Carpenter quote calculator
Price carpentry from your own time, timber, and hardware. Use separate lines for install work, repairs, built-ins, or trim. This page will not tell you what lumber costs this week. You enter each quantity and unit price, then choose the margin the final price should carry.
Give feedback on this calculator. Leave out prices and customer details.
What to include
- Labor. Measuring, cutting, fitting, fixing, site protection, and punch-list time you want covered.
- Materials and hardware. Timber, sheet goods, fixings, glue, and hardware you supply. Include waste in that cost if you buy extra stock and want it inside the quote.
- Additional expenses. Delivery fees, waste disposal, and travel billed as money rather than as hours.
- Customer-supplied material. If you are installing items the customer bought, materials can be 0 or just the fixings you provide. Say which it is in the job description.
On the job
- Delivery can be labor hours when your time is the cost, or an additional expense when a supplier charges a delivery fee. Enter the one that matches the bill.
- Offcuts you expect to throw away are part of the material you buy. Put that in the material cost. This page does not apply a waste percentage for you.
- Installation-only quotes are valid. Leave materials at 0 when you are not supplying them, and say so in the job description.
How the quote is calculated
Shop time and site time can be separate labor lines. Timber and hardware can be separate material lines. Each line is quantity times your unit price, rounded to the nearest cent, and those lines add up to direct cost. The target final price is direct cost divided by (1 − margin ÷ 100). That is profit as a share of the selling price. Putting 20% on top of the timber cost is a markup, and this page does not do that unless you already typed the higher number as your unit price.
A discount raises the price shown before the discount. Discount amount is the pre-discount price times the discount rate, rounded to the nearest cent. Final price is the pre-discount price minus that discount. Margin and discount must each stay below 100%. The customer quote lists the work and the prices they are asked to pay. It does not list your unit costs or the margin.
Arithmetic example, not a suggested price. If the lines add up to 800, the margin is 20%, and the discount is 10%, the target is 1,000 and the customer pays 1,000. The price before discount is 1,111.11 and the discount is 111.11. A 20% markup would have produced 960 instead. Delivery you forgot to enter is not in the 200 of profit.
Questions
How do I enter lumber I have not bought yet?
Use the supplier total you are willing to stand behind, including any extra stock you plan to buy. The calculator does not look up board prices.
Where should waste go?
Include it in the material cost. If you buy 12 sheets for a job that needs 10, enter the cost of 12 if that is what you will pay.
How do I quote labor only?
Set materials to 0, or enter only the fasteners and consumables you will supply. Put the hours in labor. Say in the job description that the customer is supplying the materials.
Should fuel be an hourly cost?
Only if you want fuel covered by the hourly rate. Otherwise enter a fuel or travel amount in additional expenses. Do not do both for the same cost.
Job categories
Cabinet installation, door fitting, custom woodwork, trim, and repair are titles you can apply and then edit. A cabinet job often needs one labor line for the install and separate material lines for the boxes, doors, and hardware if those prices differ. Custom woodwork can split shop hours from site hours. The form will not turn a sketch into a cut list.
Common estimating mistakes
- Pricing the timber you hope to use and forgetting the extra sheet you will actually buy. Put waste in the quantity you enter. This page does not add a waste percentage for carpentry.
- Leaving delivery as a verbal extra. A supplier fee is an expense line. Your driving time is a labor line if you want to charge for it.
- Quoting labor only, then leaving materials blank without saying the customer is supplying them.
- Comparing the profit line with a markup quote from another contractor. The same cost and the same percentage do not produce the same selling price.
Other calculators
If the job is mostly another trade, use that calculator. The math is the same. The prompts match the work.
Read how the site treats your entries in the privacy policy, and what a result is not in the terms of use. The calculation runs in your browser and does not upload the form. A saved draft stays in this browser until you delete it or clear site data.