The house
Start from a common job, then replace every figure with your takeoff. Changing capacity, system, work, or pipe never overwrites a rate you already typed.
Your crew rates
A $42/h tech loaded at 32% is $55.44. Quoting the raw wage on a published $799 installed special is how a 64k copper-and-iron cut-in that looked fine turns into a half-day loss after the first soldered run.
Your bid
- Capacity and system
- Package and extras
- Crew hours
- Loaded labor
- Softener + fittings
- Travel + equipment
- Overhead
- Total cost
- Profit at this price
- Price per foot of pipe
- Effective hourly rate
- Walk-away price
Where the hours go
Where the cost goes
Transparent arithmetic from your own inputs. Starting hours and material rates are common ballpark figures, not an industry standard, a water-quality report, or a treatment specification — replace them with your own takeoff.
Hand the customer a proposal
The price above is for you. This is the page you print or save as a PDF and give to the customer — your details, their details, the scope, the deposit split, and a line for them to sign. Your business details are saved on this device so you only type them once; the customer’s details are never saved.
Everything on the printed page is text you typed or a number this calculator worked out. It contains no warranty, lien, or cancellation wording — those depend on your jurisdiction and your contract, and this tool is not the place to invent them.
Common questions
Why are the pipe and drain lines $0 when I entered lengths?
Because both defaults sit inside their allowances. The base install carries 10 ft of supply pipe and 15 ft of drain line; the defaults enter 8 ft and 6 ft, so neither has chargeable extra footage and the $1.20 and $1.40 per-foot rates never engage. Enter a 25-foot drain run to a distant standpipe and the difference starts billing.
Then why is there still a $35 drain material line?
Because the drain kit is not the same thing as drain footage. The air gap, standpipe fitting, and clamps ship as a fixed kit whether the run is two feet or twenty — that is the $35, alongside a $65 bypass valve. Footage bills on top of it, not instead of it.
Why doesn’t a 35% target margin mean marking cost up 35%?
Because a margin is a share of the price, not an addition to the cost. The default install costs $856.42, and keeping 35% of the price means $856.42 ÷ 0.65 = $1,317.56. Marking the cost up by 35% would give $1,156.16, which is only a 25.9% margin — a $161 shortfall on a job this size, and proportionally the same on every job you price that way.
What is deliberately not in this number?
A water test, a permit, and haul-away of the old unit are all off or zero on the defaults, as is any electrical work and reverse-osmosis or iron-filter equipment. The estimate also assumes an existing loop to tie into. Sizing the unit to actual grains-per-gallon hardness is a judgment call this page does not make for you — the capacity selector is your input, not a recommendation.