A landscape estimate can look reasonable on paper and still cause problems once the project gets underway. A missed cost can cut into your margin, while an unclear scope or assumption can leave you and the client with different ideas about what that price actually covers.
A consistent estimating process helps prevent those gaps. Instead of building every estimate differently, you have a reliable way to confirm the scope, account for relevant project costs, and document what’s included before the estimate reaches the client.
To make that process easier, we’ve created a free landscape estimate template for landscape design and design-build projects. You can customize it around your company, project scope, pricing, payment practices, and terms while keeping the information clients need in one clear document.
Download the Free Landscape Estimate Template
You don’t need to build every estimate document from a blank page. Our customizable landscape estimate template gives landscape designers and design-build companies a practical starting point you can adapt to your own projects and estimating process.
The template gives you one place to organize the information that matters to both your team and your client. That includes:
- Project details and timing
- Scope and pricing
- Assumptions and exclusions
- Optional work
- Payment expectations
- Approval terms
Add your company branding, then customize the details to fit the way your business operates. The goal is to give you a consistent, professional way to document the estimate once you’ve done the calculations behind it.
[Download Your Landscape Project Estimate Template]
What Should a Landscape Estimate Include?
A landscape estimate should give the client a clear picture of the work you’re pricing and the conditions that price is based on. The total matters, but it isn’t enough on its own.
At a high level, a complete estimate should cover:
- Client and project information: Who the estimate is for, where the work will take place, and the basic project details.
- Scope of work: What you’re proposing to design, install, remove, or otherwise provide.
- Project pricing: The price associated with the proposed work, organized clearly enough for the client to understand what they’re paying for.
- Project timing: Expected timing or scheduling information that’s appropriate to provide at the estimating stage.
- Assumptions and exclusions: Conditions the price depends on and work or responsibilities that aren’t included.
- Optional work: Alternatives or add-ons the client can consider separately from the primary scope.
- Payment and approval: How payments will be handled and what the client needs to do to approve the estimate.
These categories give clients enough detail to understand what the price covers without showing all the calculations behind it. Clear scope, assumptions, and exclusions also give you both something to refer back to if the project changes.
Remember, the estimate you send to the client is the end result of the work you’ve done behind the scenes. Your team may use quantities, labor, materials, equipment, subcontractors, overhead, and other costs to build the price.
A clear estimate matters, but the numbers still depend on a reliable estimating process.
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How to Build a More Reliable Landscape Estimate
When every estimate is built a little differently, it’s easier for costs, quantities, or assumptions to get missed. And as more people get involved in estimating, those small differences become harder to manage.
A consistent landscape estimating process gives everyone the same basic checkpoints without treating every landscape project like it’s the same.
1. Confirm the Scope and Quantities
Before you start pricing, make sure you’re clear on what you’re actually estimating.
Start with the project scope, current site information, and the latest design. Then confirm the quantities you’ll need to price the work. Depending on the project, that might mean plant counts, square footage of pavers, yards of soil or mulch, or other material takeoffs.
This is also the time to clear up anything that could change the price. Is demolition included? Who’s handling site preparation? Does the latest patio layout match the quantities you’re using?
The better you define the project scope now, the less room there is for missed work or confusion later.
2. Account for What It Takes to Complete the Job
Labor and materials are usually the first costs that come to mind when creating an estimate. But depending on the project, you may also need equipment, subcontractors, deliveries, disposal, or other costs to get the work done.
Experienced estimators already know these costs exist. The challenge is making sure you account for the right ones on every job, especially when project volume grows, or more than one person prepares estimates.
A consistent process gives your team a way to check what each particular job requires instead of relying on memory.
3. Apply Your Pricing Method
Once you know what the job will cost to complete, use your company’s normal pricing method to arrive at the selling price.
That includes accounting for overhead and applying your business’s markup.
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4. Write Down What the Price Is Based On
Before the estimate goes to the client, make sure it’s clear what your price includes—and what it doesn’t.
Document important assumptions, exclusions, allowances, and optional work. If your price assumes easy equipment access, for example, say so. If permit fees or a particular part of the site work aren’t included, make that clear too.
These details give you and the client a shared reference point if something changes later. The landscape estimate template gives you dedicated space to document them without having to build that structure yourself.
Landscape Estimate Costs That Are Easy to Miss
Even when you know a project inside and out, some costs are easier to overlook than others. That’s especially true when you’re estimating several jobs at once or moving between projects with very different scopes.
Before you finalize an estimate, check whether any of these costs apply:
- Equipment: Will the job require rented equipment or equipment costs that need to be accounted for?
- Delivery and freight: Materials still have to get to the jobsite. Delivery charges can be easy to miss when you’re focused on the material price itself.
- Disposal: Demolition, excavation, and site cleanup can leave you with material that needs to be hauled away and disposed of.
- Subcontractors: Irrigation, electrical, specialty masonry, or other work handled outside your crew still needs to be included in the project cost.
- Permits and fees: Depending on the project and location, permits or other required fees may affect what it costs to complete the work.
- Material waste: Cuts, breakage, and other normal material loss can mean the quantity you need to purchase is higher than the finished quantity in the design.
- Overhead: The cost of completing a project goes beyond what happens on the jobsite. Your pricing process also needs to account for the business costs required to support the work.
Not every cost on this list belongs in every estimate. A planting renovation has different needs than a project with demolition, hardscaping, drainage, and subcontracted electrical work.
The point isn’t to turn this into another checklist you have to follow. It’s about building enough consistency into your estimating process that relevant costs don’t depend on someone remembering them at the last minute.
When a Template Is No Longer Enough
A template works well for landscape estimates when your team can keep estimating information current and manage changes consistently. As project volume grows, that can get harder.
Labor, material, equipment, and overhead costs may need to be updated across separate files. Scope changes have to make their way from the estimate to the job. And once work begins, comparing estimated costs with actual performance can mean pulling information from several places.
This is where landscape estimating software can help. Instead of maintaining the same information across disconnected tools, you can keep costs and estimates in one system, manage changes as the project moves forward, and compare what you estimated with what the job actually used.
The point where software becomes useful isn’t a particular company size. It’s when keeping your estimating process accurate and connected by hand starts taking too much work.
Start With a More Consistent Landscape Estimate
A good estimate doesn’t need to explain every detail behind your pricing. It needs to clearly reflect the work you’ve priced, the assumptions you’ve made, and what the client can expect.
The more consistently your team captures that information, the easier it is to spot missing costs, keep estimates clear from one project to the next, and manage changes when they happen.
Use the free Landscape Project Estimate Template as a starting point for building that consistency into every estimate you send.
[Download the Free Landscape Project Estimate Template]
Landscape Estimate FAQs
What Is the Difference Between a Landscape Estimate and a Proposal?
A landscape estimate focuses on the expected scope and price of the work. A proposal usually takes that information a step further by presenting the project as an offer to the client, often with additional details about the company, project approach, and terms.
In a design-build workflow, the estimate gives you the pricing foundation you need to turn your estimate into a bid or proposal.
Can I Customize the Landscape Estimate Template for My Business?
Yes. The template is designed to be customized with your company branding, project details, scope categories, pricing, payment structure, and appropriate terms.
Before using it with clients, remove the instructional placeholders and make sure the language reflects your business practices and any local requirements that apply.
When Should I Use Landscape Estimating Software Instead of a Template?
A template may be enough when you can keep your estimating information current and manage estimates consistently without creating a lot of extra manual work.
Software becomes more useful when you have multiple people preparing estimates, more projects moving at once, or costs and project information spread across different files and systems. It can also help when you need a better way to connect estimating with change orders, job costing, and actual project performance as your business grows.