the 10 and 10 to 10 and 25. The 10 is still profit but the 25 is all the overhead." reddit.com, September 29, 2024.
23. r/Contractor, a retired GC - "Markup on subs 50%. My markup on my work - 67%. Sound extreme but that amounts to a 38% gross profit. Overhead was 28%, net profit 10%." reddit.com, September 26, 2026.
24. r/Contractor - "You should have 2-5% built in for extras. Every client asks for extra." reddit.com, January 30, 2026.
25. r/Contractor - "Build a 10% contingency or additional work allowance in." reddit.com, November 14, 2025.
26. r/Contractor, a remodeler's pre-design wording - "Estimate $125-150,000 plus 15% contingency for unforeseeable conditions." reddit.com, April 3, 2025.
27. r/Contractor, "What is your payment schedule for renovations?" - "35% deposit, 20% upon start of demo, 20% upon start of drywall, 20% upon start of finish carpentry & MEP trim-out, 5% upon completion of punch list."; "I try not to go more than 2 weeks without a draw". reddit.com, October 2, 2025.
28. Massachusetts General Laws, Chapter 142A, Section 2 - "Any deposit required under the contract to be paid in advance of the commencement of work under said contract shall not exceed the greater of one-third of the total contract price or the actual cost of any materials or equipment of a special order or custom made nature, which must be ordered in advance of the commencement of work"; "No final payment shall be demanded until the contract is completed to the satisfaction of the parties thereto". malegislature.gov, read November 3, 2026.
29. Connecticut Department of Consumer Protection, "Consumer Protection Reminds the Public: Home Improvement Projects Require a Contract, Registered Contractor" (May 7, 2025) - "Legitimate contractors won't ask you for more than one-third of the project cost up front". portal.ct.gov, read November 3, 2026.
30. r/Contractor - "Client withholding $6,000 over a small crack in a concrete patio. Suggestions?" reddit.com, October 8, 2026.