3 things to do today to manage your budget: Monthend

Show Notes

Chris Anderson, founder of Monthend in Minneapolis, Minnesota, joins us on The Building Code podcast for a financially focused episode.

Chris was a partner and CFO of a building company, where he met Buildertrend after “flirting” with other software tools. As he struggled to find a way to make his business run more effectively, Buildertrend turned out to be just the tool to make that happen. After 10 years in the building biz using our platform, though, Chris decided his true passion was helping other builders through consulting – which is when Monthend came to be..

The team at Monthend consists of CPAs, bookkeepers, data specialists and Chris, the Buildertrend expert – all people geared toward helping builders with the financial side of their companies. While the builders focus on building, the team at Monthend focuses on the numbers, and everyone focuses on doing what they’re best at.

“How much money am I making or losing, and how did that happen?” is just one of the questions that brings people to Monthend. Chris’s suggestion to customers with this issue is putting systems in place built between Buildertrend and accounting. “You have a complete map that tells you exactly why or how you lost money, and if you’re doing the accounting right, then you can fix it.” Chris explains. In many cases, it’s not that builders want to ignore the accounting or put off putting systems in place – they’re just too dang busy! And they unfortunately have a mindset that accounting is a cost center … it costs more money to have an accountant. But, in reality, if they paid for someone or something else to take care of it, their profits could actually increase.

So, what can construction business owners do today to better manage their finances? Here are Chris’s tips:

  1. Plan, plan, plan. Have a good plan before your business even starts, and then once it’s up and running, keep planning! Plan on an annual or project-by-project basis – whatever works best for your business, and just be sure to do it consistently. Whether it’s on a spreadsheet or through a tool like Buildertrend, craft plans for how much money you want to make, how many projects you want to complete, etc.
  2. Always measure your success. So, you have your goals set, but how do you plan to know if what you’re doing is meeting your goals? Now’s the time to measure your executed plans to see if you’re actually moving towards your goals. A lot of builders may also find value in measuring their cycle time. How long does it take from digging the first hole in the ground to cleaning the place and being completely done? Identify your KPIs early on and follow through on them.
  3. Be able to adjust. It’s no secret that nothing is ever going to go completely as planned, especially in this industry, so you have to be ready for that. For example: If you work in Minnesota, you might want to break ground in May, but who knows if you’ll be able to because of lingering frost. The ability to adjust in a situation like this will do wonders and keep your project moving forward.

Buildertrend University
Buildertrend Payment Processing
What are KPIs?

The Better Way, a podcast by Buildertrend:

Looking to improve how your team plans projects with the top residential construction management platform this year? Pick up Buildertrend project planning pro tips on the newest season of โ€œThe Better Way, a podcast by Buildertrend.โ€ Subscribe and stream all six bingeable episodes on your favorite listening app now.

Follow us on social:

Instagram and Facebook

Listen to โ€œThe Building Codeโ€ on YouTube! And be sure to head over to Facebook to join The Building Code Crew fan page for some fun discussions with fellow listeners.

Transcript

Tom Houghton:

You are listening to โ€œThe Building Code.โ€ Iโ€™m Tom Houghton.

Paul Wurth:

Iโ€™m Paul Wurth.

Tom Houghton:

On this episode of โ€œThe Building Code,โ€ weโ€™ve got Chris Anderson from Monthend joining us. Monthend specializes in bookkeeping, accounting, finance and Buildertrend consulting. Weโ€™re going to have a financially focused discussion today with Chris. Make sure you stay tuned to the end because Chris will be sharing some great tips to help you manage your finances.

Paul Wurth:

Welcome Chris.

Chris Anderson:

Thank you. Thanks for having me.

Paul Wurth:

Happy to have you on. Are you out of Minnesota?

Chris Anderson:

Thatโ€™s right, Iโ€™m sitting in Minneapolis right now. Itโ€™s a great city.

Paul Wurth:

Iโ€™ll kick it off because I do know you, weโ€™ve had a couple of conversations. Howโ€™d you get hooked up with Buildertrend, how do you know us?

Chris Anderson:

I was a CFO of a building company. So, I got to know Buildertrend through flirting with a bunch of other software tools. This was a while ago. I think five years ago, six, ten, I donโ€™t know, long time ago. We were still figuring out how to make our business run more effectively and smoothly, and Buildertrend made the final cut. And ever since then we hitched our wagon to that piece of software, and itโ€™s been a good thing since then.

Paul Wurth:

Weโ€™re the one thatโ€™s stuck.

Chris Anderson:

Youโ€™re the one that stuck โ€ฆ

Paul Wurth:

Itโ€™s okay that you dated other people. Weโ€™re not the jealous type.

Tom Houghton:

No.

Paul Wurth:

Are we?

Tom Houghton:

No.

Chris Anderson:

We just flirted with them, we didnโ€™t actually โ€ฆ

Paul Wurth:

Okay, there you go, itโ€™s even better. Itโ€™s even better. Thatโ€™s great to hear. So, you and I had a conversation about a year ago because I wanted you to come to Buildertrend University to talk about your expertise, and thatโ€™s really why we have you on today. So, what do you do now?

Chris Anderson:

Now, I do consulting. Iโ€™m on the other side of things. I took my chips off of the table. So, I was a partner and CFO of a building company, I did that for like 10 years. Good building company, a good team over here in Minnesota, but I decided my heart and my passion is really in helping other builders do a good job.

Paul Wurth:

Honestly, itโ€™s very similar to us because I bet โ€ฆ Iโ€™ll let you go with it, but I bet you saw man, every company has the same gap in their processes or problem in construction.

Chris Anderson:

Yeah. And you see a lot of similarities with homebuilders. And then you see a lot of different similarities with remodelers. And their issues seem to be pretty similar when it comes to โ€ฆ when they come to see me, itโ€™s because theyโ€™ve exhausted all their options in terms of figuring out how to get things going in the right direction. So, you guys have an awesome team there. And a lot of the times they come to me after talking to you.

Tom Houghton:

Letโ€™s talk about your team, actually. So, can you give us a rundown of Monthend? What does it look like? How many people do you have there?

Chris Anderson:

Yeah. We have a great team. We have people that come from aerospace backgrounds all the way to people with really good real estate experience. So, we have CPA on staff, we have bookkeepers, we have people that just do data entry. And when it comes to Buildertrend, actually deep Buildertrend expertise thatโ€™s just me. Our team is learning it, theyโ€™re becoming pretty proficient in it, and they can help a lot of people.

But really, weโ€™re geared towards the bookkeeping and the accounting sorts of things. So, the services we offer bookkeeping, accounting, Buildertrend consulting, and weโ€™d like to get in on the bank side of things, too. One of the biggest issues a lot of builders have is they need capital to build spec houses, and weโ€™d like to help put them together with the right banks to help them do that.

Paul Wurth:

So, is your help based on hereโ€™s a strategy of how you go to a bank, or is it actually just connecting banks that you have relationships with, with the companies? Where do you fit in?

Chris Anderson:

Yeah, itโ€™s both of those things. So, helping them get their information in order. A lot of builders have a hard time wrapping their heads around their information, their financial stuff. They donโ€™t understand what it means. I donโ€™t mean that in a negative or derogatory way itโ€™s just โ€ฆ theyโ€™re really, really good at building houses, building beautiful houses, and they donโ€™t want to deal with accounting. So, we help them put the numbers together and put it in front of the banks. And sometimes we have the relationships with the banks for our local clients. And for the clients that arenโ€™t here in Minnesota, itโ€™s more of the former where weโ€™re putting the packages together for them to help them present things for the bank.

Paul Wurth:

Right. Youโ€™re best off if you go to a bank looking like this. Thatโ€™s your thing.

Chris Anderson:

Yeah. You want to be slick. We know the questions that the bankโ€™s going to ask. We try to put ourselves in the shoes of the bank and poke holes in the financials to say, if it was a banker Iโ€™d have an issue with this, and then come up with the answers before the bank asks them. So, when they do ask them, youโ€™re ready with a good response, so the banker feels really comfortable doing business with you.

Paul Wurth:

That makes total sense.

Tom Houghton:

Yeah. To that end, what are some common mistakes that you see a lot of builders making? Or remodelers financially?

Chris Anderson:

Well, homebuilding is a tough business, right? This is one of the tougher businesses out there. Thereโ€™s very low barriers to entry, itโ€™s easy to spin up a home building company. You have lumber prices, all of these prices are fluctuating. Trade contractors are impossible to find right now. Labor is really, really short. Interest rates fluctuate, the mortgage markets are crazy, buyers are crazy, demand is crazy. So, itโ€™s a hard business to manage. And a lot of builders donโ€™t come from a business management background. Like I said, theyโ€™re really good trades people, theyโ€™re really good at building houses. They can make a really nice product, and people can really relate to them. And the business management and the financial management side of the things is sort of an afterthought.

So, a lot of the mistakes are pretty general, typical mistakes like not really caring about the accounting and making sure itโ€™s right. That causes issues.

Paul Wurth:

What is the number one reason somebody comes to you? What part of it? And Iโ€™ll maybe throw some out there because I honestly donโ€™t know beyond what you just said, which makes a lot of sense. But is it like at the end of the job I donโ€™t know if Iโ€™m making money or not throughout the job. At the end of the job if I did make money I donโ€™t know how. I donโ€™t know which part of it I did good or bad in. Is it something down that road?

Chris Anderson:

Yeah, you got it. So, itโ€™s probably more of the former. How much money am I making and why did I make it? Or how much money am I losing and why did I lose it? And those questions can all be answered with really good systems. Between Buildertrend and accounting, you have a complete map that tells you exactly why or how you lost money if youโ€™re doing it right, if youโ€™re doing the accounting right and then you can fix it.

I think a lot of the reasons why those systems are disconnected or why builders donโ€™t generally pay as much of attention to it as they should is because they donโ€™t realize the value they can get out of it when itโ€™s done right. And theyโ€™re too busy, theyโ€™re too busy building houses, theyโ€™re too busy running a building company and they think of accounting as a cost center. It costs them money to have an accountant rather than, hey, how can I make these numbers work for me to make more profit?

And with that mindset of, hey, this is just a cost center what do they try to do? Save money. And how do they do that? Well, their husband is the accountant, or their wife is the accountant, or their brother or whatever it is, they ended up being their bookkeeper. And these guys wouldnโ€™t have their brother go trim their houses or do the plumbing in their houses because itโ€™s a technical deal. So, accounting kind of the same way.

Paul Wurth:

Yeah. Your business and our business have probably the same value props honestly. You could probably build a home, not probably, you can build a home without Buildertrend, but youโ€™d probably build it better, faster and more efficiently with it. And same thing with your business, you could probably make money on a home without knowing exactly the Xs and Os of where itโ€™s all going, but you canโ€™t do that every time unless you have a system right?

Chris Anderson:

Yeah, and thatโ€™s what people are doing. They see a house in their mind as a builder, and you have this great idea of the family thatโ€™s going to live there. And a lot of these guys are building monuments to themselves because theyโ€™re really proud of their work and they should be. These things are really beautiful, and itโ€™s the biggest investment people will make. So, they get really wrapped up into the craft of building the house and making this beautiful โ€ฆ I love saying the word monument because it really is. You can drive by this house 30 years from now and say I built that and I did that.

So, these are monuments, and a lot of times when youโ€™re building a monument the last thing youโ€™re thinking about is how cost-effectively you built that monument. How can I make this piece of artwork? Thatโ€™s a mistake that guys make. They want to build something that theyโ€™re proud of. And thatโ€™s not necessarily a mistake, but if you want to also make money, you have to think about other things than just how awesome can I make this house.

Tom Houghton:

Yeah. If we could bring it back, I think this is a great opportunity to point out the partnership opportunity, right? So, youโ€™re in a business like you said, these guys are great at doing one thing really well. Most people are great at doing one thing really well. So, these guys are building houses really well. And you need to partner with somebody โ€ฆ Dan kind of talked about this, Dan our co-founder in our first episode about finding people who can cover your blind spots. So, in this case with the financial stuff, youโ€™ve got yourself the financial side, we could leverage that in order to make it a more efficient, a better process for them.

Chris Anderson:

And I think it can actually start with the finance. Before you even think about building a house, the first thing you need to think about is how much money do I want to make? And then how can I spread that across this house? So, starting with the numbers and saying is this feasible? Does it work? Can this market support this type of a product? And back it all into the numbers. And if more builders would do that, they wouldnโ€™t be surprised at the end of the project and say, wait a second, I only made 20 bucks on this thing. Or I lost 50 grand, how did that happen? Well, the planning on the front end could have prevented some of that.

I think a lot of builders want to do that, but theyโ€™re just running at such a high pace, and theyโ€™re moving so quickly that they just donโ€™t have time. And itโ€™s more of Iโ€™m going to build this, Iโ€™m going to cross my fingers, and Iโ€™m going to make money on it because I know what Iโ€™m doing. And it doesnโ€™t always pan out that way.

Paul Wurth:

Yeah. Iโ€™m going back to what you originally said about how hard it is in the home building business when you laid it out like that. All the different moving parts, you got the client and they do things on a whim, and youโ€™re trying to work them. And you got all your suppliers and those prices are fluctuating. Youโ€™re trying to find subs, youโ€™re hoping theyโ€™re quality, youโ€™re hoping they show up. Youโ€™re hoping you have employees that are quality, youโ€™re hoping they show up.

So, to say that if at the end of a home or a project in construction that you do lose money, that doesnโ€™t necessarily mean you did something wrong, right? That can just happen. You donโ€™t want to do that a lot because surprises happen.

Chris Anderson:

No. You did something wrong.

Paul Wurth:

Really?

Chris Anderson:

Well, youโ€™re in the business to make money. And I think of that as the scoreboard right? How much money you made on a product is the scoreboard. And some people make money for the sake of making money. Some people make money because they have a higher cause that they want to use the money for. And I think accountants they donโ€™t necessarily think of it that way. How you measure success in business thereโ€™s a lot of ways to do it. But really the universal way to do it is how much money did you make? Itโ€™s keeping score. I donโ€™t mean it in a greedy way, but weโ€™re just keeping score.

How well did you do? How well did you do versus the last house? How well did you do versus last year? How well did you do versus your peers? And you want to do better than them and you can do better than them by building more beautiful things, or you can do better than them by making more money. Ideally, you could do both. So, you said, is it necessarily a mistake if you lost money on the project? Itโ€™s not necessarily a mistake that you made, but you can mitigate those issues by doing a little bit more homework, doing a little bit more planning. Put some numbers to paper on the front end.

And then yes, you did make a mistake at least youโ€™ll know why. And a lot of the times you come to these jobs at the end of them, and you lost money, and youโ€™re not really sure why or how. And you donโ€™t know if you lost cash or if you lost profit and you donโ€™t know the difference. And thatโ€™s fine, you werenโ€™t taught to know the difference you were taught to build really nice houses. So, to your point a financial partner can help with that.

Paul Wurth:

Yeah, exactly.

Chris Anderson:

The tools in Buildertrend can help with that.

Paul Wurth:

Itโ€™s the why. You can tell Chris is a competitive athlete with the scoreboard talk he just went through.

Tom Houghton:

Yeah.

Chris Anderson:

Former competitive athlete.

Paul Wurth:

Former? Yeah because โ€ฆ

Tom Houghton:

You never stop competing.

Chris Anderson:

When you had a kid, maybe.

Paul Wurth:

Thatโ€™s a good segue, you did do the triathlon or whatโ€™s your game?

Chris Anderson:

No. My wife is a former triathlete. Now, sheโ€™s an outstanding mother. Sheโ€™ll be a triathlete again.

Paul Wurth:

Nice plug on all sides there.

Tom Houghton:

Thatโ€™s good.

Paul Wurth:

She listens to this, you are in good shape.

Chris Anderson:

I used to race bicycles. And Iโ€™ve raced bicycles in Nebraska, actually, which is a great place to race bicycle surprisingly.

Tom Houghton:

The roads are okay.

Paul Wurth:

A little bit of a dig there.

Tom Houghton:

Theyโ€™re not great right now. Theyโ€™re in really bad shape right now.

Chris Anderson:

When you think of racing bicycles, you think of mountains, and you guys donโ€™t have those there, but we donโ€™t have them here either.

Paul Wurth:

Not me, I want to race bicycles flat.

Tom Houghton:

Flat. Itโ€™s easier.

Paul Wurth:

Preferably downhill.

Tom Houghton:

With the wind behind you. Chris, could you give us three things a business owner should do today to start better managing their finances?

Chris Anderson:

Well, thereโ€™s a lot of things. Some businesses do a good job already. I think if I were to think of three things, the first thing, and weโ€™ll do this in chronological order would be to plan. Very few businesses have a good plan before they start the business, and then once they do have the business, planning on an annual basis or a project by project basis, so planning. And you donโ€™t need a lot of technology to plan. A spreadsheet will do. Ideally, you have a tool like Buildertrend where you can plan very carefully in detail. But itโ€™s nice to set an annual plan, set a goal.

How much money do I want to make this year? And then figure out how to get to that goal. Okay, I want to make a million bucks, how many houses do I think I need to build to make a million bucks? I need to build 50 houses. How much money do I need to make on each one of those houses? I need to make $20,000. How much can I sell a house for and how much does it cost me to make $20,000? I can sell it for 400 as long as it costs less than 380, I can make 20 grand. 20 grand times 50 houses arrive at a million bucks. So, that process seems really simple, and you can lay it out on the back of a napkin, but youโ€™d be surprised how few people actually do that simple process.

Paul Wurth:

And I love that tip because there really is nothing beyond taking a deep breath in November, December, whatever you want to start doing it and go what is the plan? And it can be as simple as what you just said. Then I can imagine every year you do that it gets more and more detailed. More and more intricate, and you just kind of build from there right?

Chris Anderson:

Yes. I like to talk about simplicity as much as possible. Sometimes you have to get very detailed and very intricate. But as a starting point, so if people are doing things that theyโ€™re not โ€ฆ just a very simple plan, set some simple goals. And then the next step, you say three things will be the measure. So, you have a goal, all right itโ€™s great, now I need to measure what Iโ€™m doing throughout the year to see if Iโ€™m tracking toward that goal. And a lot of that measurement happens within accounting. Some of that measurement happens outside of accounting, some of it is cycle time.

So, a lot of builders can find a lot of value from measuring their cycle time. How long does it take from the time I want to start a job until the hole goes in the ground? How long does it take from when the hole goes in the ground until weโ€™re cleaning the place and itโ€™s done? And figuring out how your cycle times changing, how expensive a day is. So, understanding how much it costs for a dead day in your schedule. And then you can communicate to your team how important it is to make sure there arenโ€™t dead days in the schedule.

So, you can put it in terms of every day that house is sitting there thatโ€™s 300 bucks a day. Which is really about what it is for like a $600,000 house. For instance, 300 bucks a day, so if you can carve seven days out of that schedule, thatโ€™s $2,100. $2,100 on a $600,000 house where your net profit is maybe 60 grand, thatโ€™s a big percentage. Thatโ€™s three, four, five, six percent depending on how much time you carve out of it. And thatโ€™s just one variable that people can influence in their business by measuring things. And then having a goal and saying how can I get toward that goal.

Paul Wurth:

Yeah, but it starts with understanding where those, we call them KPIs here. Where are those things that you need to measure to understand how to get better at it? First step is where are we at today? Then, thatโ€™s the only way you can work on getting more efficient. Thatโ€™s great advice. Thatโ€™s two though.

Tom Houghton:

Check the shownotes for KPI definition. Iโ€™m not going to do it right now. Iโ€™m going to tease the show notes.

Paul Wurth:

There you go, check the show notes โ€ฆ

Tom Houghton:

All right, give us number three. You give us number one plan, number two is measure, number three?

Chris Anderson:

Adjust. So, youโ€™re planning, youโ€™re measuring, and now you have to adjust. Because nothingโ€™s ever going to go exactly to plan. Especially in this business, never. Itโ€™s never going to go to plan. You want to put a hole in the ground in May in Minnesota, who knows if youโ€™re going to be able to because the frost may not be out of the ground yet. But if you donโ€™t have a plan, you donโ€™t have anything youโ€™re driving towards. So, plan, measure and honestly the best two ways to measure stuff is through accounting and through Buildertrend.

With Buildertrend you can measure everything. You can measure cycle time, you can measure, obviously, all your job costs, you can measure everything. So, Iโ€™m a big advocate of using some of the features in Buildertrend like creating custom fields and then doing some reporting out of those custom fields and making sure your team is entering the right information. Thatโ€™s really, really, really helpful for a lot of builders. Itโ€™s easy to do. Itโ€™s really easy to do, and then adjust.

So, what do you do? What do you do if your accounting is telling you that your losing money on every house in neighborhood B, but neighborhood A youโ€™re making money on it. Well, your accounting will be able to tell you why. It could be a cost issue or it could be a revenue issue. And you can figure that out with the information, if you have the information. But then you have to adjust. Can you charge more for the house? No. Okay, how can I cut costs out of it? And if you canโ€™t do either of those, then it helps you make the decision. Well, how do we just get out of this profit altogether? And if you have the data to support it, itโ€™s an easier decision to make. I was going to say cerebral decision, but thatโ€™s just an awful word. Itโ€™s less emotional and more of an exercise of just look at the numbers.

Paul Wurth:

Yeah. I think every business probably goes through a point where they stop making gut decisions and start making data driven decisions. And that makes a business owner feel good because gut decisions are great, and itโ€™s an ego thing where if your gutโ€™s right itโ€™s great, I love that. But then when youโ€™re wrong, youโ€™re kicking yourself. So, those are three tips that I think anybody could use.

Tom Houghton:

So, Iโ€™m going to play the role of the outsider here. And the skeptics of the room are saying, all I hear is just more money. I got to spend money on accounting, I got to spend money on software, but all I see in front of me, if Iโ€™m playing the skeptic, right now Iโ€™m probably using a pen and paper, Iโ€™m using Excel. I donโ€™t even know how to start this climb up Mount Everest. What advice do you have for that person? And maybe you could speak to the benefit of course between the two.

Chris Anderson:

Yeah. It is tough in this industry, especially weโ€™re a little bit behind on the technology. I think thereโ€™s a lot of reasons for that. But a good place to start is simple, really simple, like a Google Calendar for instance. If youโ€™re always running wild, and you donโ€™t have a place to manage your own personal appointments, or even your own personal life, something as simple as a Google Calendar will help you stay organized. Does anybody use a pen and paper anymore for managing their business? I guess they do.

Paul Wurth:

85% of the construction market. Thatโ€™s true.

Tom Houghton:

We see a ton of stuff.

Chris Anderson:

I have a pen in my hand right now. And thereโ€™s a paper in front of me. So, thereโ€™s a time and a place for it but managing a $10 million construction company is not the time and place for a pen and paper.

Paul Wurth:

Another step they could make is just hit your website, right? Or hit our website.

Chris Anderson:

Yeah. Hit the Buildertrend website, get signed up with Buildertrend. And I talk to a lot of builders and a lot of remodelers, and theyโ€™ve signed up for Buildertrend. And what they try to do is implement all of it at once. And I tell them to start with something very simple. Letโ€™s start with just change orders. Letโ€™s figure out how to get your customers involved and get your change orders going through there. Or letโ€™s just start with collecting money from your clients through there. They love, and I tell people this, they love paying through your portal because they love shopping on Amazon.com, they want to pay online. They feel like itโ€™s secure, they feel confident, they can see their stuff. So, letโ€™s just start with that. Letโ€™s get that figured out and then weโ€™ll go on to the next thing.

And maybe the next thing is letโ€™s get your purchase order program put together. So, youโ€™re creating an agreement with your subcontractor, so thereโ€™s no surprises. And that hits point one before about planning. So, youโ€™re planning that this framer is going to charge you $15,000, and you guys are making an agreement on the purchase order that itโ€™s going to cost $15,000. So, when you get a bill for $16,000, you donโ€™t just pay it you ask questions.

So, maybe purchase orders is the next thing that weโ€™ll implement. And the Buildertrend team there you guys have a whole office complex full of experts on how to get builders spun up on using a purchase order.

Paul Wurth:

I think Iโ€™m going to hire Chris for our sales team.

Tom Houghton:

Shameless fun there.

Paul Wurth:

Heโ€™s going to consult our sales team. Itโ€™s nice. I think this industry, we talk about this in our marketing, this industry loves, for lack of a better term, testimonials. They really value somebody whoโ€™s actually done it. A builder, remodeler construction company, they value their opinion. So, when somebody like you, who has not only been in the industry, but then has used Buildertrend, I think itโ€™s powerful for people. Because there are skeptics out there, Iโ€™m a skeptic.

Tom Houghton:

I was playing the skeptic earlier.

Paul Wurth:

Youโ€™re a big skeptic. But especially in this industry, right? For all the points you made earlier Chris is, we havenโ€™t adapted technology yet. Maybe technology companies like us havenโ€™t done a great job of telling them why they should, thatโ€™s what we work on every day. But theyโ€™re skeptic and so, when they hear somebody go, this actually works, and you actually are going to get times X or X back for your return on your investment that makes sense to them.

I like the point you made earlier about how it could be jarring for a homeowner how non-technological construction is when they start to go pay or even understood โ€ฆ we talked about this before. In 2019, as a client, I can do everything online, and I trust that. But when I build a $600,000 home on a lake, Iโ€™m asked to cut checks, and I get paper invoices or requests right? I think itโ€™s jarring for them right?

Chris Anderson:

Yeah. People who buy $600,000 houses theyโ€™re used to using technology all day. People who buy million-dollar houses, they are used to using technology all day. Anybody who has the financial capacity and was fortunate enough to be able to build a new house and buy a new house not only are they using technology in their daily lives, but they expect it from anything they do. So, theyโ€™re used to it and just makes things easy for them. Anytime somebody sends me something like a PDF that I have to print off and then sign and like scan back in, youโ€™re not thinking about me. Youโ€™re not thinking about my needs. Youโ€™re thinking about whatโ€™s easy for you. And maybe this is easy for you because you donโ€™t have to learn some new piece of technology to figure out how to get a digital signature.

And I might be an extreme example of this, I know Iโ€™m a weirdo. I donโ€™t feel offended, but I feel like is this the best you can do? So, I think homebuilding clients now are expecting thatz, too. When youโ€™re doing things old school, and youโ€™re sending them paper, and youโ€™re asking for a check theyโ€™re like, is this the best you can do? And thatโ€™s just not a feeling that instills confidence in somebody whoโ€™s handing over their life savings.

Paul Wurth:

Exactly. It makes total sense. This is a plug because you will be coming to Omaha over the next couple of months, whenever your wife says itโ€™s good to leave town for a few days because you have a six-month-old. So, weโ€™ll have you come teach a class at Buildertrend University. We have one every month, and then weโ€™ll just talk about all this stuff.

Tom Houghton:

Thatโ€™s step one. Start with a plan.

Paul Wurth:

Plan. Weโ€™re going to go through all three of your tips to get you here.

Tom Houghton:

Exactly. Chris, you did a great job laying out some simple steps that we can follow. I think you made it very tangible for again, the skeptic looking at the mountain trying to figure out how do I get started with this. How do I take something that seems like itโ€™s just going to cost more money but then actually what we gain out of that is efficiency which is saving us money?

Chris Anderson:

And I always tell anybody who calls me this, Buildertrend has an amazing staff there, and you donโ€™t need me for much when it comes to Buildertrend. Iโ€™m able to connect those final dots, if you really want to get down and dirty with your accounting and make sure that works really, really nicely with Buildertrend. The Buildertrend people will get you 99% of the way there. In a lot of cases, a hundred percent of the way there. But if you want to discuss about it just a little bit more, and you want to get a little more reporting out of your accounting system, thatโ€™s connected to Buildertrend then we love that kind of work.

Paul Wurth:

Great. I think youโ€™re doing a great job and a great service for the industry. I think that we are trying to elevate the industry by what we do in some ways, and I think youโ€™re doing the same thing so, good on you.

Tom Houghton:

It takes a village.

Paul Wurth:

Yeah.

Tom Houghton:

All right. Thanks so much. Donโ€™t forget โ€ฆ

Paul Wurth:

The good on you was for the Australian and New Zealand clients listening.

Tom Houghton:

International podcast.

Paul Wurth:

You know that.

Tom Houghton:

So, thanks for laying all that out, thanks for sharing your expertise. We appreciated you coming on the show today, and we, of course, look forward to seeing you in Omaha later this year.

Chris Anderson:

Thank you.

Tom Houghton:

Make sure you check out our shownotes page. Also donโ€™t forget to subscribe and rate our podcast. Thanks so much for listening, and weโ€™ll see you next time on โ€œThe Building Code.โ€

Paul Wurth:

Appreciate you.

Chris Anderson | Monthend


Places You Can find us

Listen on Apple Podcasts
Available on Podbean
Listen on spotify

Get updates for The Building Code

Be the first to know when new episodes are released.

We think you’d also like this

Reporting on financials

blog | 1 min read

Dec 14, 2020

Using Buildertrend to Report on Financials: Webisode

Join us for our final financial series webisode to learn more about how Buildertrend reporting can help you keep your business on track. Contact our team today.

Read the blog
DMJ Restoration Masthead

case study

Sep 22, 2022

DMJ Restorations: How this builder saves up to five hours per week on financial management

How Buildertrendโ€™s Budget tool provides end-to-end tracking to keep this team in financial control.

Read more

podcast

Mar 2, 2021

How reporting with Buildertrend promotes financial success

Learn more about how reporting in Buildertrend allows you to quickly pull job costs and detailed budgets to help make financial decisions.

Listen to the podcast