The money side

Every number carries. Estimate to bank.

The money is the part of a job most software gets half right: a budget over here, invoices over there, and a spreadsheet in the middle holding it together. SyteNav runs the whole thing on one set of numbers, from the first soft cost to the final payment.

  1. Estimate

    Budget, soft costs, markup

  2. Buy-out

    RFQs, bids, subcontracts

  3. Build

    Progress, change orders

  4. Bill

    Invoices or pay apps

  5. Paid

    Payments, escrow, your fee

One line, three numbers

This is the whole model

Every budget line carries what you planned, what you are committed to, and what you have actually spent. Signing a subcontract fills the second one. Approving an invoice or assigning a receipt fills the third.

Nothing is typed twice, which is the only reason the numbers can be trusted at the end of the job. Understand this one graphic and you understand the money side.

  • Committed over budget is flagged the moment it happens
  • Materials receipts roll into the line they belong to
  • Variance per line and across the job, live

Budget line

Electrical · rough-in & finish

Linked to subcontract
Budgeted$48,000

What you planned when you priced the job.

Committed$46,200

Volt Bros signed at $46,200. Nothing typed twice - awarding the bid wrote this.

Actual$31,450

Two approved invoices and a materials receipt. Approving moves it, not paying.

Left to spend on this line

$16,550

Stage by stage

How the money moves

Organised the way the money actually flows on a job, not by feature name.

Before the ground breaks

Preconstruction and soft costs

Not every dollar on a job is a trade. Plans and design, permit fees, builders risk, survey, legal and recording, loan origination and interest, contingency. They live on the same budget as the trades, in their own section with their own subtotal, so the job total is the real total.

  • One click adds the standard soft-cost list, blank, to fill in as numbers firm up
  • Hard and soft split with subtotals, and what share of the job is soft
  • A job still in planning shows only the tabs that matter before you break ground

The estimate

A budget that is also your bid

Build the job at cost, line by line, in the trades you actually use. Add your markup and you have the client price. Generate the proposal as a branded PDF at whatever detail level you want the client to see. Win it, and that same budget is already your baseline.

  • 49 trade categories in build order, plus any category you name yourself
  • Import an existing estimate from Excel or CSV without losing what is already there
  • Save any budget as a template and reuse it on the next job

Your profit

Sellout and projected profit

Enter what the job sells for, or what you are contracted at, and your profit tracks itself: sellout minus cost, recalculated every time a budget line moves. Once costs land you also see profit against actual spend. Not a report you run at the end - a number that is right today.

  • Works on a spec build, where the sale price has nothing to do with your cost
  • Falls back to cost plus markup on a cost-plus job, so there is nothing to enter
  • Margin percentage alongside, and it turns red before you find out the hard way

Buy-out

Quotes out, bids compared, contracts signed

Send an RFQ and subs bid on a link with no account. The AI reads what came back and tells you where the gaps are, so the cheapest number is not mistaken for the best one. Award it and the subcontract writes itself onto the budget line.

  • AI bid comparison that flags exclusions, not just totals
  • Awarding a bid creates the subcontract and links it to the budget
  • Insurance and licence expiry tracked per sub, with reminders

Billing

Whichever way you bill

Residential and smaller jobs bill on invoices and client payments. Commercial and bank-funded jobs bill by monthly pay application against a schedule of values, with retainage, and print as a real G702 and G703. You pick per job, and the app only shows you the one you chose.

  • Approving an invoice moves the budget, not just paying it
  • Pay apps carry previous billings forward automatically
  • Change orders flow into the contract total and the sub contract both

Getting paid

Payments, escrow, and your fee

What the client has paid, what is sitting in escrow, what is still owed, and your contractor fee on top. Plus the answer to the question that keeps contractors up: can I pay my vendors this week without going into my own pocket.

  • Client payments recorded against stages you define
  • Escrow balance and outstanding tracked per job
  • A straight answer on whether you can cover what you owe right now
Payments · Linden Ave RemodelContract $148,500
Received to date$59,400 · 40%

$29,700

Escrow balance

$8,910

Your fee earned

$12,300

Owed to vendors

Deposit$14,850Paid
Rough-in complete$44,550Paid
Inspection passed$29,700In escrow
Trim-out$37,125Upcoming
Final walkthrough$22,275Upcoming

Nothing owed, nothing forgotten

Know where you stand, on every job, today

Stages you define, payments recorded against them, escrow tracked, and your fee calculated on top. The same numbers roll up across every job you are running.

$0M

in contracts tracked

0+

jobs managed

0%

invoices paid on schedule

Zoom out

One job, one building, or all of it

Across a building

A forty-unit building is forty budgets. Set the sellout on each and the site totals it: full sellout against full cost, margin for the whole thing. Units you have not priced yet are flagged, so a half-priced building never reads as a finished number.

Across the company

Every job in one money view: contracted, billed, paid, outstanding. Which job is bleeding and which one is carrying you, without opening ten tabs and a spreadsheet.

Without the retyping

Quotes, invoices, receipts and permits are read by AI into structured line items and terms. The whole reason the numbers stay connected is that nobody had to key them in twice.

Straight about it

What this is not

SyteNav tracks construction cost and the money moving between you, your subs and your client. It does not model a capital stack, a draw schedule, or an exit, and it is not your accounting system. If you run a full development pro-forma, keep running it, and use this to keep the construction side honest.

It does push to QuickBooks Online, so your bookkeeper is not re-entering the same invoices you already approved.

Put one job through it

Bring a budget you already have, and see the whole money side of that job in one place.

Invite-only beta. Free while you're in it. Tell us about your company and we'll get you set up.