Why Roofaio
Built like an estimator thinks.
Trust, enforced
Scale before geometry.
The assistant reads the sheet's printed scale note, finds a labeled dimension in the text
layer, and checks one against the other — nobody draws anything. Hand-draw is the fallback
when no assistant is connected (there's an "or draw it myself" link if you want it). When
printed and measured disagree, you see both — 3/16" = 1'-0" struck through
against the measured 1/4" = 1'-0" — and by what percent. If a sheet lies to
you, you find out now, not in the field.
- The assistant reads the printed scale and checks it against a real dimension on the sheet
- Disagreement over 2% stops the page — it is never averaged away
- Unverified pages are excluded from the BOM, automatically
The rules engine
Every line shows its math.
The BOM isn't a black box. Each line carries its waste factor, coverage, rounding rule, and the exact derivation from measured geometry — so you can defend every number in a buyout meeting. Rules are versioned, so a spec change tells you exactly what moved.
- Membrane, insulation, cover board, fasteners, term bar — from one source of truth
- Edit any rule and watch the BOM recompute with the reason attached
- Export CSV or a branded report, straight into your estimate
From BOM to bid
It prices the job, not just the material list.
Import the Excel workbook you already estimate from and Roofaio prices every line against it. Labor the way you quote it — $/square on roofing, $/lf on metal, $/ea on counts, or hr/unit × your crew rate. Overhead, tax and margin roll up to a sell price. Your cost and your margin never leave your machine.
- Your own price sheet, imported — or hand it to the assistant and it tells you what it couldn't match
- Good / better / best, priced on the same roof
- A price library that follows you from job to job
The spec book, read
It reads the spec and argues with your bid.
Point Roofaio at the project manual and it pulls every call-out that changes your number — system, membrane, insulation and R-value, screws versus adhesive, cover board, coping metal, deck, warranty — each cited to its sheet and section. Where the spec settles a number your BOM was guessing, the rule updates and the row says so. Where it contradicts your bid, you hear about it before you send it.
- Every call-out cited to its sheet and section
- BOM rules updated from the spec, marked "Updated from plan spec"
- Conflicts with your takeoff flagged, never quietly applied
Fabrication, built in
Stretch-out without the side spreadsheet.
Parapets and edges aren't just lines — they carry profiles. Pick a coping profile and Roofaio computes the stretch-out in coil inches alongside the run length. Edge metal, gutters, downspouts: fabrication quantities come out of the takeoff, not out of a second tool.
- Coping and edge profiles with automatic stretch-out to coil
- A profile library you can extend to match your shop
- Fabrication totals land in the same BOM as everything else
The assistant
Fully automated — until it needs your judgment.
Import the bid set and the assistant does the work: reads the title block, applies the printed scale, traces the roof, builds the BOM, estimate and proposal — typically in under ten minutes. Then it self-audits against the sheet's own printed dimensions, and every discrepancy it finds comes back to you as a prompt with options. Work through those, and you're still under thirty minutes from RFP to proposal.
It works through the same 50+ undoable commands you use — no privileged back door — and signs in with your Claude subscription, never an API key. Its calibrations are marked as its own and its report never hides a discrepancy — and every number it produces stays editable by you.
- First pass in under 10 minutes; conflicts resolved as guided prompts, not homework
- Self-audits against printed dimensions — flags, never guesses
- Same commands, same validation, same undo as a human — optional, always
Watch a full first pass
One sheet, start to finish, in 45 seconds.
A real 73-sheet bid set. The assistant verifies the scale, traces the roof, and self-audits against the printed dimensions — a 16-minute first pass, speed-ramped 22× so you can watch it end to end.
First pass: 16.7 min wall clock on sheet A1.1 — shown at 22×.
Depth where it counts.
Click inside the outline
Fill traces the roof to the drawn linework — out-to-out where the parapet is drawn as two lines, with anything it excluded listed to click back in.
A BOM per roof
Tag geometry Roof A, Roof B — then price each roof on its own.
Every wall's own height
Type each parapet's deck-to-top height off the wall section. Wall membrane and adhesive price from that, not from one typical number.
The whole bid set
Several PDFs open as one project; addenda and the spec book drop into the same page sequence.
Your numbers, once
Set your system, prices, waste, coverages and margin once. Every new project starts there.
Tapered sizing
Area, drains and slope in; run, thickness, board-feet and squares out.
The marked-up plan
Every sheet you touched, printed with the zones tinted, every side dimensioned, legend and totals — the PDF that goes out with the bid.
Versioned rules
Swap the manufacturer spec and the BOM recomputes with a record of what changed and why.
Offline by design
Projects live on your machine as portable .rooftk files. Work offline for a week at a time.
And the rest of the toolbox.
DXF & raster import
Bring in CAD exports and scanned drawings alongside your PDF bid sets.
Revision compare
Addendum lands an hour before bid time? Diff the sheets and see exactly what moved.
Exports that land
BOM to CSV or XLSX, estimate to CSV, QuickBooks-ready CSV, full audit report, marked-up plan, and your branded proposal.
On-sheet legend
Annotated plan pages that explain themselves to the PM and the crew.
QuickBooks CSV
Quantities flow straight into your accounting and estimating stack.
On the roadmap: ASCE 7 wind-uplift checks · tapered insulation 2D layout · cricket & saddle layout.