How to price by the square foot
Some work is sold by area rather than by the job, like coatings, flooring, and roofing. Set a rate per square foot on the price book item once, and every estimate or invoice built from it does the multiplication for you.
Set the item to price by area
Where to clickAdminPrice BookNew ItemPer Square Foot (Rate x Area)
Press Admin at the bottom of the left sidebar, pick Price Book from the admin menu, then press New Item at the top right. Fill in the item code and name, then scroll down to the Pricing card.
Pricing Type starts on Flat Rate (Fixed Price). Choose Per Square Foot (Rate x Area) instead and a short note appears under the two choices.
“The price below represents the rate per square foot. When added to an estimate or invoice, the user will enter the square footage and the total will be calculated automatically.”
Type your rate per square foot
Where to clickAdminPrice Bookthe itemRate Per Sq Ft
The two money fields rename themselves as soon as the item prices by area. Base Cost becomes Cost Per Sq Ft and List Price becomes Rate Per Sq Ft.
Under Pricing Method, pick Manual Pricing to type both numbers yourself. Put what you charge for one square foot in Rate Per Sq Ft and a worked example at 500 sq ft appears underneath.
Press Create Item and the rate is ready to use on quotes.
Add the item to an estimate
Where to clickEstimatesNew EstimateSelect from CatalogSq Ft
Press Estimates in the left sidebar and press New Estimate, then scroll to the line items and press Select from Catalog. Pick the item and it lands as a line with your rate already in the price box.
The line starts at 0 sq ft on purpose, so a quote cannot go out carrying a measurement nobody took. Type the area you measured and the line total updates while you type.
On a wide screen the two boxes are marked sq ft and /sq ft. On a phone they are labeled Sq Ft and Rate/sq ft.
Check the line before you send it
Where to clickEstimatesopen the estimate
Open the saved estimate and the line reads back as the measurement and the rate, so 1500 sq ft at $4.25/sq ft sits beside the line total. Invoices do the same thing with the same two boxes.
Your customer sees both numbers on their copy of the estimate, under a column headed Qty / Sq Ft. Nobody has to take the total on trust.
Common questions
Can I switch an item I already sell over to square foot pricing?
Yes. Open Admin, pick Price Book, open the item, and choose Per Square Foot (Rate x Area) in the Pricing card. Estimates and invoices you already raised keep the pricing they were built with, because every line stores the pricing type it was created with.
Does this work on invoices as well as estimates?
Yes. An invoice line built from a per square foot item asks for the area in the same box and reads the price box as a rate, and the line total is the two multiplied together.
Can I price by the linear foot or by the hour instead?
There are exactly two pricing types: Flat Rate (Fixed Price) and Per Square Foot (Rate x Area). For anything else, leave the item on flat rate and use the quantity box on the line, which accepts fractional amounts like 3.5.
What happens when the measurement changes on site?
Edit the Sq Ft box on the estimate or invoice line and the total recalculates from the same rate. The rate on the price book item is untouched, so the next job still starts from your real number.