Chalkline: Estimate Maker

Stop saying "I'll email you tonight." Photograph the job, price it from your own rates, and hand the homeowner a real estimate before you leave the driveway.

You are standing in a kitchen the homeowner wants gutted. They ask what it will cost. The honest answer is "I'll email you tonight" — and by tonight the job is someone else's.

Chalkline turns the walkthrough into a real estimate before you get back in the truck.

◆ PHOTO-ASSISTED JOB BREAKDOWNS Photograph what you are looking at. Chalkline reads the photo and lays the visible work out as editable line items — surfaces, quantities, tasks. Nothing is final until you say so. Every quantity is yours to correct.

◆ YOUR PRICES, NOT AI GUESSES Chalkline never invents a dollar amount. It prices from the price book you set up: your labor rate, your material costs, your markup, your overhead, your mobilization minimum. Change a rate once and every future estimate follows.

◆ ESTIMATES THAT LOOK LIKE A CONTRACTOR WROTE THEM Itemized labor and materials, scope of work, exclusions, customer and job-site details, and a labor / materials / total breakdown. Your business name, license number and contact block sit at the top. Edit any line before it leaves your phone.

◆ SCAN THE ROOM INSTEAD OF GUESSING IT On an iPhone with a LiDAR scanner, walk the room once. Chalkline measures the floor area, the wall area with door and window openings already deducted, and the perimeter for trim — then writes them in as line items. These numbers are measured, not estimated from a photo.

◆ WORTH-QUOTING SUGGESTIONS YOU CONTROL When the photo shows related work — no drip edge above the tear-off, rot beside the window being replaced — Chalkline flags it with the reason you can repeat to the homeowner. Suggestions sit in their own section, switched off, and never touch your total until you tick them.

◆ INVOICES FROM THE APPROVED ESTIMATE Turn an approved estimate into a numbered invoice with issue date, due date and terms. Deposits and part payments are credited on separate lines so the balance due matches what the homeowner sees in their bank. The invoice bills the work on the estimate — extra work still goes on a change order.

◆ WORK ORDERS FOR THE CREW Send the crew a sheet with the tasks, quantities, estimated hours, the schedule date, the site contact and your gate-code notes — and no prices on it. What your customer pays is not the crew's business.

◆ SEE HOW THE READING IS DOING Every quantity you correct before sending is measured against what the app read. Chalkline shows you whether it reads high or low on your own jobs, trade by trade. That stays on your phone.

◆ CHANGE ORDERS, NOT DO-OVERS When the homeowner adds a bathroom halfway through, the original estimate stays intact. Chalkline issues a numbered change order that shows what changed, what it was, what it is now, the difference, and how the schedule moves — on its own page, with its own signature block. That page is what you point at when the final invoice gets questioned.

◆ PDF YOU CAN SEND FROM THE DRIVEWAY Preview the finished document, check the required contractor details are on it, and share it straight from your phone. Revisions go out as the quote plus its change order page, in one file. Invoices and work orders share the same line items, so two sheets never disagree.

◆ BUILT FOR SMALL CONTRACTORS General contractors, remodelers, painters, flooring installers, plumbers, electricians, landscapers, roofers, siding and deck crews — anyone who bids the job standing in it.

◆ YOUR DATA STAYS YOURS Estimates, price book and customers live on your device. No account to create. Photos are sent for reading only when you take one.

◆ TERMS AND PRIVACY Terms of Use (EULA): https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Privacy Policy: https://sites.google.com/ra2lab.io/ra2lab-privacy-policy/home