Pr3ciseConstruction cost estimating services in Miami
Pr3cise provides quantity takeoffs and line-item cost estimates to contractors building in Miami-Dade and Broward, priced against the Florida Building Code and Miami-Dade High-Velocity Hurricane Zone requirements, delivered in 24 to 72 hours at a fixed fee agreed in writing before work starts.
Pr3cise is a remote estimating office — Clear Ascend OÜ, registered in Estonia — that acts as the outsourced estimating department for general contractors, subcontractors, developers and architects working in South Florida. There is no Pr3cise office in Miami and no site visit: the client sends the drawing set, specifications and addenda, one engineer measures and prices the work and a second checks it, and the estimate comes back by CSI MasterFormat division in Excel and PDF with the colour-coded takeoff markups, so every quantity can be traced to the sheet it was measured from. Pr3cise works in English and Spanish.
If you are looking for a construction estimator in Miami because a bid is due on Friday and the drawings landed on Tuesday, this is what you are buying: a remote estimating office that works as your cost estimator on that bid, without a salary on the payroll. You send the drawing set; an estimator measures it, prices it and sends it back with the takeoff markups, so every quantity can be checked against the sheet it came from.
Every project inside Miami-Dade sits in the High-Velocity Hurricane Zone. That is not a footnote in the estimate — it is the estimate. HVHZ drives product selection, connection density, inspection sequencing and lead times, and an estimator who prices a Miami job off national averages will be wrong in the same three places every time.
Pr3cise works with general contractors, subcontractors, developers and architects across Miami-Dade and Broward. The estimate comes organized by CSI MasterFormat division, material, labor and equipment split on every line, overhead and profit broken out. To see the document before you commit, look at the sample estimates in our portfolio.
Construction estimators for Miami contractors
Most people who find this page searched for estimators in Miami, a cost estimator near me or takeoff services near me, and they mean one of two things: hiring somebody onto the payroll, or getting this month's bids measured without six weeks of onboarding. We are the second one — not a staffing agency and not a job board, but the estimating office you send a project to, at a price agreed before anyone opens a drawing.
That distinction matters commercially. A salaried estimator is a fixed cost that carries on through a slow quarter; an outsourced estimating team is a cost per bid, and capacity is elastic — one trade package this week, five next week, without changing anything in your office.
The work is remote and the code knowledge is local. Pr3cise is a team of estimators based in Europe serving Miami-Dade: there is no office on Brickell Avenue and Pr3cise does not pretend otherwise. What there is, is a measured understanding of what the HVHZ, Miami-Dade product approvals and South Florida site conditions do to a number.
What Miami-Dade actually changes in a construction estimate
- High-Velocity Hurricane Zone compliance. The HVHZ covers Miami-Dade and Broward counties, and it governs impact-rated openings, roof-to-wall connection density, enhanced fastening schedules and the product approvals that go with them. HVHZ is not a line item you add at the end — it changes assemblies throughout the building.
- Notice of Acceptance constraints. Miami-Dade product control issues a Notice of Acceptance for products used in the HVHZ, each with its own number and expiry date, and the permit submittal has to carry them. A statewide product approval does not automatically satisfy the zone. That removes cheaper unapproved substitutes from the pricing set: we price the approved assembly your specification names rather than guessing a replacement.
- Wind-borne debris protection. Openings need impact-rated glazing or approved shutters, and the choice between them is one of the largest single swings in a South Florida envelope budget. We price it per opening type, off the window and door schedule.
- Permit fees priced as real money. Building permit fees are calculated from the declared construction value under the fee schedule of whichever authority has jurisdiction, and each municipality runs its own. It is the most commonly forgotten line in the budgets we are asked to review.
- Recertification and milestone inspection work. Miami-Dade's building recertification program and Florida's milestone inspection requirements generate a steady stream of repair scopes, priced straight from the engineer's report and itemized so an owner or association sees what each recommendation costs.
- Local labor and material rates. Miami-Dade wage rates and South Florida material pricing, cross-checked against live supplier quotes, not a national average that understates the job by double digits.
- Coastal and flood-zone conditions. Elevation requirements, corrosion-resistant fastening, salt-air material selection, and a water table shallow enough across much of the county to put dewatering into the groundworks price.
None of that is exotic knowledge in Miami — your own project manager knows it. The problem is that generic estimating templates do not, which is how a job gets bid at a national average and built at a Miami price. We wrote about where that gap opens up in the risks of an inaccurate construction estimate.
How a Miami estimate gets built, in four steps
The same four steps on every job, one trade or the whole building. What we need from you is listed with each one, because a missing schedule is the usual reason an estimate slips.
Drawings and scope in
Send the drawing set, specifications and any addenda, plus the bid date and the trades you want priced. PDF is fine; CAD or a BIM model is better. We confirm the fixed fee and the delivery date in writing before anything starts, and we say so plainly if your deadline is not realistic.
Measurement and takeoff
Quantities come off the drawings on screen, sheet by sheet, with every measured item colour-marked on the plan. Areas, lengths, counts and volumes are kept in their own units rather than converted to a single lump. Drawing conflicts and scope gaps are logged as we find them, not swallowed.
Pricing and assumptions
Material, labor and equipment are priced separately on each line with South Florida rates, waste factors applied per material, and productivity shown in hours. Anything the drawings do not answer becomes a written assumption or an exclusion, so your risk is visible before bid day rather than after award.
Delivery and review
You receive the estimate in Excel and PDF with the marked-up takeoff, organized by CSI MasterFormat division. We walk you through it if you want, adjust markups to your numbers, and reprice affected sections when an addendum lands or the scope moves.
What you receive, and what the estimate leaves out
The deliverable is a working document, not a summary sheet. It arrives as an Excel workbook plus a PDF, structured by CSI MasterFormat division, with material, labor and equipment split on every line, quantities in their proper units, unit rates, waste factors, productivity hours, and general conditions, overhead and profit broken out where you can edit them. The marked-up drawings come with it, so any line can be traced to the sheet and the shape it was measured from. A number nobody can check is a number nobody can defend in a bid review.
Estimate class is stated rather than implied. A conceptual budget built on an early scheme is not a bid-level estimate, and pretending otherwise is how owners end up treating a guess as a commitment. Pr3cise uses the AACE International classification — Class 5 or 4 for order-of-magnitude work, Class 3 for a control budget, Class 2 or 1 for hard bidding — and the cover says which one you are holding.
Exclusions are written down. Fees the authority has not confirmed, utility connection charges, owner-supplied equipment, escalation beyond the stated validity date, bonds and insurance at rates we do not know, unforeseen ground conditions, and any scope the drawings leave to a design-build subcontractor: each is listed explicitly instead of hidden in a lump. When an addendum lands, Pr3cise reprices the affected sections and reissues rather than patching a total. The failure patterns we design around are set out in seven ways to ruin a construction project, and the money side in how construction cost estimating saves money.
| Item | In a Pr3cise Miami estimate |
|---|---|
| Line items by CSI MasterFormat division, in an Excel workbook and a PDF | Included |
| Material, labor and equipment split on every line, with unit rates, waste factors and productivity hours | Included |
| General conditions, overhead and profit broken out as editable lines | Included |
| Colour-coded takeoff markups on the drawings, sheet by sheet | Included |
| AACE International estimate class (Class 5 to Class 1) stated on the cover | Included |
| HVHZ assemblies, Notice of Acceptance products and wind-borne debris protection, priced per opening type off the schedules | Included |
| Building permit and impact fees calculated under the published fee schedule of the authority having jurisdiction | Included |
| Written assumptions for anything the drawings do not answer | Included |
| Fees the authority has not confirmed | Excluded, listed by name |
| Utility connection charges | Excluded, listed by name |
| Owner-supplied equipment | Excluded, listed by name |
| Escalation beyond the stated validity date | Excluded, listed by name |
| Bonds and insurance at rates Pr3cise has not been given | Excluded, listed by name |
| Unforeseen ground conditions | Excluded, listed by name |
| Scope the drawings leave to a design-build subcontractor | Excluded, listed by name |
| Site visits, on-site supervision and construction management | Not offered — Pr3cise works remotely, by file |
Trade estimating services in Miami
Price a single trade or the whole building. Each trade below has its own scope, its own code requirements and its own way of going wrong.
MEP estimating services
Mechanical, electrical and plumbing as a coordinated package — the trades that carry the most cost risk and the most coordination conflict on a Miami build.
Electrical estimating services
Service and distribution, branch circuiting, lighting, fire alarm and low-voltage, priced to NEC and Florida Building Code requirements.
Plumbing estimating services
Underground and above-ground rough-in, fixtures, domestic water, sanitary, storm and gas, priced to the Florida Building Code Plumbing volume.
Fire protection estimating
Sprinkler, standpipe, fire pump and alarm interface, priced to NFPA 13 and the Florida Fire Prevention Code.
Concrete & masonry estimating
Foundations, slabs, tilt-up, CMU, formwork, rebar and tie beams — the structural backbone of most South Florida construction.
Everything else
Framing, drywall, roofing, glazing, flooring, painting and millwork, priced as a package or individually.
Working a single trade? Go straight to concrete and masonry estimating, electrical estimating, plumbing estimating, fire protection estimating or MEP estimating — or see the full range of estimating and takeoff services if the project runs wider than Florida.
Where we work: takeoff services across Miami-Dade and Broward
We take projects anywhere in Miami-Dade County, including Miami, Miami Beach, Coral Gables, Coral Way, Brickell, Wynwood, Little Havana, Doral, Hialeah, Kendall, Aventura, North Miami, Homestead, Cutler Bay, Pinecrest, Key Biscayne and unincorporated Miami-Dade County, and north into Broward for Fort Lauderdale and Hollywood work. Because everything is exchanged digitally, where your office sits makes no difference to turnaround.
What changes between those places is the paperwork and the building. Unincorporated Miami-Dade is permitted by the county, while Miami, Miami Beach, Hialeah, Doral, Coral Gables, Homestead and Aventura each run their own building department with its own fee schedule. And Brickell high-rise cores price nothing like Hialeah light industrial, Doral warehousing nothing like a Coral Gables remodel, while coastal work on Miami Beach or Key Biscayne carries corrosion and elevation costs an inland job never sees.
We work while Miami sleeps. Our estimating team runs seven hours ahead of you: drawings sent at the end of your day are measured overnight, and the estimate is waiting when you open the office. Everything moves digitally, so nothing waits on a courier, a site visit or a meeting to hand over documents. That is also the honest answer to takeoff services near me — in this trade, proximity buys you nothing and a shared clock costs you a day.
Prefer to work in Spanish? Vea esta página en español →
Miami construction estimating FAQs
Pr3cise quotes a fixed fee per project, not an hourly rate. The fee depends on the trade count, the scope and how complete the drawing set is, so Pr3cise prices it on your actual documents. You get the number and the delivery date in writing before any work starts, and neither moves afterwards.
We do the work. Pr3cise is an estimating office you hire per project, not a recruiter and not a staffing agency: no CVs, no onboarding, no salary between bids. You send the drawings for the job you are pricing, Pr3cise measures and prices it, and you get the estimate back with the takeoff markups.
Yes. Pricing Miami-Dade work against the High-Velocity Hurricane Zone is the main reason contractors come to Pr3cise rather than to a generic national estimating shop. Miami-Dade and Broward sit inside the High-Velocity Hurricane Zone, which governs impact-rated openings, roof attachment, connection density and product approvals. Pr3cise prices to those requirements, not to national averages.
A Notice of Acceptance is the product approval Miami-Dade issues for building products used in the HVHZ, and the permit submittal has to carry one for the products in the assembly. Each NOA has its own number and expiry date. It removes cheaper non-approved substitutes from your options, so an estimate built on unapproved products will be lower than reality and will not survive permitting.
Pr3cise covers the whole of Miami-Dade and Broward, and in this trade that is what proximity actually means: drawings, markups and estimates move digitally, so nothing depends on the distance to your job. What you gain instead is the clock — the Pr3cise team runs seven hours ahead of Miami, so work sent at the end of your day is measured overnight.
Yes. Permit fees here are calculated from the declared construction value under the fee schedule of the authority having jurisdiction, and each municipality runs its own. Pr3cise includes permitting, impact fees where they apply, general conditions and the inspection sequence HVHZ work requires, and lists as an exclusion anything the authority has not confirmed.
Pr3cise covers all of them, individually or as a full package: electrical, plumbing, HVAC, fire protection, concrete, masonry, structural steel, framing, drywall, roofing, glazing, flooring and finishes. Subcontractors usually come to Pr3cise for a single trade; general contractors for the whole building.
The drawing set and specifications, any addenda, the bid date and the trades you want priced. PDF works; CAD or a BIM model is faster. Schedules matter more than people expect — door, window, fixture, panel and equipment schedules are where half the quantities live — and if one is missing Pr3cise asks rather than assumes.
Yes. Pr3cise works in English and Spanish, and delivers estimates, scope letters and correspondence in either. Much of the Miami market runs in Spanish and Pr3cise is set up for it.