Updated September 7, 2026. Third-party prices were checked on that date and link to their sources; our own prices are the published monthly plans on our pricing page.
The short answer: outsourced bookkeeping for a construction company usually runs from about $350 a month for a one-crew contractor with a handful of jobs to $1,000 or more a month for a multi-crew operation that needs job costing, payroll allocated by job and work-in-progress reporting. Two things push a contractor’s bill above what a store or a consultancy pays: the number of moving parts (jobs, subs, deposits, retainage, equipment) and how far behind the books are when you start. At AB The Tax Expert, monthly plans are $399, $549 and $899, and construction clients with job costing usually land on the $549 or $899 plan; a backlog is scoped separately as catch-up bookkeeping. Here is what other providers publish, the twelve things that move the price, and how to work out which tier you are.
What construction bookkeeping costs in 2026: published ranges
Few bookkeeping firms publish contractor pricing, but the ones that do are consistent about the shape: a low tier for solo operators with no job costing, a middle tier where job costing and payroll come in, and an open-ended top tier for multi-crew operations.
| Source | Small / solo | Growing (job costing, payroll) | Multi-crew / WIP reporting |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aladdin Bookkeeping (contractor pricing guide) | $350–$450/mo (1–5 employees) | $450–$1,000/mo (6–20 employees) | $1,000–$3,000+/mo (21+ employees) |
| Edgestrat Finance (construction pricing explained) | $300–$700/mo (no job costing) | $800–$2,000/mo (basic job costing, weekly payroll) | $2,500+/mo (WIP, full cost-code structure) |
| AB The Tax Expert (published plans) | $399/mo Essentials | $549/mo Growth | $899/mo Scale |
Our plans are flat monthly prices, not hourly, and they do not step up with revenue; the plan is set by how many accounts and workflows the books involve. Tax returns are priced separately (see business tax preparation). If a quote you receive elsewhere is far below the low end of this table, check whether it includes reconciliations, job-level reporting and a preparer-ready year-end, because those are usually what has been left out.
The 12 things that set a contractor’s bookkeeping price
1. Transaction volume, not revenue
A $2 million general contractor with twelve big draws a year has fewer transactions than a $600,000 remodeler paying forty suppliers and six subs every month. Bookkeeping is priced on the work of coding and reconciling entries, so the remodeler often costs more to keep than the GC. Count your monthly bank, card and processor lines before you compare quotes.
2. Number of accounts
Every bank account, credit card, line of credit, equipment loan, fuel card and merchant account has to be reconciled to a statement each month. This is the main variable in our own plans: two or three accounts sits in Essentials; a business running six to ten sits in Growth or Scale.
3. Job costing depth
Job costing is the difference between construction bookkeeping and ordinary bookkeeping. The cheapest level assigns each expense to a customer or project. The next level uses cost codes (labor, materials, subs, equipment, other) by phase, so you can see that framing on the Jefferson job ran 18% over estimate. The top level tracks committed costs and budgets against actuals. Each step adds setup and monthly time, which is why the middle tier in every published price list starts where job costing starts.
4. Payroll and labor allocation
Payroll itself usually runs through a payroll service. What costs bookkeeping time is allocating wages, payroll taxes and workers’ comp to jobs, and reconciling the payroll clearing account every period. Weekly payroll for field crews is more work than semi-monthly office payroll, and certified payroll on public work adds its own reporting.
5. Subcontractors and 1099s
Each sub needs a W-9 on file, lien releases matched to payments, and a 1099-NEC at year end. For payments made in 2026 the 1099-NEC threshold rises from $600 to $2,000, but tracking still has to be by payee all year. A contractor with twenty active subs is a different monthly job from one with three.
6. Deposits, progress billing and retainage
Customer deposits are a liability until earned; progress billings have to match the schedule of values; and retainage held by the customer (or held by you against subs) sits in its own receivable and payable accounts until released. Straight cash-basis bookkeeping ignores all of this and overstates income in the months you invoice. Handling it correctly is part of the Growth-tier work.
7. Work-in-progress and revenue recognition
Contractors with jobs that span year end, bonded work, or lenders who want percentage-of-completion statements need a WIP schedule: contract value, costs to date, estimated costs to complete, billings to date, and the over/under-billing adjustment. This is a monthly or quarterly accounting task, not data entry, and it is what pushes the top tier past $1,000 a month at most providers.
8. Materials, inventory and equipment
Materials bought for stock rather than for a specific job need an inventory account and periodic counts. Owned equipment needs a fixed-asset register, depreciation, and an internal charge-out to jobs if you want true job margins. Leased equipment and vehicle loans each add an account to reconcile.
9. Software and how it is set up
We keep books in QuickBooks Online. A file that was set up with a construction chart of accounts, classes or projects, and a working link to your estimating or field app takes far less time each month than one where every job has been coded to “Cost of Goods Sold.” Rebuilding the chart of accounts and project list is a one-time cost that pays back inside a year.
10. The state of the books when you start
This is the biggest single variable in a first-year quote. Books that are months behind, or that were kept but never reconciled, are scoped as a separate catch-up or cleanup project before the monthly plan begins. Our guide to cleanup versus catch-up bookkeeping explains which one you need; both are quoted as a single fixed price after we see the file. Monthly plans assume the books are current on day one.
11. Reporting expectations
A profit and loss and a balance sheet once a month is the base. Job profitability reports, a monthly WIP schedule, cash-flow projections, and reports formatted for a bonding agent or lender each add review time. Decide what you will actually read; paying for a WIP report nobody opens is common.
12. Sales tax, multi-state work and licensing reports
Contractors who sell taxable materials, work in more than one state, or file gross-receipts reports to a licensing board add filings that a bookkeeper has to support with clean numbers. Each extra jurisdiction is another monthly or quarterly deliverable.
Three contractor profiles and where they land
| Profile | What the books involve | Published market range | Our plan |
|---|---|---|---|
| Owner-operator trade contractor (electrician, plumber, painter), no employees, 2–3 accounts | Coding by job, monthly reconciliations, 1099s for a few subs, tax-ready year-end | $300–$700/mo | Essentials, $399 |
| Remodeler or specialty contractor, 1–2 crews, 5–8 accounts, payroll, deposits and progress billing | Cost-code job costing, payroll allocated to jobs, deposit and retainage accounts, job profitability reports | $450–$2,000/mo | Growth, $549 |
| General contractor with multiple crews, equipment, bonded or lender-reviewed work, 8+ accounts | Everything above plus WIP schedule, equipment charge-outs, inventory, lender-ready statements | $1,000–$3,000+/mo | Scale, $899, scoped after review |
The market ranges are the published third-party figures in the first table. Our plan is the fit in most cases at that profile, confirmed after we look at your file; a business with unusual volume or reporting needs is quoted individually before work starts.
What is usually not in the monthly price
- Payroll processing. Running payroll is a payroll-service subscription; bookkeeping records and allocates it.
- Accounts payable and invoicing. Entering vendor bills, paying them and issuing customer invoices is bill-pay work. Some contractors want it outsourced; it is scoped on top of bookkeeping.
- Tax returns. The business return (Schedule C from $750; partnership, S corporation and C corporation returns from $1,200) is a separate engagement, priced on our business tax page. Clean monthly books are what keep it at the base price.
- Catch-up or cleanup of prior months. Always a separate, fixed-price project.
- Software subscriptions. QuickBooks Online and any job-costing or field app are billed by the vendor.
Hourly, flat monthly, or in-house?
Hourly bookkeepers are unpredictable for contractors because volume swings with the season, so the bill floats month to month (our general bookkeeping cost guide compares hourly, flat and in-house with published figures). Flat monthly bookkeeping plans move that risk to the provider, which is why most online firms, including us, price that way. An in-house bookkeeper is the right answer once the work fills most of a week: at that point wages, payroll taxes and software will exceed an outsourced plan, but you get someone on site who can chase lien releases and match delivery tickets. Many contractors run a hybrid, with an office manager handling AP and invoicing and an outside firm doing the month-end close, job costing and the year-end handoff to tax.
How to get an accurate quote
Have these ready and any provider can price you in one conversation: the number of bank, card and loan accounts; a rough monthly transaction count; the number of active jobs and subs; whether you run payroll and how often; whether you take deposits, bill on progress or hold retainage; the last month your books were reconciled; and which reports you need and for whom. Our construction bookkeeping service page lists what is included each month; Get Started collects those answers and we confirm the plan and price in writing before anything begins.
Common questions
Why does construction bookkeeping cost more than regular bookkeeping?
Job costing, payroll allocation, subcontractor tracking, deposits, retainage and work-in-progress accounting all add monthly work that a service business does not have. The base tier for a solo contractor with no job costing costs about the same as ordinary small-business bookkeeping; the extra cost begins when jobs have to be tracked individually.
Is job costing worth paying for?
If you estimate jobs, yes. Without job-level actuals you cannot tell which kinds of work make money, and most contractors who start job costing find at least one line of work that was losing money at the price they were charging.
Do I need WIP reporting?
Only if jobs span year end or a bonding company, lender or CPA-reviewed financial statement requires percentage-of-completion accounting. A residential remodeler on short jobs usually does not.
What if my books are a year behind?
The backlog is scoped as a one-time catch-up project with a fixed price, and the monthly plan starts once the books are current. See catch-up bookkeeping.
Are your prices different for construction clients?
No. The published monthly plans apply to every industry; construction clients tend to fit the Growth or Scale plan because of the number of accounts and the job-costing work.
Sources
- Aladdin Bookkeeping, What is the pricing for monthly bookkeeping for contractors? — aladdinbookkeeping.com
- Edgestrat Finance, Construction bookkeeping pricing: what contractors actually pay — edgestratfinance.com
- IRS, Instructions for Forms 1099-MISC and 1099-NEC (2026 reporting threshold) — irs.gov
- AB The Tax Expert, Pricing — abthetaxexpert.com/pricing/
Questions about how this applies to your situation? We can talk it through and point you to the right next step.