What construction actually costs
What contractors actually paid on completed jobs — not catalog averages, not a national guess. Not published yet; below is why, and what has to be true first.
The index
Why this exists
Every estimate in this industry gets priced off the same thing: a cost book of periodic regional averages that excludes the contractor's own margin — sold by subscription, commonly for thousands of dollars per user each year. Contractors will tell you those numbers can be well off in their market.
The only genuinely accurate cost data is what contractors actually paid on real jobs. Nobody published it, because nobody had it. MAGE ID's cost engine learns exactly that from every job our contractors close — and we mean to give the aggregate away, once it can be published without exposing any one contractor's price.
How the numbers are made
Contractors build a private price book from their real invoices, receipts, sub commitments and labor hours. Contributing is off by default; a contractor who turns it on is counted in the index when it opens.
Why nothing is published yet
A market median built from rates contractors type in can be reverse-engineered: someone who keeps changing their own submitted rate and re-reading the index can work out a competitor's exact price — even with a minimum number of contributors and rounding. So no figure is released until each rate is computed on our servers from the job costs logged in MAGE ID, not from a number anyone submits. No contractor, company or job is ever named.
Get a number for your job
Homeowners: get a real quote from a contractor who prices off their own history. Contractors: your price book is free, and it's built from your jobs — not a catalog.