The job came in profitable. You found out at closeout it lost money — and by then there was nothing left to do but eat it. That gap between busy and broke is where most builders live, because the books never tell them the truth about a job until the truth no longer helps. Accounting Guide for Builders puts the answer in your hands while the work is still open — so you know which jobs make money, which are bleeding it, and exactly what to do about it today. Here is what this book delivers: • Track every dollar in real time — follow a single cost from the moment it lands through your books to your bottom line with the Job-Cost Trace System, the method woven through every chapter • Price labor at what it actually costs — build a fully burdened rate that captures the payroll taxes, workers' comp, and benefits that turn a $30 wage into a $46 cost • Set an overhead rate you calculated instead of guessed — and catch the stale rate that quietly underbids every job at once • Read your WIP schedule like a fuel gauge — calculate over- and underbilling, and spot the job-borrow trap before it sinks the company • Recognize a loss the moment you see it coming — apply the rule that protects you, the bank, and the surety • Use the right tax method — work the recent changes to IRC Section 460 and the home-construction exception with your CPA • Win more bonding capacity — show a surety the working capital and clean WIP schedule that unlock bigger work Written for builders, general contractors, remodelers, specialty subs, and the bookkeepers and office managers who keep their books.
