Construction & Skilled Trades
Bookkeeping for contractors who need to know which jobs make money and which ones just keep the crews busy.
The Industry
You buy materials before the job starts. You pay your crew every Friday. You bill when the work is done and collect 30 days later if the customer doesn’t drag it out. A profitable job can still leave you short on cash because the timing never lines up.
Construction accounting isn’t just tracking revenue and expenses. It’s tracking them by project, managing the gap between when money goes out and when it comes back, and knowing which types of work actually make money once you count everything.
Who This Covers
Who This Covers
General contractors, electricians, plumbers, HVAC, roofers, painters, concrete, landscaping, fencing, flooring. Any trade business bidding jobs, buying materials, and managing crews.
What Makes It Different
What Makes It Different
Job costing by project. Payroll with varying hours and overtime. Subcontractors who need W-9s and 1099s. Ohio BWC audits that require clean records. Cash flow that doesn’t match profitability.
What We Handle
Monthly bookkeeping with job costing so you can see profit by project, not just overall. Payroll for crews with overtime calculated correctly. Subcontractor tracking so 1099s don’t become a January emergency. The back-office work that piles up when you’re running jobs.
We set up QuickBooks for construction, which means job costing enabled, expenses coded to projects, and reports that actually tell you something useful about which work is worth pursuing.
Job Costing
Job Costing
Labor, materials, subs, permits, equipment rental. Every cost tied to the job that caused it. You see what each project actually cost and whether the bid was accurate.
Payroll
Payroll
Weekly or bi-weekly payroll processed for your crew. Overtime calculated, taxes withheld, deposits made. Ohio BWC class codes tracked correctly for audit season.
Common Problems
Contractors who don’t track by job can’t bid accurately. Every estimate becomes a guess because you don’t know what the last similar project actually cost. You think you’re making money overall, but you have no idea which jobs are profitable and which ones are dragging down the average.
Then there’s the paperwork that doesn’t get done. The change order that was agreed to verbally but never billed. The sub who worked three jobs but never sent a W-9. The receipts that faded on the dashboard before anyone recorded them.
Bidding Blind
Bidding Blind
Without job cost history, every estimate is optimistic guessing. You underbid because you forgot what the last one actually cost. Or you overbid and lose work you could have won.
BWC Surprises
BWC Surprises
Ohio Bureau of Workers’ Compensation audits your payroll by class code. If your records aren’t clean, you get hit with premium adjustments that wipe out months of profit.
What Changes
You know your real margins by job type. That commercial work you almost turned down? Best margins of the year. Those small residential jobs that felt easy? Half of them lost money once you counted the callbacks. You start making decisions based on data instead of gut feeling.
Payroll happens without eating your Friday. BWC audits become routine because the records are already organized. Subs have W-9s on file before the first check goes out. The paperwork stops piling up because someone is actually handling it.
Better Bids
Better Bids
Historical job data shows what things actually cost. You bid based on reality, not hope. You stop losing money on work that looked good on paper.
Time Back
Time Back
Payroll processed without you calculating hours. Books closed without you sorting receipts. The back office runs whether you’re paying attention to it or not.
Northwest Ohio’s Trusted Bookkeeping Partner
The Next Step:
A 15-Minute Discovery Call
Let's talk about your current bookkeeping situation. We'll assess your needs, outline a plan of action, and give you a clear quote.
