Curious what everyone’s running. Here’s mine: • JobTread — PM, estimating, budgets, and the file system: plans, drawings, receipts, job docs all live here • QuickBooks — accounting • Notion — business brain / SOPs + cost history • Airtable — Contractor OS data layer • Claude / ChatGPT — the glue. Skills + MCP connectors so I’m not re-entering the same data three times Google Drive is still in there, but honestly it’s redundant — it only exists as a staging spot until I get receipt capture running properly through the agents. Once that’s clean it comes out. What are you running — and what’s sitting in your stack that you know you don’t actually need?

Accurate estimation starts with accurate quantity takeoff. In construction, cost overrun often does not start from the site. It starts from inaccurate quantities. I have seen many projects where the estimate was prepared without a proper takeoff process. At the beginning, the budget looked fine, but during execution, the real issues started appearing: • Material shortage • Extra ordering • BOQ variation • Client confusion • Contractor loss • Budget mismatch • Delays in procurement This is why I use PlanSwift for quantity takeoff. PlanSwift helps me measure directly from drawings and prepare a more organized, visual, and accurate takeoff. With PlanSwift, I can work on: • Area takeoff • Room-wise measurements • Flooring quantities • Plaster and paint areas • Tile work measurements • Linear measurements • Item counts • BOQ preparation • Cost estimation support • Quantity verification The screenshot shows a color-coded room-wise area takeoff, where each space is measured separately. This makes the estimation process easier to review, easier to explain, and easier to connect with the BOQ. For me, estimation is not just about applying rates. It is about understanding drawings, extracting correct quantities, controlling cost, and giving the client a realistic project budget. As a Civil Site Engineer, Construction Consultant, BOQ & Estimation Specialist, and Cost Control Advisor, I believe digital tools like PlanSwift improve speed, accuracy, transparency, and professional documentation. I am RIFAQAT YOUNIS, and I help contractors, builders, and construction companies improve project planning, BOQ/estimation, cost control, site execution, and business growth through practical site experience and digital tools. What do you use for quantity takeoff? Manual measurement, Excel-based takeoff, or digital software like PlanSwift? #PlanSwift #QuantityTakeoff #ConstructionEstimation #BOQ #CostControl #ProjectPlanning #CivilEngineering #ConstructionManagement #DigitalConstruction #Estimators #ConstructionTechnology #RifaqatYounis

I've done a bit of an update to my previous approach of how to get AI to read construction drawings. I basically copied an idea from BIM The original inspiration for this is I actually saw a study where they used AI for estimating and graded it on how well it could estimate and found that it did quantity takeoffs 100% accurately. I was incredibly surprised by this and then I found out that they'd actually given it a BIM model and a connector. So I dug a little deeper and found that what BIM actually is a structured database Which led me to the idea of could you actually convert your construction drawings into a structured database grouped by the physical things we were installing rather than the pages on the drawings? Which led to this approach If you want the drawing analyser skill, its in ContractorOS: https://www.skool.com/contractor-os

Hey everyone 👋 New month — figured I'd kick off a fresh thread. We've been building out some new skills lately, along with starting to integrate the elite Contractor OS Skills. A few that have been saving real time: **Voice memo to scope** — record a site walkthrough, drop the transcript in, get a proper scope out the other side. Early stages but promising. **Cost-plus invoicing** — pulls your time and materials together and builds a draft invoice. Currently saving me about an hour. What are YOU working on this weekend? First skill, full system build, or just getting started — drop it below 👇

has anyone managed to connect with outlook yet to email claude instructions and get claude to draft emails? im currently having to use a personal Gmail account to send and receive emails from my agent, not very efficient and cant send attachments.