utecture is a pre-construction platform built to make planning and pricing residential projects easier.

At the centre of utecture is a 3D digital twin of the home, which connects the design with the information behind the build, including materials, quantities and pricing. This allows builders to move from plans to a detailed estimate without relying on the usual mix of manual takeoffs, spreadsheets and disconnected systems.

Whether you need help estimating one project or want a system your team can use every day, there are different utecture options to suit the way your business works.

A lot of estimating time is spent doing work that isn’t really estimating. Measuring plans, transferring quantities, checking price lists and then updating everything again when the design changes can take up a surprising amount of the day.

utecture connects the project model with material quantities and pricing, reducing the amount of manual takeoff and double handling involved. This gives estimators more time to review the project and apply their construction knowledge, rather than spending hours measuring the same plans.

Put simply, a digital twin is a digital version of the home you’re planning to build, but there’s a lot more going on behind it than a nice-looking 3D model.

Within utecture, different parts of the model can hold information about the actual products, materials, quantities and pricing behind the build. That means the same model can support estimating, material takeoffs, design decisions and 3D visualisation throughout pre-construction.

The model isn’t just there to show you what the house looks like, it’s helping tell you what goes into building it too.

Rather than simply measuring areas from a PDF plan, utecture uses the 3D project model, along with the products, construction rules and project information behind it, to calculate material quantities.

Those quantities can then feed into the estimate and Bill of Materials, creating a much more connected process between what’s being designed and what’s being priced.

The level of detail we can provide will naturally depend on the information available. The more detailed your plans and specifications are, the more project-specific the quantities can be.

Yes, utecture provides several forms of documentation from costing through too Floor plans, Elevation, and contract documentation all automatically produced and Live.

This is where having the model, quantities and pricing connected becomes particularly useful.

You don’t necessarily need to start the estimate again every time somebody decides a window should be bigger or a finish needs to change. If a relevant building element, material or finish changes, the associated quantities can update with it and then flow through to the Bill of Materials and pricing.

It gives you a clearer idea of what a design decision means while you’re still in pre-construction, rather than discovering the impact further down the line when it’s considerably less convenient.

Construction estimating software helps builders calculate the quantities, materials and costs involved in a construction project.

Different platforms approach this in different ways. Some focus primarily on pricing or spreadsheets, while utecture connects estimating with a 3D model of the home, allowing the design, quantities and pricing to work together during pre-construction.

The aim isn’t simply to replace a calculator with another piece of software, it’s to reduce the amount of manual work required to get from a set of plans to a useful project estimate.

Potentially, yes. You don’t necessarily need to throw out everything your business already does well just because you’re introducing utecture.

The right setup depends on how you currently estimate, where your pricing comes from, who manages your projects and which parts of the process you’re trying to improve.

For some businesses that might mean using Trade for individual projects, while others may want Trade+ or an Enterprise setup integrated more closely into the way their estimating team already works.

No. That’s actually one of the reasons there are different ways to use utecture.

A smaller residential builder might simply want help estimating individual projects without adding another software subscription or hiring a dedicated estimator. A larger business might want its estimating team working within its own utecture environment, using company-specific products, pricing and repeatable designs.

The technology might be the same underneath, but the way you use it can scale with the way your business operates.

Trade is the easiest way to use utecture without taking on another software platform.

Send us your residential plans and project information, and our team does the heavy lifting. We’ll create the 3D model, calculate the relevant quantities and produce a detailed estimate for the project.

It’s particularly useful for builders who don’t have an in-house estimator, don’t want to spend hours completing manual takeoffs, or simply want to get some of that pre-construction workload off their plate.

Trade is designed for residential builders who need detailed estimating information but don’t necessarily have the time, resources or project volume to manage the whole process in-house.

It can be a particularly good fit if you’re pricing individual projects, running a smaller building business without a dedicated estimator, spending too much time manually measuring plans, or simply want another set of eyes across the quantities and project costs.

If estimating is something your team does regularly and you’d rather manage your models and pricing internally, Trade+ is probably where you’ll want to look instead.

The goal of a Trade estimate is to give you a clear picture of what’s required to build the project and what it’s expected to cost.

Depending on the plans and information you provide, this can include material quantities, a Bill of Materials, labour and subcontractor allowances, building measurements and detailed estimating information.

You’ll also be able to see the assumptions and allowances that have been made. That’s particularly useful when parts of the project haven’t been fully specified yet, because you can see what’s actually sitting behind the number rather than being handed a total with no context.

Once you’ve sent us your plans and specifications, the project is modelled in utecture. Construction rules, product information and calculations are then used to quantify the relevant building components.

This goes further than simply measuring areas from a plan and applying broad rates. The resulting quantities can feed into your Bill of Materials and wider project estimate, giving you a more detailed picture of what actually goes into the build.

Trade+ gives your business its own utecture estimating environment and is designed for builders who estimate regularly and want more control over the process.

Rather than sending away each project and receiving a completed estimate, your team can continue working with the project model as the job develops.

That means you can work with your own supplier, labour and subcontractor pricing, update designs, generate Bills of Materials and detailed estimates, and reuse existing models for standard or repeatable house designs.

It’s really about bringing more of your estimating workflow into one connected environment, rather than bouncing between plans, takeoffs, spreadsheets and price lists every time something changes.

The easiest way to think about it is how involved you want to be in the estimating process.

With Trade, you send us the project and we produce the estimate for you.

With Trade+, you have your own utecture environment and can continue working with the estimate and model yourself.

Trade+ gives your team greater flexibility to make revisions, work with your own pricing and continue using the project model as the design develops. Trade is better suited to builders who would rather hand us the plans and let us take care of the estimating work.

Yes. Trade+ can be set up with supplier, labour and subcontractor pricing that’s relevant to your business.

Trade+ is preconfigured and maintained by utecture, with detailed measures modelled using NZS 3604 standards or relevant product specifications. These are linked with default supplier pricing and labour or subcontractor rates, which can then be adapted to better reflect the products, suppliers and pricing your business actually works with.

That gives you a useful starting point without locking you into somebody else’s idea of what your projects should cost.

Enterprise is a stand-alone fully bespoke solution, configured to the exact way your business currently runs. It can include all your own supplier parts & pricing, logos, specification letter, workflows, and Bill of Materials layout.

utecture will run a technical discovery process on your business to advise you on the scope, timelines, and cost to set up an Enterprise system for your business. This is a no obligation process.

The utecture team can teach you how to add your own products, or we can continue to do this as part of a maintenance package.