Best estimating software in Australia: Estimator+ runs the tender

So which estimating software should you be on?

For a commercial builder pricing through subcontractors, it's Estimator+. We make it, so of course we'd say that. Stick with us for the reasons, though.

Think about a tender in its last week. A folder of drawings, a takeoff file, quotes in someone's inbox, a pricing workbook and the client's submission form. Then an addendum lands and every one of those has to catch up.

So we built Estimator+ to run the whole tender as one system, from the folder on your drive to the PDF the client gets. We call it the Estimating Operating System, and here's how it hangs together.

It starts in your own tender folder

Until now, estimating software could only see what you manually uploaded. Estimator+ connects to the tender folder on your computer, the company-drive folder that's synced there. Something like D:\Tenders\Riverbend Aged Care.

The AI is Claude or ChatGPT, running in its desktop app on the plan you've already got. You say "Set up the Riverbend tender in Estimator+." It reads the tender documents, creates the tender, and uploads the measurable drawings (plans, elevations, sections and details) as sheets.

The specs, schedules, reports and contract stay on your drive, and the AI keeps reading them there for context without clogging your workspace. Estimator+ holds the sheet pictures, the measurements and the estimate, plus whatever you send out to subbies through Sendout.

The AI writes inside its own _Estimator+ folders in the tender folder. It never moves, renames or deletes your files.

Then the AI does the takeoff

Ask for the takeoff and AI Takeoff V5 reads the whole tender before it measures a line, every addendum included. So it catches the trade exclusions, counts what a note calls for, and sets up the client's PC sums, provisional sums and priced options as trades of their own, worded the way the tender words them.

Here's the bit we'd hang the whole argument on. The AI never types a quantity. Every quantity is a shape (an outline, a line or a dot) or a pin on a sheet, and Estimator+ works out the number from that shape and the sheet's printed scale. The scale's proven on the sheet itself, and your own calibration is never replaced.

So your estimator checks shapes they can see, each one labelled on the plan in Review mode, instead of trusting a number somebody typed. Every assumption gets shown, and the open questions come back together at the end of the run. Our best takeoff software post goes deeper on checking it.

Getting the subbies to actually price

You know how it goes with tender platforms. Generic system invites get buried in spam or ignored as one more mass-blast. With Sendout, the invites come from your own email address.

The AI maps the document packages by trade for you to review, picks subcontractors from your address book, and drafts each invite in your Outlook or Gmail. You check it and press send. Estimator+ never sends mail itself.

Each subbie gets one link with the job, the due date, their trade package, the full set and Quoting or Not quoting buttons. You see who opened, who downloaded and who passed. Ask "Who's pricing Riverbend, and who needs chasing?" and the AI tells you, then drafts the reminders.

You can also send them BOQs with marked-up plans, in PDF and Excel, which takes the heavy lifting out of pricing. When the quotes come back as PDFs and emails, the AI files them into Quotes.

"Why are we carrying the dearer ceilings quote?"

Here's an example, with made-up figures, all ex GST. A fitout's ceilings measure 936 m² on the current reflected ceiling plans, Revision C. The director reviewing the tender stops at ceilings, carried at $86,112, and asks why when two quotes came in lower. Fair question.

B's lower because it priced less: 46 m² fewer, and no plant room ceiling. C's lower because a cost moved to another trade, where somebody still has to carry it. A covers the ceilings as drawn, which is why it got picked.

In Estimator+ the director reads all of that in Quotes, right beside the ceilings line. B's lump sum stays fixed to the 890 m² it was priced on, with a comment saying Revision B, and B's and C's exclusions sit on their own prices. There's more on this in how to compare subcontractor quotes.

Pricing, margin and the client's form

When you ask, the AI drafts rates and prices the job. Each rate names its basis, whether that's your own rates and files or past tenders on Estimator+ with research, and it stays indicative until you confirm it. The money's ex GST. The picks, the margin and the strategy stay yours.

Review puts coverage per trade, margin per line or trade and cost per m² on FECA in one place. Then the client breakdown regroups the same money into the client's own submission form, with sub-folders and subtotals. It has to add up to the tender total, so nothing goes missing in the shuffle.

The submission, the addendum and every revision after

The submission goes out as a branded PDF, with or without the individual cost lines and carrying its revision number, and there's an Excel export too. Any past revision opens as a full workspace, so you can see what changed between the one you sent last week and today's.

And when Addendum 02 drops on the Thursday before close? Put it in the tender folder and tell the AI. It matches each new revision to its old drawing, uploads the new sheets and supersedes the old ones. A rate follows the live quantity, a lump sum holds, and Sendout adds revision notes for the trades it affects. Our post on tender addenda and revisions walks through it.

Can the whole team be in it at once?

Yep. Estimator+ runs in the browser on Mac or Windows, with nothing to install. The whole team works in the same tender in real time, from the office, site or home, and its database is hosted in Sydney.

So in the last week, one estimator can be sorting the addendum while another checks quotes and the director looks at margins, all on the same numbers.

So what does it cost, and what's the catch?

A seat is A$450 a month ex GST, billed monthly, cancel any time, no contract. Every seat includes the AI takeoff and the whole workflow, with unlimited tenders, drawings and exports. The AI runs on your own Claude or ChatGPT plan, so there's no AI bill from us.

Now the honest bits. Estimator+ reads PDF drawings, not CAD or BIM models, so it won't take off a model. The takeoff needs the Claude or ChatGPT desktop app with your folder open. ChatGPT in a web browser can still work on the estimate, quotes and pricing. It just can't see the folder.

There's no free trial, either. We'd rather show you on a real job, so book a demo and we'll run the takeoff on one of your own tenders, at your office or on Google Meet.