Material takeoff: how to do a quantity takeoff

A material takeoff measures every task and material on a job from the drawings or on site, each in its own unit: surfaces in square metres, skirting and pipes in metres, doors and drains in pieces, concrete in cubic metres. You measure the finished work without waste. Waste goes only on the materials you buy, and labour hours are the quantity times the labour consumption.

What goes into a bill of quantities?

A bill of quantities lists the tasks on a job and how much of each there is. Every line has an item, a unit and a quantity. For pricing you add waste, labour consumption and a unit rate.

What you measure	Unit	Typical lines
Surfaces	m²	painting, skim coat, tiling, floor covering
Long, narrow items	m	skirting, pipes, handrails, sealant joints
Separate items	pcs	doors, windows, floor drains, penetrations
Volumes	m³	concrete, fill, demolition waste
Work you cannot measure (protection, cleaning, trips)	sum	one line with its contents written out

Group the lines by work item or by building part: demolition, preparation, waterproofing, tiling and painting. The Finnish Talo 2000 measurement guide from Rakennustieto, the Finnish building information institute, allows either order and lets the bill cover the whole job or a single item. When the groups follow the order of work, the same list also drives the schedule and the purchasing.

Download the free bill of quantities template for Excel (XLSX). Its formulas work out each line’s quantity from the dimensions, the purchase quantity with waste and the labour hours from the labour consumption.

How do you do a material takeoff?

Do the takeoff in the same order every time so no task gets missed.

1. Collect the inputs. Drawings, specification and photos. On a renovation, measure the site yourself, because old drawings often differ from what was built.
2. List the tasks before you measure. Walk the job room by room and put every task on its own line, from demolition to final cleaning.
3. Pick a unit for each line. Use the unit your labour consumption and price list use, or the multiplication will not work.
4. Measure the finished work. Talo 2000 starts from the rule that a takeoff measures the finished result. Deduct openings by the rule you have chosen.
5. Count the details. Drains, penetrations, boxing-in and external corners take time that the square metres do not show.
6. Add waste to the materials. The purchase quantity is the quantity times the waste factor, rounded up to whole packs. Square metres become kilograms or litres through the consumption rate of each product.
7. Work out the hours. Quantity times labour consumption, the hours one unit takes.
8. Price the lines. Quantity times unit rate, then overheads and margin.

As formulas:

What you calculate	Formula
Wall area	room perimeter × height − openings above the chosen limit
Floor or ceiling	length × width
Skirting	room perimeter − door widths
Volume	area × thickness
Material to buy	quantity × (1 + waste), rounded up to whole packs
Labour hours	quantity × labour consumption (h/unit)
Line price	quantity × unit rate

A takeoff for a 3 × 4 m room

The room is 3 × 4 m and 2.5 m high. The walls get painted, the floor gets a new covering and new skirting. The door is 1.0 × 2.0 m and the window 1.0 × 1.5 m.

Line	Working	Quantity
Walls, gross	14 m × 2.5 m	35.0 m²
Door and window	2.0 m² + 1.5 m²	3.5 m²
Wall painting	35.0 − 3.5	31.5 m²
Ceiling painting	3 × 4	12.0 m²
Floor covering	3 × 4	12.0 m²
Skirting	14 m − 1.0 m	13.0 m
Floor covering to buy	12.0 × 1.10, 2.0 m² packs	7 packs

With 10 percent waste you need 13.2 m² of floor covering, which is 6.6 packs, so 7. Labour is still worked out from 12.0 m², because waste does not add to the surface being laid. If two coats on walls have taken you 0.25 hours per square metre on past jobs, the walls take 31.5 × 0.25 = 7.9 hours.

Do you deduct doors and windows from the area?

Deduct openings above an agreed size. In Talo 2000, painting is measured in square metres following the shape of the surface, and openings over 1 m² are deducted. Narrow painted items such as pipes and handrails are measured in metres, and doors and windows are counted on their own.

A small opening is not worth deducting, because cutting in around it takes as long as the area you skip. A large one should come off, or you pay for material nobody needs. Use the same rule on every quote and write it into the quote, so extra and changed work can be measured the same way.

Should you measure from drawings or on site?

On new builds you take quantities off the drawings. Talo 2000 measures them as theoretical quantities, from the dimensions of the structure on the drawings. Renovations often have no drawings, or the drawings do not show what is inside the walls, so measure and photograph the site yourself.

Hidden structures are the biggest quantity risk on a renovation. In a study of a renovated old apartment building (Lendo-Siwicka, Pawluk, Kowalczyk and Trach 2019), the amount of solid brick rebuilding came to more than three times the bill of quantities. The cause was the condition of the walls, which showed only once the plaster was off. Price repairs to hidden structures on their own lines with a unit rate, and write in the quote what condition the quantities assume.

Why does waste go on materials and not on labour?

The bill of quantities holds the finished quantities. Talo 2000 says the bill is not meant as such for ordering building products, so waste is added only to the purchase quantity. The installer works on the finished surface, and offcuts do not add square metres to lay.

Add waste to the hours as well and the quote gets dearer for no reason. Leave it out of the materials and you pay for the missing packs from your own margin. Waste depends on the material, the pack size and the shape of the room, so the consumption you have recorded on your own jobs is the best starting value.

How do quantities turn into labour hours and a quote?

Labour hours are the quantity times the labour consumption. Rakennustieto’s Rakennustöiden menekit collects Ratu data on labour and material consumption for new building and renovation. Once you have recorded the real hours on your own jobs, they are the best benchmark.

The price comes from the same list: materials with waste at purchase price, hours at your hourly cost and other costs as lump sums. Overheads and profit are covered in the guide to markup vs margin, and the rest of the quote in the contractor quote template guide.

Which quantities get left out of a takeoff?

These quantities are easy to miss, and every missing line is paid for out of your margin:

• demolition and removal of the waste in cubic metres (Talo 2000 measures demolished parts like the matching new ones and gives their volume for transport)
• protection, dust control and final cleaning
• preparation: skim coat, primer and falls to the drain
• ceilings and the upper parts of walls, when you only measured the floor
• window reveals, sills and external corners
• skirting, thresholds and trims
• penetrations, drains and boxing-in as pieces
• drying times that lengthen the job
• delivery of materials and carrying them upstairs
• repairs to hidden structures

A takeoff in minutes with The Platform

The Platform does the takeoff for you. Describe the job, add photos or upload a drawing, and it builds a bill of quantities for labour, materials and hours, prices each line and exports the quote to Excel in minutes. You can change every line before the quote goes out. The service is launching soon.