Material Assembly Formulas

To create a material assembly formula:

1. Choose a blank cell in Fixed Costs or Dimensions, and define a name for each material you'd like to use (see pages 61-63). For example, you might want to define blueboard as the per-sheet cost of blue urethane foam insulation board.
2. Choose Specifications from the MacNail menu, and scroll to the line(s) where you'd like to use the defined material cost.
3. Type a formula into the '$/unit material' column. For example, =blueboard/32 will convert the per-sheet cost to a per-square-foot cost.
4. Whenever the price of blueboard insulation changes, type the new cost into its cell. Unit costs that use blueboard will be adjusted automatically.

Some Specifications line items have modifiers or additional costs in the labor and/or material calculation formulas. These formula addenda usually use defined names from the Dimensions section of the MacNail construction estimating software. In the example below, the material cost is adjusted by the 'foundation insulation thickness' quantity from Dimensions (fndins). For more on formula modifiers, see page 113.