Masonry Template vs. Estimating App — Who Carries the Counts?
A masonry bid is a stack of small calculations — units per square foot, bags per hundred, cells per cubic foot of grout, scaffold days — balanced on top of judgment about condition and matching. The template question is really: do those calculations happen at the wall once, or at the kitchen table every time?
What the template does well
Our free construction bid template handles the document: parties, scope, itemized lines, exclusions, signatures. The terms you refine in it — matching expectations, hidden-condition unit prices, weather clauses — are permanent assets whichever tool you use. At a bid or two a month, it's genuinely sufficient.
Where masonry outgrows it
| Template | FieldSquire | |
|---|---|---|
| Unit/mortar/grout math | You compute nightly | Drafted from narration at the wall |
| Rates by wall type | You look up your notebook | Learned prices, applied automatically |
| Joint/damage photos | Separate email, maybe | Attached to the lines they justify |
| Repair options on shared staging | Manual assembly | Accept-per-line options |
| Signature & deposit | Print and chase | E-sign on site, deposit tracked |
| Cost | $0 | $19/mo Solo after free 14-day trial |
The switching rule
Count last month's bids and last month's evenings. If bids ≥ 4 and any evening went to retyping counts you'd already made at the wall, run the 14-day no-card trial on your next three estimates. And whichever tool you use, run your margin method once through the free margin calculator — cost × margin is the oldest leak in the trade.
Try it on a real job: FieldSquire's Solo plan is free for 14 days with no credit card — unlimited manual estimates and AI-assisted drafts you review line by line. Start the free trial or see the masonry estimating app guide.