LBM Leaders Praise How AI Slashes Take-Off Turnaround Time, But Stress That Humans Remain Indispensable

Artificial intelligence and automated estimating tools are radically compressing takeoff turnaround times from days to minutes. But three dealer executives and other experts warned Oct. 7 that automation alone cannot generate an accurate, shippable bill of materials without experienced estimators verifying the work.

During a webinar hosted by Webb Analytics and sponsored by building-platform provider Higharc, the panelists agreed that, while speed is essential to winning bids, pure automation without human oversight poses major risks to the jobsite and the bottom line.

(You can watch the webinar at https://youtu.be/rSXwyg0n7BA?si=9xu4VnHZEo-H_qFd)

Speed to Quote Drives Tech Adoption

For pro dealers, the primary catalyst behind deploying AI-driven takeoff tools is customer response time. As national homebuilders, retail giants, and well-funded consolidators invest heavily in digital workflows, the traditional multi-day estimating queue is becoming a competitive liability.

Jake Trapp, president of RoMac Building Supply in Central Florida, said his company developed proprietary tools to remove friction for builder clients. RoMac's custom truss-quoting software now produces estimates based on board footage in just five minutes per plan, and whole-house material takeoffs take 10 to 20 minutes to extract needed data from designs.

"The definition of the right speed is getting the information to the customer before they make the decision to buy from someone else," Trapp said, asserting that if an outside competitor can return a bid in six hours while an independent dealer takes five days, the customer will migrate. RoMac has already reallocated its drafting labor as a result, reducing the staff required for initial truss estimates from five or six designers down to a single person verifying the automated models.

Webb Analytics President Craig Webb, the event's moderator, reported on a speech by a Lowe's VP who said that the home center's tech improvements enabled it to cut take-off turnarounds from 20 days before to two days today.

'Automate the Work, Not the Judgment'

Despite the efficiency gains, panelists rejected the idea that software can run on autopilot. In building materials, an inaccurate quote that misses hardware or miscalculates framing packages leads directly to costly jobsite drops, hot-shot deliveries, and returns.

There are three things we want in a takeoff," said Michael Cassidy, chief operating officer at Builders Corporation, which operates seven facilities across Nebraska and Colorado. "Is it comprehensive, is it accurate, and is it fast? If it’s fast and it’s not the first two, then it’s just extra work."

Cassidy cautioned that no algorithm accounts for jobsite realities, such as how framing crews actually cut and place lumber in the field, or the nuances of differing regional plan revisions. "The first rule of gunfighting is you can't miss fast enough to win. It doesn't matter how fast you miss," he said.

Brandon Pearson, head of solutions consulting at Higharc and an 18-year production homebuilding and estimating veteran, said software should "automate the work, not the judgment."

"Let’s get the tracing, the coloring, and the modeling out of the way," Pearson said."We take the approach of codifying that 20 years of framing experience into the platform to build confidence."

Levi Smith, CEO of Idaho-based Franklin Building Supply, estimated that current takeoff platforms capture roughly 75% of a whole-house material list reliably, leaving the remaining 25% as an identified gap for experienced estimators to address.

"We don’t hold these tools to the standard of a calculator where it has to be 100% right every single time," Smith said. "Knowledgeable people who have been doing this for years remain our differentiator. Estimators are becoming even more valuable today because they can zero in on what the software missed, take action, and refine the model."

Luke Jansen, VP of sales for estimating service provider Tsarsi, agreed that AI is shifting estimators into quality-control analysts rather than replacing them. "AI takes away the repetitive, redundant tasks and allows a trained estimator to become the verification layer," Jansen said. "They help make decisions on assumptions when plans are vague or incomplete."

How to measure ways to improve take-offs? The panelists identified internal cost per square foot or per board foot as a key performance indicator.

Smith offered a practical benchmark: add two zeros to the number of plan sets reviewed annually. A dealer processing 500 plans per year should anticipate spending at least $50,000 on software, development, or outside services to meaningfully accelerate the workflow.

"Know what your internal per-square-foot estimating and takeoff number is, and then you know whether you’re really saving money," Smith said. "If you’re not saving money, you must be capturing enough additional value in customer experience to cover that gap."

The Next Hurdle: ERP and POS Integration

Both RoMac and Franklin are integrating their takeoff platforms with BisTrack, an ERP system from Epicor, using application programming interfaces (APIs) to map automated takeoffs directly to live SKUs, inventory levels, and customer-specific contract pricing. Builders Corporation is deploying internally designed code assisted by AI tools to link takeoffs to its core systems, while software platforms like Higharc are engineering dynamic bills of materials that export directly to dealer systems.

Addressing audience concerns regarding big-box retailers partnering with takeoff software—such as BuildExact or Houzz Pro routing material orders directly to The Home Depot—dealers expressed confidence that relationship-driven service and logistics protect pro-dealer market share.

"Ninety percent of what we deliver is on a truck that gets dropped on a jobsite, and 90% of what Home Depot sells ends up in someone’s trunk in the parking lot," Cassidy said. "They are two wildly different models. Pro builders need drivers who know where to drop framing packs and sales teams aligned with their crews."

Smith added that locking contractors into a single retail ecosystem often causes professional builders to push back. "Pro customers of scale do not like getting boxed into a supplier where they lose their agency," he said.

Similarly, as consumer AI platforms like Anthropic's Claude prompt homeowners and small builders to submit rough, AI-generated concept drawings for bids, panelists said pro yards remain essential for turning sketches into buildable packages.

"Claude doesn't know the local building code, and it doesn't know that you need a specific bracket or structural hardware piece," Pearson said. "They can dream with AI, but to actually land the plane and build the house, they still need the distributor's expertise."

Editor's Note: In keeping with the webinar's theme, the first draft of this article was written with AI software. It then was edited--and corrected--by Webb Analytics.