Guide · Quoting
What a flooring estimator does, and the maths they use
The estimator is the person who decides what a flooring job will cost before anyone lays a board. Win too many jobs and the price was probably too low; win none and it was too high. This guide covers what the job involves, the maths behind every quote, and the mistakes that cost the most.
What a flooring estimator does
A flooring estimator turns a set of documents, or a site measure, into a priced quote. On builder work the documents are usually the working drawings and the builder's selections or colour schedule. The work runs in the same order on every job:
- Read the documents. Which plan revision is current, which rooms are floored, and which floor goes in each one.
- Measure. Every floored room, robe, recess and stair, from the printed dimensions or on site.
- Add allowances and waste. Floor through doorways, under kickboards, and the offcuts every layout produces.
- Round up to what you buy. Whole packs of hard floor, whole lineal metres of carpet off the roll.
- Price it. Supply and install rates, trims, stairs, removal, preparation and travel.
- Check and send. Every line, against the documents, before the builder sees it.
- Follow up. Answer questions, re-price revisions, and hand the won job to ordering and scheduling.
In a small business the estimator is often also the owner, the sales person and the person who orders stock. In a larger one it is a dedicated role, working through a queue of plan sets from several builders.
The maths behind every quote
None of the maths is hard. What makes estimating slow is doing it room by room, dozens of times a week, without a slip.
Area
Builder plans give dimensions in millimetres. A room printed 4200 by 3600 is 4.2 m by 3.6 m, or 15.12 m². An L shaped room is split into two rectangles and added. A kitchen island or a void is measured and taken out. The floor area from plans guide has a calculator for this.
Allowances
The floor runs through each doorway and to the frame of each full-length window or sliding door, so most estimators add a strip across each one, commonly about 10 cm deep. Floor also runs under cabinets to the kickboard, and robes are floored to the sliding door line. The guide to robes, recesses and kickboards covers those.
Waste, then rounding
Add the waste percentage to the total area first, then divide by the pack size and round up to whole packs. Round once, on the total, not room by room. The waste percentage guide explains how to pick the figure.
Carpet off the roll
Carpet is bought in lineal metres off a roll of fixed width, usually 3.66 m in Australia. A room is cut in whole drops across the roll, so the carpet bought is nearly always more than the room's area. See carpet lineal metres and roll width.
Trims, stairs and tax
Trims are counted per opening where the finish changes, and priced per trim or per metre, with each opening rounded up to a whole metre. Stairs are priced per step. Tax is worked once on the quote total, not line by line, so the rounding does not drift.
A worked example
Example only
The rooms, sizes and allowances are made up to show the method. They are not a real job or anyone's rates.
| Step | Working | Result |
|---|---|---|
| Living, hybrid | 6.2 m × 4.8 m | 29.76 m² |
| Bed 2, hybrid | 3.4 m × 3.1 m | 10.54 m² |
| Hall, hybrid | 4.0 m × 1.1 m | 4.40 m² |
| Doorways and sliding door | (0.82 + 0.82 + 0.82 + 2.40) m × 0.10 m | 0.49 m² |
| Floor area | 29.76 + 10.54 + 4.40 + 0.49 | 45.19 m² |
| Plus 5% waste | 45.19 × 1.05 | 47.45 m² |
| Packs of 2.2 m² | 47.45 ÷ 2.2 = 21.6, round up | 22 packs (48.40 m²) |
| Trims, per metre | three doors at 1 m each, the 2.4 m slider at 3 m | 6 m |
| Bed 3, carpet | 3.6 m × 3.3 m room, one 3.6 m drop off a 3.66 m roll | 3.6 lm (13.18 m² bought) |
The quote then prices 48.40 m² of hybrid, not 45.19 m², because that is what will be ordered and installed, and 3.6 lineal metres of carpet rather than the 11.88 m² of floor in the room.
Imperial plans: the method is the same. One square metre is about 10.76 square feet, carpet is often sold by the square yard (9 square feet, about 0.84 m²), and a 12 foot roll is about 3.66 m wide.
The mistakes that cost the most
- Pricing the net area. Quoting the rooms' area instead of the packs or roll metres you will buy leaves the waste unpaid.
- Rounding every room. Rounding each room up to packs, then adding them, over-orders on every job.
- Missing spaces. Robes, recesses, under-stair stores and walk-in pantries are easy to skip.
- Trusting the scale. A PDF that was resized or printed to fit no longer matches its printed scale. The printed dimensions are safer.
- Old documents. Quoting from a superseded plan revision or last month's selections.
- Stale prices. A supplier price rise that never reached the rate card.
The flooring quote checklist catches most of these before a quote goes out.
Skills that make a good estimator
Reading drawings matters most: knowing where a dimension string starts and ends, which drawing is current, and what the hatching and notes mean. Next is product knowledge, so the right underlay, trims and stair method end up on the quote. Then patience for checking, because the builder judges the business on the one line that was wrong. Many estimators come to the job from installing, sales or drafting and learn the rest working beside someone experienced.
Plans or site measure?
An estimator quoting for a builder usually works from plans, often before the slab is down, while a measurer goes to site and measures what was built. Many businesses do both: they quote from plans, then check measure before ordering. The guide to takeoff versus measure-up explains when each one is the right basis for a quote.
Where software fits
Estimators use everything from a spreadsheet to PDF measuring tools to software that reads the plans. Whatever does the measuring, the estimator still owns the quote, so the useful question is how quickly each figure can be checked. The guide to flooring estimating software compares the kinds of tools and how to trial one on your own plans.
Squaro is built for estimators who quote from builders' plans. It reads the drawings and selections, measures each room from the printed dimensions, applies your own rules and prices, and shows the page and dimension text behind every figure, so you check each line rather than retyping it. More on the flooring takeoff software page.
Related reading
- How to quote flooring from builder plansThe full method, from the builder's pack to a priced quote, with a worked hybrid example.
- How to calculate floor area from plansBreaking rooms into shapes, deducting islands and voids, with an m² calculator by finish.
- Flooring waste percentage, and when to round up to packsChoosing a waste figure, applying it in the right order, and rounding to whole packs.
- How to price flooring installationBuilding a supply and install rate per square metre from your real costs.
- The flooring quote checklist: what to check before you sendDocuments, scope, measurements, materials, trims, extras and wording, checked in a few minutes.
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