10 Buildertrend Alternatives: Succeed with Similar Software This Year!
Are you looking for a Buildertrend alternative to explore the new depths of construction project management? While it is a popular software in the industry, it may not be the perfect fit for everyone. As the construction market grows alarmingly, the demand for improved technology also rises. That’s why we have compiled a list of the top 10 Buildertrend alternatives to help you expand your construction toolset and aim for higher productivity.
Our list contains options for all types of budgets and construction company types, with each software including a unique array of features to help you increase work efficiency. We will review each program and help you decide on a suitable option for your projects.
If you’re one of the users experiencing pain points with Buildertrend or simply looking for a change, keep reading to discover the best alternative options that could become a turning point in your project management.
Buildertrend Alternatives Worth Considering
Users praise Buildertrend for its mobile application and project management capabilities. While these features have made it stand out, other software programs have stepped up their game to provide a more intuitive user experience. Most users betray Buildertrend for a more modern platform that offers better features and value for money.
Moreover, as the new corporate policy requires users to pay almost twice as much as the initial price after two months, there’s no surprise that many will look for more affordable Buildertrend alternatives.
So, what are these alternatives that are gaining popularity among construction companies? Let’s dig deeper and find a sophisticated solution for your next project.
Buildern: Your All-in-One Construction Project Management Assistant
Buildern is comprehensive construction project management software designed with contractors’ core professional needs and challenges in mind. It offers a wide range of features, such as project estimation and scheduling, selections and allowances, bid requests, purchase orders and change orders management, accounting workflow, reporting and analytics, and much more.
Starting at $225/month (billed annually)
Check the pricing calculator for personalized details
Key Features Defined
Construction Estimation
The estimation involves figuring out the projected cost, which is then used to allocate a budget and timeline. While some project management tools in the construction industry cannot accurately estimate costs, Buildern, as one of Buildertrend alternatives, strives to fill this gap by integrating estimation and construction management.
Estimation in Buildern enables users to generate estimates using the takeoff derived from the project plans, along with the associated material and construction equipment costs. Users can access various options for creating estimates, including materials, labor, equipment, fees, subcontractors, allowances, and assemblies, which can be customized for their clients.
Buildern’s Estimation feature comprises overheads, line items, and markups. Users can input predetermined overheads, but the system will automatically include them if overlooked. These overheads consist of the supervision percentage, contingency, and management fees.
This step is crucial to ensuring that estimates are accurate and don’t result in excessive spending. Also, Buildern will soon introduce a feature to track estimation history on its dashboard, which is a significant advantage over other construction management tools. This feature will enable construction managers to compare different versions of past estimates and identify areas where they could improve.
Project Scheduling
Buildern defines its competitive advantages by offering a user-friendly interface and a multi-view construction scheduling module. This software helps users create workflows that are easy to follow by breaking down tasks into smaller parts and assigning them to individual team members.
Additionally, Buildern’s scheduling feature provides two different views:
- List view – displaying the project timeline in a list format
- Gantt charts – showing the complete project
Gantt charts are the most commonly used type of scheduling in Buildern, as they allow users to quickly identify bottlenecks by showing dependencies and progress for each task. Buildern can display finish-to-start, start-to-finish, start-to-start, and finish-to-finish dependencies, allowing users to add baselines, define milestones, and adjust the project schedule.
Selections and Allowances
Across the construction industry, a “selection” is chosen for inclusion in the scope of work. For example, if a contractor decides to use a specific window, that is classified as a selection. The project manager should create a corresponding document clearly defining these selections and associated costs. Once the client chooses a selection, the builder proceeds with construction.
Professional software solutions, like Buildern’s selections and allowances, are highly beneficial in effectively communicating essential project details. Buildern’s unified dashboard keeps a record of all the construction selections made. Clients can access the full details of their selections without the need to log into the system.
Bid Requests
Buildertrend’s features require new users to go through a brief introduction to familiarize themselves with the software interface. Unlike other Buildertrend alternatives, Buildern’s user-friendly functionality requires minimal onboarding and is highly intuitive. It offers a comprehensive bid request feature that allows users to manage the whole subcontractor bidding process quickly and easily.
Buildern users can generate precise bid requests and distribute them to vendors and subcontractors invited to their Buildern project dashboards. Once the subcontractor receives a bid on a project via email, they can freely respond to it and rest assured that all communications will be saved in Buildern’s dashboard.
This feature enables estimators to provide project-related details, ensuring everyone’s on the same page.
Purchase Orders and Change Orders
Purchase orders (POs) and change orders (COs) are sensitive issues in the construction industry. Both processes require proper management to ensure the project remains on budget and timeline while any changes are approved and documented accordingly.
We know that only Advanced and Complete plan users can access purchase orders and change orders in Buildertrend. This may seem fair unless you learn that Buildern offers better and more advanced features for a relatively lower payment to its Starter plan users.
Once you add subcontractors and vendors to the Buildern account, you can create and send POs and COs to them directly from the platform’s project dashboard. Documents generated via Buildern include detailed information about
- Cost codes
- Unit cost
- Quantity or units
- Tax amount
Additionally, all construction-related expenses can be automatically updated between Buildern and your other accounting software like QuickBooks and Xero. Users enjoy even more advanced features with Buildern’s functionality, as the two-way integration ensures no data is lost in the middle of communication. More features regarding POs and COs include resending, withdrawing, or marking the issued orders as complete.
Taxation in Buildern
Many construction project management tools fail to provide tools for accurate taxation. Buildern stands out from the pack by offering a comprehensive solution for tax calculations, deductions, and allowances that make it easier to manage taxes.
The software has precise tax calculation features considering the location and taxes applicable to the job site. Whether you operate in the USA or Australia, Buildern knows the local taxes and adjusts the calculations accordingly. You are also free to add your own tax preferences, and rest assured the software will follow them for every calculation.
Furthermore, users can easily create deduction reports or allowances while working with estimates and invoices. Taxation in Buildern leaps forward, ensuring construction managers always charge the correct amount of tax on their projects, which is crucial for project profitability.
Everything described above may seem challenging at first sight, but Buildern has been designed to streamline any construction-related process. The user-friendly and intuitive software offers comprehensive features to make construction management a breeze. For small to medium-sized contractors, Buildern is the answer to all your construction management needs! Accessible and all-encompassing, it’s the perfect tool for managing any building project.
Procore
Pricing
Available upon request
General Overview
Procore is a cloud-based construction project management software with advanced pre-construction, project management, and financial features. It allows teams to collaborate in real time, manage tasks, share files, and access project data from anywhere.
One thing that differentiates Procore from its competitors is its Building Information Modeling (BIM) functionality. Procore’s BIM tools allow users to view 3D models, create and manage clash detection reports, and generate quantity takeoffs, among other features. The feature enables teams to collaborate on projects in 3D, improving communication and reducing errors.
When comparing the two, both Procore and Buildertrend offer robust solutions for construction project management. However, Procore’s feature set is more extensive, providing a wider range of features, such as quality and safety management, which Buildertrend fails to offer. Procore also has a more significant market share and is used by larger construction firms, while Buildertrend is more popular with smaller to mid-sized companies.
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AccuLynx
Pricing
Available upon request
General Overview
AccuLynx is cloud-based software designed specifically for roofing contractors to manage a wide range of roofing business operations. Integrating with QuickBooks, QuickMeasure, EagleView, and other software, AccuLynx streamlines the process of estimating, job tracking and management, customer relationship management (CRM), and more. The roofing CRM generally works with insurance restoration, retail roofing, residential and commercial cases.
While AccuLynx is a powerful tool for managing roofing projects, it may not be suitable for construction firms looking for a more comprehensive solution for project management. One of the potential disadvantages of AccuLynx is that it is designed specifically for roofing contractors. Therefore, it may offer limited features for managing other tasks.
Suppose a construction firm specializes in multiple types of projects. In that case, it may need multiple software platforms to manage its projects, which can be time-consuming and lead to data inconsistencies. Consider this while looking for a Buildertrend alternative in the face of AccuLynx.
Oracle Aconex
Pricing
Available upon request
General Overview
Oracle Aconex is another cloud-based Buildertrend alternative that meets construction and engineering project needs. With built-in model coordination, the software seamlessly connects teams ensuring everyone has access to the latest data and project models.
Although Oracle Aconex and Buildertrend are construction project management software, both have unique features the other one lacks. As for functionality, Oracle Aconex is a complex tool with advanced features, including communication, document, schedule and cost management, quality, and safety control monitoring. Its target users are large-scale construction companies opting for features geared towards managing complex and multi-party projects. It can be tough for small and medium-scale projects to handle this amount of complexity requiring a longer learning curve, but the rewards for larger projects are well worth it.
Both software solutions offer subscription-based pricing. However, the pricing models differ. Aconex’s pricing is typically customized to each project and can be relatively higher than Buildertrend’s standard pricing tiers.
The choice between the two depends on your company’s needs and requirements.
Corecon
Pricing
Available upon request
General Overview
From pre-construction to project closeout, Corecon has a well-developed project management system helping companies keep projects on track. The software stands out among its competitors due to its well-developed Pre-construction module. The latter offers robust capabilities, including tracking job opportunities and leads. The system allows keeping track of every potential customer’s progress by recording everything on the Bid Calendar and organizing them by custom stages such as plan reviews, biddings, bid submissions, etc. Contractors can classify their leads to ensure they track the status of every lead.
Corecon’s integrations help provide users with analytics tools to track and monitor internal flows. However, the lack of pricing information on the official website may result in ambiguity and impede potential customers from choosing this Buildertrend alternative.
Fieldwire
Pricing
Starting at $39 per user/month (billed annually)
General Overview
Designed for jobsite management, Fieldwire provides features for all teams involved in construction. The software’s goal is to unite each foreman and the project manager in one platform, enabling them to keep track of all tasks and assignments.
The ability to work with up-to-date drawings and align the field and office makes its collaboration functionality stand out. Unlike its competitors, Fieldwire’s mobile application allows recording markups and as-builts even on offline devices.
Like other Buildertrend alternatives discussed above, Fieldwire has features like project scheduling, document management, team communication tools, etc. Although its field management capabilities make it stand out from its competitors, sometimes users report system malfunctions. Also, the per-user pricing model can lead to a higher cost for larger teams and become a major drawback.
Projectmates
Pricing
Available upon request
General Overview
Serving various industries from retail to real estate and government, Projectmates is construction program management software focusing on Owners. The software helps owners manage projects of all sizes by giving them the visibility to track progress in real-time.
The system allows for planning and design collaboration providing both parties with pre-built and configurable reports, submittal tools, punch lists, etc.
There are several things helping Projectmates withstand the competition, and capital project management is one of them. It helps owners clarify their Capital Improvement Program (CIP) by intuitively strategizing, allocating, and tracking capital projects.
Contractor Foreman
Pricing
Starting at $49/month (billed annually)
General Overview
Contractor Foreman has a complete array of project management tools to cover the entire project lifecycle. The software helps contractors to manage their projects by creating and assigning tasks, managing contacts, tracking time and expenses, etc.
Depending on the subscription plan, users get access to different integrations to streamline management processes smoother than they would have done with Buildertrend. Still, there are things that doom the overall user experience. Several users have been claiming occasional glitches and poorly performing functionality with relatively poor customer service to remedy any issues.
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CMiC Construction Platform
Pricing
Available upon request
General Overview
CMiC Construction Platform is an enterprise-level software solution that offers a suite of modules to help contractors manage their projects, financials, and resources in a centralized location. Compared with other Buildertrend alternatives, CMiC is typically used by larger contractors and construction firms looking for an all-in-one platform to handle large projects.
The software offers comprehensive reports and analytics to monitor performance, increase project visibility, and ensure efficient data delivery. It also provides a comprehensive document management module to manage contracts, change orders, etc., so nothing slips through the cracks.
However, several users claim to have problems with smooth document management. Although the software can function via mobile browsers, it doesn’t have a supportive iOS or Android application. Its web-based capabilities may be more than enough for some projects, but most need the flexibility of accessing the project data on any device.
Viewpoint Construction Management
Pricing
Available upon request
General Overview
The Viewpoint Construction Management includes a suite of modules that can help contractors and builders manage their projects from pre-construction through to project closeout. This software provides in-depth information regarding each project, from equipment management to on-site monitoring and financial analysis.
Viewpoint sets itself apart from Buildertrend with a broader feature set. The choice between the two platforms will depend on the specific needs of the contractor or builder, the size and complexity of their projects, and their budget. With a complex set of features and monitoring tools, Viewpoint is an advanced platform that requires its users to have certain levels of expertise.
Key Findings from Buildertrend Alternatives
Choosing the right construction management software can be challenging, but we hope our list of the top 10 Buildertrend alternatives has helped you narrow your options. Each alternative offers unique features and benefits that can help you streamline your construction projects and enhance your overall workflow.
While there are several Buildertrend alternatives, we would like to emphasize that Buildern is the most user-friendly and highly functional solution for general contractors. With the lowest learning curve, Buildern thrives on user experiences and feedback, helping you get the most out of their construction program management software.
At the end of the day, the software you choose should align with your business goals and requirements. We encourage you to do your research, try out demos, and read user reviews to make an informed decision.
