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Buildertrend + Job Costing

Buildertrend Job Costing Done Right

Buildertrend gives you estimates, budgets, cost categories, purchase orders, time tracking, and a budget-vs-actual report. For most builders, those numbers are wrong. Labor is missing. Bills hit the wrong cost code. Change orders are logged but the budget never updates. QuickBooks shows a completely different total. This guide goes deep on why Buildertrend job costing breaks, how every layer of the system is supposed to work, and how to fix it so your numbers are real.

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How the System Works

What job costing in Buildertrend is actually supposed to look like

Buildertrend job costing runs through a connected chain of tools. Understanding each link matters because when costs end up wrong, the failure almost always traces to one specific link breaking. Here is the full chain.

The estimate and budget

Every job starts with an estimate. In Buildertrend, that estimate is made up of line items tied to cost categories such as framing, concrete, electrical, plumbing, or cabinets. Once you win the job and it moves to active status, you convert that estimate into a budget. The budget is your internal cost target; it is separate from the contract value the owner sees. The budget says: we expect to spend $42,000 on framing, $18,000 on electrical rough-in, $6,500 on exterior doors. Those become the benchmarks your budget-vs-actual report measures against.

Cost categories and cost codes

Cost categories in Buildertrend are the buckets that organize every dollar spent. Buildertrend ships with a default category list, but most builders customize it. A well-structured category list separates costs by trade or scope: site work, concrete, rough framing, exterior sheathing, roofing, plumbing rough, HVAC rough, electrical rough, insulation, drywall, trim, cabinets, flooring, painting, and so on. Within each category, some builders also use cost codes to break down further, for example separating labor and materials within the framing category. The more granular your categories, the more useful your job-cost data is for future bidding. The tradeoff is administrative overhead: someone has to code every bill correctly. A clean, medium-granularity list with 15 to 25 categories is usually the right balance for custom home builders.

Purchase orders

When you order materials or hire a subcontractor, that cost starts life in Buildertrend as a purchase order. The PO links to a specific job and a specific cost category. When the PO is approved, it becomes a committed cost: the money is not spent yet, but it is locked in. When the bill arrives and you post it against the PO, it moves from committed to actual. This two-stage movement, from PO to bill, is what lets Buildertrend show you both what has been invoiced and what you have already obligated but not yet paid.

Bills and the QuickBooks connection

Bills in Buildertrend post to vendor accounts and then sync to QuickBooks as accounts payable. For the job-cost data to transfer correctly, three things need to be true: the bill has a job attached, the cost category is mapped to a QuickBooks service item or account, and the sync ran without errors. When any of those three things fails, the bill exists in one system but not the other, or it exists in both but with different job tags or amounts. That is how the gap between Buildertrend and QuickBooks opens. See the full breakdown at why the QuickBooks sync breaks.

Time clock and labor costs

Buildertrend includes a time clock feature. Employees clock in and out on the mobile app, and those hours are tagged to a specific job and cost category. That time data becomes the basis for allocating labor costs in QuickBooks. When payroll runs, the wages for those hours should be split across jobs in QuickBooks based on the time entries, not posted as a single lump payroll expense. This allocation step is where most builders fail, which is why labor is consistently the most understated line item in budget-vs-actual reports.

Owner invoices and what they are not

Buildertrend also handles the owner-facing side: draw requests, progress invoices, and final billing. These are owner invoices, and they record what the client owes you. They are revenue, not costs. One of the most common errors in Buildertrend job costing is confusing the draw amount with the cost amount. A draw request for $85,000 does not mean $85,000 in costs were incurred. The costs are on the PO and bill side. The invoices are on the revenue side. Conflating the two produces wildly wrong profitability numbers.

The budget-vs-actual and job-cost reports

With all of the above working, Buildertrend generates a budget-vs-actual report that shows, for each cost category: the original budget, any budget revisions, committed costs (approved POs not yet billed), actual costs (bills posted), and the variance. That report is the point of the whole system. It tells you whether framing is on track, whether your electrical sub is running over, and whether the overall job is trending toward the margin you bid. When the inputs are right, it is genuinely powerful. When they are not, it looks authoritative but is not real. The complete job costing guide covers the broader principles that apply in any construction accounting system.

The Three Cost States

Committed costs, actual costs, and projected cost at completion

Most builders read their budget-vs-actual report by looking at the actual column and comparing it to the budget. That is a mistake. On an active job, actuals are always an undercount because bills come in after work is done, sometimes weeks later. Sophisticated job costing tracks three distinct cost states, and your Buildertrend setup and your books need to reflect all three.

Committed costs: the money you have already promised

A committed cost is a cost you have contractually obligated yourself to pay, even though no invoice has arrived yet. In Buildertrend, committed costs come from approved purchase orders and signed subcontractor contracts. When you approve a $34,000 framing PO, that $34,000 is committed. The framing sub has not sent an invoice. No money has moved. But that cost is as real as if it had been paid, because you have no way to un-commit it without a contract dispute.

When you run your budget-vs-actual and look only at actuals, that $34,000 does not appear. Your framing budget shows $34,000 remaining when you actually have zero dollars of budget left. You make decisions based on headroom that does not exist. Running the report with committed costs visible is not optional. It is how the report is supposed to be read on an active job.

Actual costs: what has been billed and posted

Actual costs are bills that have been received, coded to a job and cost category, and posted in QuickBooks. These are the numbers that flow into your financial statements and, when the sync is working, into the actual column in Buildertrend. The actuals column is reliable only to the extent that: every bill has been entered, every bill is coded to the right job and category, and the QuickBooks sync has run and matched correctly. In practice, there is usually a lag, a bill sitting on someone's desk, a sync error that fired last Tuesday, a cost coded to overhead instead of the job. The actuals column is always a snapshot, not a complete picture, which is why committed costs matter.

Projected cost at completion: where the job is actually going

The most important number is one Buildertrend does not automatically calculate for you. Projected cost at completion is your best estimate of what the job will ultimately cost, combining what has already been spent, what is committed, and your revised forecast for any remaining scope. It answers the question: given everything we know right now, how much will this job cost by the time we hand over the keys?

Tracking projected cost at completion requires judgment from the project manager, not just data from the system. If you are 60 percent through rough framing and you have already spent 75 percent of the framing budget, the projected cost at completion for framing is higher than the original budget, and you need to know that now, not when the final framing bill arrives. Good job costing means the project manager updates the forecast column regularly, not just at billing milestones. The books then need to reflect those revised projections in the WIP schedule.

How the books and Buildertrend should reflect all three states

In QuickBooks, committed costs from POs are not yet on the income statement. They sit as open purchase orders. When a bill is received and matched to a PO, it posts to accounts payable and hits the income statement as a cost. Your bookkeeper should be reconciling the open PO list against what is in accounts payable, so that the committed costs in Buildertrend have a corresponding record in QuickBooks. The projected cost at completion lives in the WIP schedule, which sits outside the general ledger as a management report. All three states together give you the complete picture: what you have paid, what you have promised, and where the job is going.

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Root Causes

Why your Buildertrend job costs are wrong

Each of these is a silent error. The report still runs. The numbers just are not real. Seven mistakes, each with its fix.

Labor is not allocated to jobs, and labor burden is ignored

Employees log hours in Buildertrend, but when payroll runs in QuickBooks, the wages post as a lump payroll expense, not split across jobs. The result: your budget-vs-actual shows materials and subs but labor is blank or wildly understated. Worse, even when labor is allocated, the burden, meaning payroll taxes, workers comp, and benefits, stays in an overhead account and never touches the job cost. A framer who costs you $38 an hour fully burdened shows up in your job cost as $28 an hour. The fix: use Buildertrend time entries tagged to jobs and categories; run a payroll journal entry that splits wages and burden by job in QuickBooks each pay period.

Costs are not coded to the right cost code

A subcontractor bill arrives. Someone posts it to "Construction Costs" or "Job Expenses" in QuickBooks without linking it to a specific job and cost category. It lands as a general expense and never shows up on the Buildertrend job-cost report. Or it gets coded to the job but to the wrong category: tile labor goes under "Materials" instead of "Subcontractors," making category-level analysis meaningless. Over multiple jobs and vendors, the miscoded pile grows fast. The fix: every bill and PO needs both a job and a cost code at entry time. Cleanup after the fact catches some of it but not all.

Change orders are approved but the cost budget is not updated

A change order is signed and logged in Buildertrend. The contract value increases. But if the cost budget is not also revised to reflect the additional scope, the budget-vs-actual will show you as over budget on profitable change-order work. The extra costs are real; the budget line just did not follow them. This creates false alarms, where a profitable job looks like it is bleeding, and trains builders to distrust the report. The fix: every approved change order that adds cost scope gets a corresponding budget revision, ideally on the same day, assigned to one person as a standing task.

Buildertrend and QuickBooks disagree

Buildertrend shows $180,000 in job costs; QuickBooks shows $210,000. The gap comes from bills entered directly in QuickBooks without going through a Buildertrend PO, sync errors between the two systems, duplicate entries created when someone entered the same bill in both places, or costs posted in QuickBooks without a job tag. When the two systems disagree, you do not know which one to trust. The QuickBooks number is usually closer to the truth for financial reporting, but it misses the committed costs that only Buildertrend knows about. The fix: route all costs through Buildertrend first, enforce the job tag on every QuickBooks entry, and reconcile the two systems monthly. Our deep dive on the QuickBooks sync covers the most common failure points.

Owner invoice amounts are confused with job costs

Draw requests and progress invoices in Buildertrend show what the client owes you. Some builders read these as job cost summaries, or worse, their bookkeeper records the draw amount as a cost. A $120,000 draw request is revenue, not a cost. Posting it on the cost side overstates your costs, wrecks your gross margin, and produces a WIP schedule that shows phantom over-billing. The fix: keep owner invoices on the revenue side. Job costs come from POs, bills, payroll, and time entries only.

Allowances and selections are not tracked separately

A flooring allowance of $15,000 is built into the contract. The client picks $22,000 flooring. The overage becomes a change order, but if the allowance was never set up as its own budget line, there is no clean way to track what the allowance covered and what the change order covers. Selection overages get buried in the general flooring budget, and the budget-vs-actual looks over budget on flooring even when the cost was contractually covered by the client upgrade. The fix: set up each allowance as its own budget line in Buildertrend, track selections against it as they are made, and process overages as change orders with matching budget adjustments.

Committed costs from POs are ignored when reading the report

The budget-vs-actual report in Buildertrend has a committed costs column. Many builders read only the actual column, which shows bills received. A $45,000 HVAC PO is approved, the work is scheduled, but no invoice has arrived. The actual column shows $0 for HVAC. The builder thinks there is $45,000 of budget remaining. There is not. The committed costs column shows the truth. Reading the report without it leads to decisions made on phantom budget. The fix: run your budget-vs-actual with committed costs included on every active job. Never make a cost decision based on actuals alone mid-project.

Setup Guide

How to set up a cost-code structure that ties out

This is a one-time setup that determines whether job costing works. Get it right here and the ongoing work becomes a process problem, not a system problem.

1 Define a clean cost-code list before anything else

Sit down with your project manager, your most experienced field supervisor, and your bookkeeper or accountant. Build a list of 15 to 30 cost categories that reflect how you actually build. Group them logically: site and civil, foundation, structure, exterior envelope, MEP rough-in, insulation and air sealing, interior finishes, exterior finishes, specialties, equipment, permits and fees, supervision and project management, warranty and callbacks. Each category should be distinct enough that anyone can tell without guessing which category a given bill belongs to. Vague categories like "Miscellaneous Construction" are a trap; they become catch-all buckets that hide cost overruns.

2 Mirror that list in QuickBooks before the first sync

Once you have your Buildertrend cost category list, build the matching structure in QuickBooks. This usually means a set of service items (if you use QuickBooks job costing through service items) or a set of expense accounts (if you use class or project tracking). The goal is a one-to-one mapping: every Buildertrend cost category maps to exactly one QuickBooks account or item. Do this before any bills sync. If the mapping is not established first, every synced bill lands in QuickBooks in an incorrect or generic account, and you will be recategorizing hundreds of transactions manually. See how the QuickBooks and Buildertrend integration should be structured.

3 Separate materials, labor, subs, equipment, and other within categories

Within each major category, track cost types separately. Framing has framing materials, framing labor, and possibly a framing subcontractor if you use a framing crew. Tracking these together in one bucket hides your real cost structure. If you are consistently overspending on framing materials but your labor is on target, a combined framing bucket will not tell you that. The separation also matters for WIP and financial reporting: labor, materials, and subs have different margin dynamics and different timing patterns. Your QuickBooks cost-type accounts should follow the same separation.

4 Map Buildertrend categories to QuickBooks and document it

Create a mapping document, a simple spreadsheet is fine, that shows: Buildertrend category name, QuickBooks account or item name, cost type, and any notes on edge cases. Share this with your project manager, your office manager, and your bookkeeper. When a new vendor or cost type comes up that does not fit neatly into the existing categories, this document is the reference for where it goes. The mapping needs to be a living document, reviewed and updated at least annually, not a one-time exercise that everyone forgets.

5 Allocate labor and labor burden by job every pay period

Every pay period, pull the time entries from Buildertrend and use them to split payroll costs by job and cost category in QuickBooks. The split should include not just gross wages but the full burden: employer payroll taxes, workers compensation, and any employer-paid benefits. A simple payroll journal entry in QuickBooks can do this if you have the time data from Buildertrend. If you use a payroll service that feeds QuickBooks directly, make sure the journal entry that posts wages is replaced with or supplemented by a job-allocation entry that ties to your Buildertrend time records. This is the step most bookkeepers skip, and it is the single largest source of understated job costs.

6 Handle change orders and allowances with their own budget lines

When a change order is approved, open the Buildertrend budget immediately and revise the affected cost category. Do not wait until the bill arrives. If the change order adds scope across multiple categories, revise each affected line. For allowances, set them up as their own budget line from the start of the job, separate from base-scope costs in the same trade. When a client selection comes in over or under the allowance, the variance is visible at a glance and the change order is easy to price because you are working from a clean baseline.

7 Reconcile Buildertrend to QuickBooks monthly, close the gap before moving on

Once a month, run the total job costs by job in Buildertrend and compare to the total job costs by job in QuickBooks for the same period. They should agree. If they do not, the difference is a sync error, a direct-entry bill in QuickBooks, a timing issue, or a missing job tag. Find it and fix it before the next month opens. This reconciliation is the quality-control step that keeps the whole system honest. Assign it to your bookkeeper, not your project manager. It is an accounting task, and it should happen on a fixed date, not whenever someone gets around to it. Our Buildertrend bookkeeping service owns this reconciliation every month.

Budget vs Actual

Reading budget vs actual the right way: variances, overruns, and early warnings

The budget-vs-actual report is Buildertrend's most powerful financial tool. Most builders look at it wrong and miss the signal until the overrun is already locked in.

What the columns actually mean

The report has at minimum four meaningful columns: original budget, budget revisions, committed costs, actual costs, and variance. The variance is calculated against the total budget (original plus revisions). Committed plus actual is the total exposure to date. The remaining budget is total budget minus committed minus actual, which tells you how much you have left to spend before you are over budget. Reading only actuals versus original budget, which is the default view many builders use, ignores both change-order budget revisions and committed POs. It will almost always show you as under budget when you are not.

How to catch overruns early

An overrun that surfaces at the end of a job cost you the whole margin. An overrun caught at 40 percent completion gives you options: value-engineer remaining scope, renegotiate with a sub, or at minimum protect your cash by billing more aggressively. To catch overruns early, you need two habits. First, the project manager reviews the budget-vs-actual by cost category every two weeks on active jobs, not just at billing milestones. Second, the forecast column, projected cost at completion, is updated each time the PM reviews it. When the framing sub's first invoice comes in 12 percent over the PO estimate, the PM updates the framing forecast, and the report immediately shows a budget variance even before the overrun is fully realized.

Variances worth investigating versus noise

Not every variance is an emergency. Small variances, say under 3 to 5 percent on any given category, often reflect timing differences, a bill coded slightly wrong, or normal field variation. Large variances, anything over 10 percent on a material cost category, or any variance on a fixed-price sub scope, deserve immediate investigation. The most dangerous variances are negative ones that appear late in a job and grow quickly. That pattern usually means costs have been flowing into the job uncoded or under the wrong category, and you are only now seeing the true total. At that point the damage is done; the only value of finding it is accuracy for your books and your next bid.

Buildertrend job costing reports vs QuickBooks job profitability

Buildertrend shows you cost by category and commitment state. QuickBooks shows you cost versus revenue and therefore profitability. You need both views. The Buildertrend report tells you where costs are going and whether you are on budget. The QuickBooks job profitability report tells you whether the job is making money, incorporating the revenue side that Buildertrend's cost reports do not show. Running both reports monthly on each active job, and reconciling any discrepancies between them, is what a properly run construction accounting function looks like.

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WIP Report

WIP and over/under billing built on accurate job costs

A WIP report is a schedule of all your active jobs showing whether you have billed more or less than you have earned on each one. It is the most important financial report a general contractor produces. And it is completely dependent on accurate job cost data.

How percent complete is calculated

The most common method for calculating percent complete in construction is the cost-to-cost method. The formula is straightforward: costs incurred to date divided by total estimated costs at completion equals percent complete. Take that percent complete and multiply it by the total contract value to get earned revenue. Compare earned revenue to what you have actually billed to find whether you are over- or under-billed on that job.

For example: a job has a $600,000 contract value and an estimated $480,000 in total costs. You have spent $192,000 so far. Dividing $192,000 by $480,000 gives you 40 percent complete. Forty percent of the $600,000 contract value is $240,000 in earned revenue. If you have billed $270,000, you are over-billed by $30,000, meaning you have collected more than you have earned. If you have billed $210,000, you are under-billed by $30,000, meaning you have earned more than you have collected.

What happens when Buildertrend job costs are wrong

If your Buildertrend job costs are understated because labor is missing or bills are miscoded, your cost-to-date is too low. That makes your percent complete look lower than it really is. You think the job is 40 percent done when it is actually 52 percent done. Your earned revenue is understated. The WIP report shows you as under-billed when you might actually be on track or even over-billed. You leave money on the table by not billing aggressively enough, or you make draws based on a completion percentage that is not real.

The opposite error, overstated costs, happens when costs from other jobs land on the wrong job, or when owner invoice amounts are mistakenly posted as costs. Overstated costs make the job look more complete than it is, making you appear under-billed when you may be over-billed. Either error corrupts the WIP schedule in a way that your bank, bonding agent, or CPA cannot easily detect, because the numbers look internally consistent even when the inputs are wrong.

What lenders and bonding agents look for in a WIP schedule

Lenders who finance construction and bonding companies who write performance bonds both require WIP schedules as part of financial review. They are looking for several things: that the under-billing positions are collectible (work is genuinely done and will be billed), that over-billing is not excessive (if you have collected far more than you have earned on many jobs, that is a liquidity warning), and that the total of earned but unbilled revenue is consistent with your reported gross profit. A WIP schedule that has been built on unreliable job costs often fails these checks in subtle ways. The percentages look plausible job by job, but the aggregate pattern, gross margin implied by WIP versus gross margin on the P&L, does not reconcile. The complete WIP guide covers the mechanics in full.

Accurate job costs are the prerequisite, not the output

Builders sometimes approach WIP as a reporting exercise: produce the schedule, submit it to the bank, move on. The schedule is actually a diagnostic. If your Buildertrend job costs are accurate, the WIP schedule confirms that your billing is aligned with your production. If they are not, the schedule is a document that looks precise but is built on guesses. Fix the job costs first. The WIP schedule then becomes a tool that genuinely informs your cash position and your draw strategy, not just a compliance form.

Reporting Cadence

The monthly reporting rhythm that makes accurate job costing real

Accurate job costing is not a one-time setup. It is a monthly operating cadence. Here is what that cadence looks like in a well-run construction accounting function.

During the month

  • Every bill that arrives is entered in Buildertrend against the correct job and cost category within 48 hours of receipt.
  • Every PO is created before the work is ordered, not after the bill arrives.
  • Time entries are reviewed weekly; any gaps or miscodings are fixed before payroll runs.
  • Change orders are approved in Buildertrend on the same day the client signs, and the cost budget is revised immediately.
  • The QuickBooks sync is checked after every bill batch for errors.

At month close

  • All bills received through month-end are entered and coded.
  • Payroll is allocated by job and cost category in QuickBooks.
  • Total job costs in Buildertrend are reconciled to total job costs in QuickBooks.
  • Open PO list is reviewed; any POs that should have been invoiced by month-end are followed up with vendors.
  • Budget-vs-actual is reviewed for each active job; large variances are flagged and explained.
  • WIP schedule is prepared using the month-end costs and the latest forecast from the PM.
  • Job profitability report in QuickBooks is compared to the WIP schedule and any discrepancies are resolved.

How clean books make all of this real

None of the above is possible if the underlying bookkeeping is behind. A backlog of uncategorized transactions, bank accounts that have not been reconciled in three months, and bills sitting in a pile because no one has time to enter them all mean that the job-cost report is always stale. The project manager is making decisions based on data from six weeks ago. The WIP schedule is built on costs that are 20 to 30 percent incomplete.

The bookkeeping is not the glamorous part of construction accounting. But it is the foundation that every useful report is built on. Buildertrend bookkeeping done well means every bill is entered and coded on time, every pay period ends with an allocation, and the month closes cleanly so the reports reflect reality. When that is in place, the budget-vs-actual is trustworthy, the WIP is reliable, and you can make bids, draw requests, and business decisions from numbers that are actually right.

Job costing is a system problem, not a software problem

Builders often assume that a new version of Buildertrend, a different QuickBooks subscription, or a different report view will fix job-cost accuracy. It will not. The fix is almost always process and mapping: who codes costs and when, how labor gets allocated by job, whether change orders trigger same-day budget updates, whether someone owns the monthly reconciliation, and whether the two systems are set up to talk to each other correctly.

FinTruction works with custom home builders and remodelers across the United States to build that system. We set up the cost-code mapping, own the monthly reconciliation, allocate labor every pay period, and make sure your budget-vs-actual report is something you can bid, draw, and make decisions from. Based in Coppell, Texas, working remotely nationwide.

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Answers

Frequently Asked Questions

Why does my Buildertrend budget-vs-actual show different numbers than QuickBooks?

The most common causes are: bills entered directly in QuickBooks without going through a Buildertrend PO, sync errors between the two systems, costs posted in QuickBooks without a job tag, or duplicate entries created when someone entered the same bill in both places manually. The fix is to route all job costs through Buildertrend first, enforce the job tag on every QuickBooks entry, and reconcile the two systems at month close. Our guide on the QuickBooks sync covers the specific error types and how to find them.

What are committed costs in Buildertrend and why do they matter?

Committed costs are approved purchase orders and signed subcontractor contracts where the cost is locked in but the invoice has not arrived yet. If you read your budget-vs-actual using only the actual (billed) column, you miss all the committed spend and think you have more budget remaining than you actually do. Buildertrend lets you include committed costs in the report. On any active job, always run it with committed costs visible. Reading actuals alone mid-project leads to cost decisions made on budget headroom that does not exist.

How do I get labor costs into Buildertrend job costing?

Labor needs to flow into job costs from two directions. First, employees log time in Buildertrend against specific jobs and cost categories via the mobile time clock. Second, when payroll runs, those wages are allocated by job in QuickBooks using a payroll journal entry tied to the Buildertrend time data, not posted as a single lump payroll expense. A fully accurate approach also includes the labor burden: employer payroll taxes, workers compensation, and employer-paid benefits. If only gross wages are allocated and burden stays in an overhead account, your job costs will be consistently understated on the labor side.

Do I need to update the Buildertrend budget when a change order is approved?

Yes, every time. Approving a change order in Buildertrend updates the contract value but does not automatically adjust the cost budget. If the change order adds scope that will cost money, you need to revise the budget lines for each affected cost category. If you do not, the budget-vs-actual will show you as over budget on profitable change-order work. Assign budget revision as a required step in your change-order workflow, the same day the client signs.

What is the difference between a Buildertrend owner invoice and a job cost?

Owner invoices and draw requests in Buildertrend are the amounts your client owes you. They are revenue. Job costs are bills you owe to vendors, subs, and employees. They are expenses. Posting a draw amount as a cost, or using the invoice total as a proxy for how much was spent, produces severely wrong profitability numbers. Job costs come from POs, bills, payroll allocations, and time entries only.

How does Buildertrend job costing connect to a WIP report?

A WIP report uses the cost-to-cost method to calculate how much revenue you have earned on each active job: costs incurred to date divided by total estimated costs equals percent complete; percent complete multiplied by contract value equals earned revenue. If the costs in Buildertrend are incomplete because labor is missing or bills are miscoded, the percent complete is wrong, and the entire WIP schedule is built on a false number. Accurate Buildertrend job costs are the direct input to a reliable WIP. The complete WIP guide covers the formula and what to do with the over/under billing result.

How should I set up cost codes to match between Buildertrend and QuickBooks?

Build a master cost-code list in Buildertrend first, then create matching accounts or service items in QuickBooks before any bills sync. Map each Buildertrend cost category to exactly one QuickBooks account or item and document the mapping in a shared spreadsheet. Separate cost types within each category: materials, labor, subs, equipment. Review the mapping document at least annually as your trade mix or business evolves. The QuickBooks and Buildertrend integration guide covers the technical setup of the connection.

How often should I reconcile Buildertrend job costs against QuickBooks?

Monthly, at minimum, and it should happen before the month is closed in QuickBooks. Total job costs by job in Buildertrend should match total job costs by job in QuickBooks for the same period. Any discrepancy is either a sync error, a direct-entry bill in QuickBooks without a Buildertrend PO, or a timing issue. Finding and fixing it before the next month opens keeps the cumulative discrepancy from growing into a major cleanup project.

Can a bookkeeper help fix Buildertrend job-costing accuracy, or is this just a software setup issue?

Both, but the larger ongoing lever is the bookkeeping process. The software setup, cost-code mapping, sync configuration, and QuickBooks structure, is a one-time task. What breaks job costing long-term is the ongoing work: coding every bill to the right job and category within 48 hours, allocating labor and burden every pay period, reconciling Buildertrend against QuickBooks at month close, and updating budgets the day change orders are approved. A construction bookkeeper who knows Buildertrend owns that ongoing work so the numbers stay accurate month after month. See what that looks like in our Buildertrend bookkeeping service.

What happens to my WIP report if allowances are not tracked separately?

If allowances are folded into the base cost budget for a trade, selection overages get buried in the general category and appear as budget overruns even when the client is paying for them through a change order. The cost-to-cost percent complete gets skewed because the denominator, total estimated costs, does not correctly reflect the change-order scope added. Set up each allowance as its own Buildertrend budget line from the start of the job. Track client selections against it. Process overages as change orders with a same-day budget revision.

What is projected cost at completion and how do I track it in Buildertrend?

Projected cost at completion is your best estimate of what the job will ultimately cost, combining costs already spent, costs committed through POs, and your revised forecast for remaining work. Buildertrend does not calculate this automatically; it requires the project manager to update the forecast column based on field knowledge. The PM should review and update the forecast every two weeks on active jobs. When a category is running over, update the forecast immediately so the budget-vs-actual variance is visible while you still have time to respond.

Do I need to be in Texas to work with FinTruction on Buildertrend job costing?

No. FinTruction is based in Coppell, Texas, and works with custom home builders and remodelers across the United States. Buildertrend access and QuickBooks Online are both remote, and so is the entire bookkeeping and job-costing function we provide.

Keep Reading

More on Buildertrend & Your Books

Buildertrend QuickBooks Sync Not Working When costs hit the wrong job or the sync breaks entirely.
Buildertrend Bookkeeping Services Have us keep job costs accurate every month.
QuickBooks + Buildertrend Integration The cost-code mapping behind accurate job costs.
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What Construction Owners Say

Real results from builders and contractors we have helped untangle their books and systems.

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They didn’t just record transactions and call it a day. They built a custom chart of accounts around how a remodeling company actually runs, did a full catch-up on years of bookkeeping inside QuickBooks Online, and now stay on top of my monthly bookkeeping and payroll. Every step, they broke it down in simple terms instead of burying me in accountant talk.

Oniel Campbell, Founder of Moonz Contracting
Oniel Campbell
Moonz Contracting Founder

FinTruction rebuilt the whole thing from the ground up, with real job costing, work in progress, and retainage. They didn’t just hand me reports and disappear; they walked me through my numbers until I understood them.

Carl Moore, Owner of Hearth & Haus
Carl Moore
Hearth & Haus Owner
Dalton Mayberry, Owner of ProperCoat Painting
Sahil and his team handle the bookkeeping and job costing for my painting business. They cleaned up my books and set up integrations that give me accurate, timely job costing with solid weekly data. Reliable, detailed, and genuinely invested in getting the numbers right.
Dalton Mayberry
ProperCoat Painting
Owner

FinTruction is the only bookkeeping team we’ve found that truly understands construction accounting and WIP reporting. They aligned our income and costs across 21 jobs and gave us full, monthly transparency. Fast, accurate, and an indispensable partner.

John Wesley Sebastian, President of B&B Concrete
John Wesley Sebastian
B&B Concrete President

When I came to FinTruction I had no financial structure. No job costing, no WIP tracking, books behind. They did a full cleanup and rebuilt job costing and WIP tracking in QuickBooks. Now I know what’s billed, what’s owed, and where every job stands.

Clay Pearson, Owner of C. Pearson Contracting Corp
Clay Pearson
C. Pearson Contracting Corp Owner
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Client testimonial

Hear it straight from a builder we work with

A couple of minutes from a contractor we support, sharing what working with FinTruction has been like and what changed once their numbers finally made sense.

  • An owner sharing their honest experience
  • From guessing to numbers they actually trust
  • Why they recommend us to other contractors
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We will audit your current setup, find where costs are leaking out of the right jobs and categories, and build the system that keeps budget-vs-actual accurate every month. Free consultation, no obligation.

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