A team of excavators is using Rapid Estimates to get costs to clients fast.

Eric Lindhorst lives in Cincinnati, OH, and his favorite color has always been Caterpillar yellow. As the Lead Estimator for Shea’s Land Services, Eric is combining his field experience, his project management knowledge, and the technology and data from 1build to create fast and accurate estimates for high-end clients.

As an excavation subcontractor, Shea’s Land Services works directly with a set of general contractors with whom they have formed strong relationships. Some of the projects they work on include pools, basements, and putting greens for large residences, as well as tree clearing and trench digging for small commercial projects.

Big Digs, Big Change Orders, and the Software to Speed It Up

Just like all big excavation projects, Eric experiences his share of change orders and scope changes once a project has already begun, so the ability to adjust numbers on the fly and still get an accurate estimate has been his favorite part of working in 1build construction estimating software.

“The whole thing has been awesome,” Eric said about his experience with 1build. “You can type [numbers] in or have the numbers set so you can get it going. Or, you can change one number so you don’t have to do math for an hour.

We just did a job where we were excavating for footers and found out that dirt was terrible. We ended up digging down 12 feet, pouring concrete walls, and then trucking in 200 tons of gravel. It was an $80,000 change order.”

With ten crew members driving up to 20-ton excavators on the job site, every hour that is saved in estimating is an hour gained in the field. And with that extra time, general contractors and owners can make decisions faster, and Eric can complete projects on time—even when things change.

Eric Lindhorst

“1build is great for changing a bid when the bid scope changes.”

1build is also saving Eric time on the front end of every bid. “We called a bunch of companies, but what [1build] offers seemed to fit best for us, because we don’t always have plans—sometimes we just have numbers or pictures,” Eric said. “But now I can get my estimate finished in a quarter of the time it used to take.”

Customer Success Coaching for Life

So, what is speeding up the estimation process so much? Eric worked with the 1build Customer Success team to customize his material and equipment library, so the items Shea’s Land Services uses on a regular basis are right at Eric’s fingertips. Then, with his estimate set to their local county, every item comes pre-loaded with the real-time cost for easy estimating. “I’ve got a huge library in 1build, and a lot of our items are one-time use, since we do crazy requests,” Eric said.

And the Customer Success team is still helping Eric refine his estimating process, getting access to the materials data he needs for every new project. “My 1build rep has been right there, walked through everything and just made life a lot easier,” Eric said. “Just calling him for an hour and going over everything was kind of awesome to get up and running. And I'm sure there are more things he could teach me that will help everything make more sense. And the platform is constantly getting streamlined. It's just becoming better and better to us.”

Try It for Yourself

Ready to try out 1build for yourself and see how much time you’ll save with easier estimating? Check out our 14-day trial, which gives you access to 1build’s Rapid Estimate view, live and local cost data, and Dynamic Takeoff tools.