Painting Estimating Software for Painting Contractors

Why painting jobs are hard to price

• Square footage adds up fast. Walls, ceilings, trim and doors are each measured differently.
• Prep is easy to undercount. Patching, sanding, caulking and masking can take as long as painting.
• Coats and coverage. Color changes and new drywall often need more coats than you planned.
• Cut-in and height. High ceilings, stairwells and lots of trim slow the job down.

How Trades HQ helps painting contractors

• Ready-made painting template. Start from an interior repaint template with the lines a painting bid usually needs, instead of a blank page.
• Quick Measure for painting. Enter room measurements and your labor rates, preview the lines it creates, and add them to your estimate.
• Measure from blueprints. For new construction, measure walls and areas right off a blueprint PDF.
• Labor-rate guidance by state. See typical painter wages in your state, then set your own rate.
• Price book. Keep your own material prices and reuse them on every bid.
• One click to invoice, plus deposits and change orders when the customer adds a room.

A painting estimate, step by step

1. Measure wall area: room perimeter × wall height.
2. Subtract large openings like doors and windows.
3. Multiply by the number of coats.
4. Divide by the paint's coverage per gallon (check the can; many paints list roughly 350–400 sq ft per gallon).
5. Add prep time, trim and ceilings as their own lines.
6. Apply your overhead and profit.

Example (illustrative): a 12 × 14 ft room with 8 ft walls.

Pricing tip: Price prep as its own line so it doesn't disappear into your painting rate. And remember that markup and margin aren't the same number: a 20% margin needs a 25% markup. The Estimating Basics guide walks through the math, and the free markup and margin calculator does it for you.