Framing takeoff for house framers

What it takes off

The structure, from the ground to the ridge

Floor joists and I-joists, beams and headers in plies of LVL, PSL, glulam or dimension lumber, posts, trusses, rafters, hips and valleys, and the sheathing over all of it. Sizes come from the drawings, the engineer and the truss supplier, and you type them into your framing types — it counts and measures, and it never designs. A framer who has been handed a number they could not trace knows why that matters.

One number: labour and lumber together

A framer bids one price. Floor square feet, wall feet, roof squares and flights of stairs come out as labour quantities your own crew rates price, beside the lumber list, and your markup stays inside the unit prices on the proposal your builder reads.

Reading the framing plans

Press one button and it lists the framing callouts the drawings print — 2x10 joists at 16 inches on centre, I-joist series, LVL plies, trusses and pitch, sheathing — with the sheet and the words each one came from. Turn one into a framing type when it is right, after you check it against the drawings.

Every number shows its working

Nineteen trusses of 24-foot span, because 36 feet times 12 divided by 24 is 18, plus one. A 14-foot span plus bearing is a 16-foot LVL, three plies. Every line in the takeoff carries the arithmetic that produced it, so you can check it the way you would check your own.

What it does not do

• It never sizes a member. Joist, beam and header sizes, truss design, girders and bracing come from the structural drawings, the engineer and the truss supplier.
• It counts trusses as a starting point for the supplier's layout, not in place of it.
• Rafters are counted as a simple roof of one pitch, and jack rafters are yours to add. A dormer's numbers are typed per dormer. Engineered floor layouts are not in yet.
• It reads the text on the drawings; it does not count symbols, and it cannot promise to read every callout a set prints.
• No framer's set has been through it end to end yet. It is built from how framers bid, and the arithmetic is worked by hand in our tests, but no framer has run their own job through it. Check your first bid line by line.

Questions estimators ask

Will it tell me what size joists or beams to use?

No. It reads and counts what the drawings and your framing types say. Member sizes are the drawings' and the engineer's, and truss design is the truss supplier's.

Can I price framing labour by the square foot?

Yes. Floors give labour by the square foot, roofs by the square, walls by the foot and stairs by the flight, and each is priced by the crew rate you set, together with the lumber.

Does it handle I-joists and LVL beams?

Yes. A floor type can use I-joists with their own stock lengths and bearing, and a beam type can be LVL, PSL or glulam in any number of plies. Both are filed as engineered lumber.

Has a framer used this on a real job yet?

Not yet. Wood framing went in on 15 September 2026. The arithmetic is worked by hand in our tests, but no framer has run their own job through it end to end. That is worth knowing before you bid with it, and it is why your first bid is free.

Is there free framing takeoff software?

Our wood wall framing and stair stringer calculators are free, with no account, like the rest of our calculators, and each does one run from numbers you type. Your first bid is free too, with no card: one drawing set of up to 75 sheets, from the upload to the proposal. After that, the smallest plan is 250 US dollars a month for 20 bids: the founding price for the first 50 paying companies, and 350 US dollars after the first 50.

How much does framing takeoff software cost?

Takeoff software is usually sold one of three ways: per seat by the month or year, as a one-time licence with paid updates, or by the job. Ours is priced by the drawings, not the seat: each plan is a monthly allowance of bids, and one bid is one drawing set of up to 75 sheets, however many walls, floors and roofs it has. Unused bids do not carry over. The Estimator plan is 250 US dollars a month for 20 bids and 1 seat. That is the founding price for the first 50 paying companies, who keep it while they stay subscribed; companies after them pay 350 US dollars a month. An addendum is charged only for the sheets that changed, at one bid per 75 sheets. Your first bid is free, with no card.

Is it Canadian takeoff software?

Yes. PreConstruct AI is built in Ontario, Canada, for subs who bid from drawings in millimetres, in feet and inches, or both. Each company chooses imperial, metric or both; metric schedule sizes are read as millimetres, and Canadian rebar sizes from 10M to 55M are built in. Prices are in US dollars, and the estimator types the tax rate on every job.

How accurate is it?

We publish no accuracy figure: how well any tool reads a set depends on the drawings, and one number across all of them means little. Every quantity read from the drawings shows its sheet and its arithmetic, anything it cannot settle is flagged for you rather than guessed, and wall suggestions are a beta you confirm. The honest test is a job you have already bid: run it as your free first bid and compare it line by line.