Civil Takeoff
Civil takeoff is a crucial component of any construction project. Be it a residential or commercial building or some mega infrastructure project, you need accurate takeoffs and estimates the first time. The construction industry is highly competitive, especially civil works, and precise estimates are essential to convert bids and win projects.
Civil work takeoffs can vary a lot from project to project. Some are fairly simple, like masonry or infrastructure work, but others are complex for mega projects like high-rise buildings, bridges, highways, commercial shopping centers, and industrial buildings.
Your bid, including the cost of a construction job, depends a lot on the civil takeoff. So, in this article, we’re going to explain what makes up a civil takeoff, what is the best way to craft one, and what are some of the factors you must consider while creating one for your project:
A typical civil takeoff comprises the breakdown of the quantities of all the construction components required for completing a project. The process is similar in approach for both new civil projects as well as for renovations.
Accurate takeoffs
In order for the civil takeoff to be effective and useful, it has to be accurate. A thorough estimate includes even all minor details to avoid project budget overruns or overall loss. So, it is pretty important that estimators know how to takeoff measurements from the blueprints. They might also need to cover the project specifications to understand the specific requirements and consider the same in their estimate.
Preparing such an estimate and doing such a takeoff manually or by hand is not realistic. You probably don’t have time to undertake such a tedious job. But at the same time, it’s critical for you as a contractor to submit bid proposals that accompany accurate estimates at a super-fast pace to win projects and earn profits.
That’s why we recommend outsourcing your civil work takeoff to specialized estimating companies like Construction Estimating. Our team comprises highly technical and trained individuals who fully understand how to read blueprints and draw item quantities from the outline. Their experience in making estimates by using modern computer apps and software helps our clients stand out in their bid proposals among competitors. We’re striving to make effective, accurate, and project-winning bid proposals.
Civil Takeoff service
Although, for small projects, you can easily itemize the material required to complete a project. You can easily brainstorm for the items because of your experience, make a list, assign a cost to every item, and you’re done.
But not all projects are simple, and as an experienced contractor, you can’t always earn good profits in bidding for simple and small projects. For larger civil projects, takeoff and preparing estimates is a time-consuming activity. You need to hire a team of expert estimators, and in turn, you will increase your overheads. So, the best approach to streamline the estimation and takeoff process is to outsource your work to a company that knows the use of fully functional construction estimating softwares. They’re able to understand the process and help you make civil takeoffs for very demanding and complex projects.
Civil blueprint takeoff
With the civil blueprints, you should include all materials required for finishing a project. The list of materials required depends a lot on the type of project. A residential, civil work might only include lumber, sheathing, flooring, roofing, and foundation. But a bridge civil work would include reinforcement, concrete, formwork, foundation, girders, and so many elements.
Apart from the consumable materials, your project might also include prefabricated materials like doors, windows, tiles, pipes, and relevant items. You’ll take the measurement for all these materials from the blueprints. After that, you can assign the quantity against each material list to prepare a complete takeoff.
In terms of measurements, different items have different standard units. For doors and windows, you can simply count from the plan. For things like lumber supports, joists, columns, and studs, you need accurate length measurements. For components like roofing, cladding, siding, or flooring, we generally do the takeoff in terms of area or square footage. However, for some items like concrete, excavation, and backfilling, we use the cubic footage unit as volume.
So, you see, there’re a number of items and their associated complexities. But modern takeoff software has in-built modules or plugins for each of these trades. Without doing some complex calculations, you can easily and accurately estimate the number of components on the go.
But learning the software from scratch needs commitment and time. You being a contractor, are already burdened to work under the nose. You got some technical commitments and, at the same time, dealing with clients. With such, you might not be able to catch up with the competition.
Looking for Civil Takeoff Estimating Services?
A lot of contractors are outsourcing their civil take-off work, and that’s why we’re offering our services to contractors like you. We’ve been working with clients on all their requirements for civil takeoff. We not only do the takeoff, but we deliver a complete package, including labor costs, overheads, stage fees, and optimizing profit margins.
So, if you’re looking for CSI division 3 Civil takeoff estimating services, call us now, and we’ll be happy to serve you.
We use Planswift Software to do Digital Takeoffs
So, if you’re looking to take off your residential or commercial masonry project, you require a helping hand. That’s where software like Planswift can be pretty helpful. It let you quickly determine the required area of finish but has specific built-in tools to make your paint takeoff easy as ago.
