Budget & Cost Tracking

Knowing your numbers is the difference between a profitable project and one that bleeds money. Baulit tracks costs at the task level so you can see exactly where every dollar goes — from the framing lumber to the final coat of paint.

How Budget Tracking Works

Every task in your project can have one or more cost line items. Each line item records an estimated cost (what you budgeted) and an actual cost (what you spent). The Budget tab rolls all of these up into a project-wide financial picture.

The basic workflow:

Set estimated costs when you create your schedule. This is your budget — what you expect to spend on each task.

Record actual costs as invoices come in, material purchases are made, and labor hours are logged.

Monitor the gap between estimated and actual. The Budget tab highlights items that are over budget so you can take action early.

Adding Cost Line Items

Open the task by clicking its name in the task list.

Click the cost icon (dollar sign) in the task row or edit panel. This opens the cost line items modal.

Click "Add Cost Item." A new row appears with fields for category, description, estimated amount, and actual amount.

Select a category from the dropdown (see the seven categories below).

Enter a description — be specific. "Romex 12/2 wire - 1500ft" is more useful than "electrical supplies" when you review costs months later.

Enter the estimated and/or actual amounts. You can enter estimated now and fill in actual later when the invoice arrives.

Save. The cost item appears on the task and is included in the Budget tab totals.

You can add multiple cost items to a single task. For example, a "Rough Electrical" task might have separate line items for wire, panels, boxes, and labor.

The Seven Cost Categories

Every cost line item belongs to one of seven categories. These categories help you analyze spending patterns and generate meaningful reports.

Category	Use For
Labor	Crew wages, hourly labor, day rates for workers you employ directly
Materials	Lumber, concrete, roofing, drywall, paint, fixtures, hardware
Subcontractor	Invoices from plumbers, electricians, HVAC techs, and other subs
Equipment	Tool rentals, excavator hire, scaffolding, dumpster fees
Permits & Fees	Building permits, plan review fees, impact fees, inspection fees
Overhead	Insurance, bond premiums, portable toilet rental, site security
Other	Anything that does not fit the categories above

The Budget Summary

The top of the Budget tab shows a summary bar that is always visible as you scroll through cost items:

Total Estimated — the sum of all estimated costs across every task
Total Spent — the sum of all actual costs recorded so far
Remaining — estimated minus spent (how much budget is left)
% Spent — actual divided by estimated, shown as a progress bar

This gives you an instant read on project financial health without scrolling through individual tasks.

Over-Budget Warnings

When the actual cost on a task exceeds its estimated cost, Baulit highlights that task in red on the Budget tab. This visual flag makes it easy to scan for trouble spots.

Over-budget items also appear in the Budget Risk report (accessible from the Reports Hub), where you can see every at-risk line item across all your projects in one view.

Tip: Do not wait until a task is finished to record actual costs. Enter invoices and receipts as they come in. The sooner you see a cost overrun forming, the sooner you can adjust — whether that means negotiating with a supplier, value-engineering a specification, or alerting the homeowner about a potential change order.

Estimate at Completion (EAC)

The EAC is a projected final cost for your project based on current spending patterns. If you have completed 40% of the work and already spent 50% of the budget, the EAC will be higher than your original estimate, warning you that you are trending over budget.

Baulit calculates EAC automatically and displays it in the Budget tab summary and in budget reports. It updates in real time as you record actual costs.

Change Order Impact on Budget

When a change order is approved, its cost delta (the difference between original and new amounts) automatically creates a cost line item on the linked task. This means your budget stays accurate without manual data entry.

For example, if a homeowner adds a tray ceiling that costs an additional $2,400, approving that change order adds a $2,400 cost item under the Subcontractor category to the linked drywall task. Your budget totals update instantly.

See Change Orders for the full workflow.

Exporting Budget Data

Click the Export CSV button on the Budget tab to download a spreadsheet with every cost line item. The export includes:

Task name
Phase name
Cost category
Description
Estimated amount
Actual amount
Variance (estimated minus actual)

This CSV works with QuickBooks, Excel, Google Sheets, and any accounting software that imports CSV files.

Important: Cost line items belong to individual tasks, not to phase headers. If you add a cost to a phase row, it will not be counted in the budget totals. Always add costs to the specific task where the expense occurred. Phase rows display the aggregated totals of their child tasks automatically.

Budget Visibility by Role

Budget data is only visible to Admins and Managers. Contractors and Stakeholders do not see cost information. This is intentional — subcontractors do not need to see your markup or what you are paying other trades, and homeowners see only what you choose to share in reports or change orders.