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The Ultimate Hub for
Hardscapers & Project-Based Landscapers

AI-powered estimates, contracts, invoices, and 2D/3D design — all in one tool built for contractors. Describe a job, get a full breakdown in seconds. Free to sign up, free to try.

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Features

Everything you need to price jobs and win work

Stop using spreadsheets and guesswork. Outdoor Estimates gives project-based landscapers and hardscapers a complete estimating workflow — from takeoff to signed contract.

AI-Powered Estimates

Describe the job in plain English. Our AI analyzes the scope and generates a full material, labor, and equipment breakdown based on your actual costs.

Estimate wizard screenshot

2D / 3D Design Tool

Show clients exactly what their project will look like — paver patterns, planting beds, borders, and lawn areas. Visual proposals that close more jobs.

3D landscape design tool — night mode with landscape lighting on a paver patio

AI Design Renders

Snap a photo of the customer's yard, type what you want, and AI renders a photorealistic "after" image right on top of their real photo. Then it picks the right materials from your library and builds a printable spec sheet you can attach to the estimate.

AI-generated photorealistic landscape design example with material breakdown

Contracts & E-Sign

Send proposals with a built-in contract. Customers review scope, pricing, and terms — then sign digitally. No printing, no scanning, no chasing paperwork.

Contracts screenshot

Professional Invoices

Create and send professional invoices to your customers. Track payments, manage billing, and keep your financials organized — all in one place.

Invoices screenshot
Hundreds of materials, real prices

Make prices using our entire material library

Pavers, wall blocks, caps, decorative rock, aggregate, sand, mulch, plants — every product you actually buy is in the library with a price field ready for your real cost. Add your own custom materials on top in seconds.

Hover any tile to see the product name. Hover the row to pause it.

How It Works

The setup walkthrough — step by step

Most contractors spend their first hour on the platform building an estimate before they realize their material prices, labor rates, and overhead are still the defaults. Don't be that guy. Here's the actual order to set things up so the very first estimate you build is dialed to your real numbers and ready to send.

01 First — Materials & Pricing

Set up your material library before anything else

Open the Business Inputs page and walk through the materials list. We come pre-loaded with hundreds of common landscape and hardscape products at solid average prices — but YOUR local supplier almost always charges something different.

Spend the first hour on the phone with the suppliers you actually buy from. Update each material's price in the app to match what you actually pay. Pavers, base aggregate, mulch by the yard, plants by size, polymeric sand by the bag — every line. Skip this and the AI estimates jobs at industry averages from three states away. Get this right once and every estimate from this point forward is dialed to YOUR true cost.

Material library setup screen
Material library — built in, then you reconcile with your supplier's prices
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02 Equipment, Labor, Overhead

Plug in YOUR rates, not industry averages

Same Business Inputs page — scroll down. Enter the hourly rate for every machine you own (mini-ex, plate compactor, dump trailer, skid steer). Enter your foreman, crew, and subcontractor labor rates. Then enter your monthly overhead: insurance, truck payments, fuel, shop rent, software, phone.

The AI uses these to calculate machine-hours, crew-hours, and the overhead allocation that gets baked into every job. Without your real numbers, you'll quote jobs that LOOK profitable but actually don't cover your fixed costs once the truck payment comes due. With your real numbers, every estimate has a true margin you can trust.

Equipment and overhead setup
Equipment hourly rates + monthly overhead — the math behind every job
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03 Build Your First Estimate

Describe a real job in plain English

Open the Estimates tab. Type a description like you'd text a buddy: "20x20 paver patio with a charcoal border, sitting wall along the back, and some plant beds around the edges." The AI parses the scope, asks a couple of clarifying questions, and builds the full breakdown.

Materials by quantity, labor hours by phase, equipment time, overhead allocation, and your margin. Review every line. Adjust margin up or down depending on the customer or competition. Hit Save. The estimate now lives in Saved Estimates with a "Not Sent" status — ready to send when you're confident.

AI estimate wizard
The AI estimate wizard — type the scope, get a full breakdown
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04 Save & Send

Send by email, text, or share link

From the saved estimate, hit Send. Three options: Email it directly to the customer with a PDF attachment, Text them a link to a customer-facing view they can review on their phone, or generate a printable PDF. The instant you send it, the status flips from Not Sent to Pending automatically.

The customer-facing view is mobile-optimized and has a big green Accept Estimate button at the bottom. When they tap it and confirm, the estimate's status flips to Won, you get an email notification, and the customer sees an "Accepted" thank-you state. No more "I sent the quote, now I'm waiting on a phone call" — they accept right from the link.

Saved estimates with status tracking
Saved estimates — status auto-updates from Not Sent → Pending → Won
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05 Design Tool — 2D/3D

Show them what they're getting before they sign

For higher-end jobs, a visual proposal closes 2-3× more than a written one. Open the Design tab. Drag-and-drop pavers, walls, plants, and lights onto a real-scale canvas. Pick paver patterns and colors from the Techo Bloc / Belgard / Unilock catalog built in.

Switch to 3D mode and walk the customer through their finished patio with landscape lighting on at dusk. Save the design and attach it to the estimate. Customers stop comparing your bid to the cheaper guy's flat PDF and start picturing themselves in the space. The design tool is a Pro tier feature and one of the biggest reasons people go from $50/mo to $100/mo.

3D design tool with night-mode lighting
3D mode at dusk — landscape lighting on, the way the customer will actually see it
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06 AI Photo Render

Drop the finished project right onto the customer's yard photo

The killer Pro feature. Snap a photo of the customer's yard from the angle they'll see the finished space. Type what you want: "paver patio with charcoal border, sitting wall on the left, fire pit in the center." AI generates 4 photorealistic "after" renders right on top of THEIR actual yard photo.

Pick the variant they like best, type any refinements ("make the pavers grey", "add string lights overhead", "show this at dusk"), and AI re-renders 4 new variants. Attach the final to the estimate. Customers don't squint at a sketch trying to imagine it — they SEE it. This is the feature that gets the homeowner saying "yes" before you've even quoted the price.

AI photo render of finished project on customer's yard
AI photoreal render — the finished project, rendered onto the customer's actual photo
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07 Contracts & E-Sign

Turn an accepted estimate into a signed contract in one click

Once a customer accepts the estimate, open the Contracts tab and hit Make Contract. The estimate's scope, customer info, and pricing pre-fill. Add the payment schedule (50% deposit / 50% on completion is the standard), warranty terms, and any special conditions.

AI generates a multi-section contract with proper trade language. Send the customer a share link — they review it on their phone, sign on a touch screen with their finger, and you get a signed PDF in your inbox plus a copy stored in Saved Contracts. No printing, no scanning, no chasing signatures across three back-and-forth emails.

Contract generation and e-sign
Contracts auto-generated from accepted estimates, signed digitally on any device
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08 Invoice & Get Paid

Send the invoice, customer pays online, money hits your account

Job's done. Open Invoices, generate from the won estimate (or build standalone), set the amount, and send. Customer gets an email with a Pay Now button. They click it, enter their card, and Stripe processes the payment — money in your account in 2 business days.

QuickBooks integration pushes every invoice straight to QBO if you use it, so your bookkeeping happens automatically. Track paid / unpaid / overdue invoices on the dashboard. Set up Stripe Connect once at the start (10-minute onboarding) and from then on every invoice is one tap to send and one tap for the customer to pay.

Invoice with online payment
Invoices with Pay Now buttons — customer pays via Stripe, you get paid in 2 business days
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AI estimates included 2D / 3D design tool Contracts & e-sign Pro invoices

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Want a Guided Tour?

Book a free 15-minute demo with the founder.

I'll get on a quick call, walk you through how to set up your business so every estimate matches your real costs, and answer anything specific to the kind of work you do — patios, walls, lawn installs, drainage, all of it.

  • ✓ Personal walk-through of every feature
  • ✓ Help configuring your material prices & labor rates
  • ✓ Free — no commitment, no pitch

Schedule your demo

FAQ

Common questions

What is Outdoor Estimates?+

Outdoor Estimates is an all-in-one platform for landscape and hardscape contractors. It includes AI-powered project estimating, customer-ready proposals, contracts with e-signature, professional invoices, a 2D/3D landscape design tool, and an AI photo-render feature that turns a description and a yard photo into a finished design. Homeowners can use the design tools for free and get matched with a vetted local contractor.

Is the AI landscape design tool really free?+

Yes, completely free for homeowners. Upload a photo of your yard, type what you want, and the AI renders a photorealistic image of the finished project. Learn more about AI landscape design.

What kind of projects can I price with the estimating software?+

Paver patios, walkways, paver driveways, retaining walls, sitting walls, garden walls, steps, fire pits, fire pit kits, mulch beds, rock beds, sod and seed installations, hydroseed, French drains, drainage projects, grading and excavation, demolition and disposal, concrete, blacktop / asphalt, and water features. The estimating engine handles all of it. See the full list.

How much does a paver patio actually cost?+

A typical paver patio runs $22-$45 per square foot installed in the US. Our free paver patio cost calculator gives you an instant breakdown for your specific dimensions, paver type, base depth, and labor market.

Does the AI render use my actual yard photo?+

Yes. The AI uses image-to-image generation, so it edits your photo rather than drawing a generic landscape. Your house, fences, neighbors, sky, and trees stay exactly as they are — only the yard area gets the new project rendered onto it.

Is this better than HomeAdvisor or Angi for finding contractors?+

For outdoor projects specifically, yes — because you can show the contractor exactly what you want with the AI design or 2D/3D plan before you ever talk to them. That cuts misunderstandings, revision rounds, and wasted site visits dramatically.

What Contractors Say

Trusted by crews across the country

Real feedback from contractors who switched to Outdoor Estimates.

★★★★★
"I used to spend an hour on every estimate. Now I describe the job, tweak a few numbers, and send it out in 10 minutes. This thing pays for itself on the first job every month."
MR
Mike Rossi Rossi Hardscapes — Raleigh, NC
★★★★★
"The design tool is a game-changer. I showed a client the 2D layout on my phone at the job site and they signed the contract on the spot."
JT
Jamie Torres GreenLine Landscapes — Austin, TX
★★★★★
"We are a 5-man crew and none of us are tech guys. This was easy to set up, the proposals look professional, and clients take us more seriously now."
DK
Derek Kim Summit Outdoor Services — Denver, CO