Chapter 1
Why Job Costing Matters
Most contractors don't know their true job costs until it's too late. They estimate a job at 20% profit margin, only to find out months later they actually made 5%—or lost money entirely.
Job costing is the discipline of tracking every dollar spent on a project as it happens, so you can:
- Catch budget overruns before they eat your profit
- Make informed decisions about change orders
- Price future jobs accurately based on real data
- Identify which types of work are actually profitable
Without job costing, you're flying blind. With it, you have the data to run a profitable business.