- Home / Home Improvement Ideas Videos / Free Home Remodeling Software For Mac Free Home Remodeling Software For Mac rHome August 30, 2016 Home Improvement Ideas Videos Leave a comment 19 Views.
- SmartDraw is the best floor planning tool for Mac for creating 2D floor plans quickly.
Here are some of the choices for the title of ‘best home design software for Mac’. They each have something unique to offer, and you can use them to come up with some beautiful designs and layouts for your home.
With the help of home design software meant specifically for Mac, you can create visuals of your dream home and plan out details and layouts that normally fall in the realm of architects. The advancements in technology have made it possible for us to carry out this work of designing a virtual house on a computer.
This Mac software is a 3D home designing and estimating software that has a very powerful 3D BIM and simplifies the building process. It can be used to reduce repetitive tasks, save time and money and also increase the quality of the building process. Each object can be tracked and a comprehensive material takeoff can be generated.
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Whether you are a professional home contractor, or someone who is looking for a suitable design for their home, you will find these tools very useful indeed. It will undoubtedly take some time to master the software, but after a while you will have all the power right at your fingertips. The qualities that the best software must have are ease of use, support and documentation, plenty of features and tools, and aesthetic appeal.
Google SketchUp 8
It is a preferred choice of many professionals, and it offers a long list of features. The ease of use is also excellent with 28 tutorial videos to guide you through. There are 5 basic modules for you to build a 3D model, and you can choose any model based on your needs. You can even feed real 2D photos or sketches to the program and add animation for better presentation. If you are pursuing this interest seriously, this is the right program for you.
Punch!
It’s an inexpensive program, but it is quite good for its cost. It provides you with multiple templates and modules to pick from, and you can change the view, and take a 3D tour any time you want. You even have the option of changing the flooring, wiring, paint, and kitchen cabinets. The interface is very simple to use due to the many tutorial videos and 444 page user’s guide. All these features make this software very simple to use, and anyone with basic computer knowledge can create some great designs with it.
Live Interior 3D Pro
This program does not have as many multipurpose formats like the above mentioned programs, but its interior designing formats are very extensive and effective. It will take some time to get used to the interface though, but once this is achieved, you will feel like a real professional. Real time 3D editing is just one of the many great features of this program, and there are hundreds of items in the object library that you can make use of. The lighting and other visual effects can be changed with ease, but you must remember that it’s ideal only for interior home designing.
3D Home Architect
It is perfect for beginners and for people who have no experience with software and architecture. The videos and user manual definitely help in guiding one through, but one can be left dissatisfied. The interface is elementary to say the least, and it is ideally suited for sketching and drawing purposes only. In spite of this, it is a good platform for a novice to start with.
Other software reviews that you should be on the lookout for are as follows.
- AutoCAD Freestyle
- AutoDesk HomeStyler
- BeLight Live Interior 3D Mac Edition
- Better Homes and Gardens Home Designer Suite
- Chief Architect Home Designer Suite 9.0
- IMSI TurboFLOORPLAN Home and Landscape Pro
- IMSI TurboFLOORPLAN Instant Architect
- Live Interior 3D
- MacDraft Pro
These applications are very useful home improvement tools, and you will absolutely love playing with them on your Mac.
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Performing accurate cost estimating is critical to the success of your construction business. Estimate too high and you win fewer jobs, too low and your profits disappear. That’s why it’s so important to get it right the first time.
Estimating by hand is time-consuming, so at some point, you may consider using software to bid more jobs in less time. Although software can be a big investment, not every tool has to break the bank.
In this guide, we highlight five free and open source estimating and takeoff products to try if you’re considering this type of solution for your construction business. We chose products that offer a stand-alone free or open source version, meet our definition for construction estimating software, and rank highly in search. (Learn more about how we chose featured products here.)
Here’s what we’ll cover:
- Free construction estimating and takeoff software
- Open source construction estimating and takeoff software
Free construction estimating and takeoff software
In most cases (but not all), free construction estimating and takeoff software options earn revenue by offering a basic free version to entice users to download, with premium features available for a price.
As a result, you should note that the free version of the products listed below may not have all the features you need.
Easy-Pro Builders Estimator
N/A
No reviews yet
Overview: This is a 100% free tool that is based entirely on the Apache OpenOffice spreadsheet program Calc. It has two dozen worksheets that report back to a summary page in order to provide updated estimates.
Easy-Pro Builders Estimator was created by a construction manager who wanted to serve smaller construction firms looking for an accurate and simple program that was free.
The software also comes with a 20-page manual so you can get up to speed on how the program works and you’re not simply left in the dark to figure it out yourself.
Some features include:
- Adjustable taxation rates depending on which country you are in
- Client unbilled reporting
- Printable project reports
- Compatible with Windows, Linux
- 24 trade worksheets available
Estimator 2.0
5.0/5
1 review
Overview: Estimator 2.0 is aimed at architects, builders, engineers, and construction companies that want to create detailed estimates for residential and commercial buildings. Estimator 2.0 allows users to prepare tenders, a cost abstract, purchase orders, and other documents needed for a proper estimation.
The free program lets you create an estimation and then print it out, ideal for those who are pressed for time and want to quickly make an estimation without having to spend a lot of money on premier software.
Estimator lets construction companies create estimates for a host of construction projects, including concrete structures, earth work, masonry, plastering, and more.
Some features include:
- An extensive tutorial for new users
- Quickly generate an estimate and then print it out
- Prepares tenders, cost abstracts, and purchase orders
- Compatibility with Windows
STACK Takeoff & Estimating Software
4.46/5
950+ reviews
Overview: STACK offers free construction software aimed at firms looking to streamline the bid process and accurately estimate materials, equipment, and labor. The software also provides access to an “extensive library of prebuilt, industry-specific material libraries,” according to its website. It generates an estimate based on your input of how much of each material will be needed and what labor, equipment, and overhead will be involved.
The software is cloud-based and therefore can be accessed from anywhere there is an internet connection. It is also compatible with all types of platforms, from smartphones to desktop computers.
STACK also includes training with the software for free. A full-featured version is available for purchase.
Some features include:
- Ability to upload digital plans
- Takeoff tools that provide shortcuts for measurements, making it quicker to produce a takeoff
- Prebuilt reports to provide insights to inform your estimates
- Cloud-based
- Free training
Open source construction estimating and takeoff software
Open source construction estimating and takeoff platforms are also free, but they have an additional wrinkle: the original source code is available. There are some benefits and drawbacks to this you should be aware of.
The benefits are that in addition to being free, you will be able to customize and adapt the software to fit your individual business.
The drawback comes up if you don’t have the know-how to mess with original source code. Lack of technical ability could become a problem if the software needs improvement down the road to fit your firm.
2-plan Team Software
Free House Plan Software For Mac
4.50/5
5 reviews
Overview: 2-plan Team is a project management platform geared toward construction firms, and among its three PM tools is an open-source desktop system that can be used for multiple projects and teams. It is mostly meant for managing the entirety of a construction project as opposed to just estimating and takeoff, but there are tools available for that purpose as well.
The source code for 2-plan Team has been published at SourceForge, where you can download it for free. It can be installed on any LAMP (Linux, Apache, MySQL-4 or higher, PHP-5.1) server, and it may work on some Windows servers.
Some features include:
- Manage virtual teams with shared online workspaces
- View the status of multiple projects at the same time with the Project Dashboard
- Tracks time on mobile devices
- Ability to share estimates and budgets with clients, partners, teams, and staff
- Ability to manage teams via mobile devices
Free Home Building Software For Mac
ESTIMATE
N/A
No reviews yet
Overview: ESTIMATE is a cloud-based, open-source option that has been released under GNU Affero General Public License. It’s a community-support project, which means the source code is freely available to anyone who wants to customize it for their own construction firm—ideal for construction managers with a little coding know-how.
ESTIMATE aims to be a simple and fast tool that can be adapted to any firm’s size.
Some features include:
- Ability to archive projects and documents for reference
- Can have up to 200 users
- Can create reports in PDF, complete with tables and charts
- A centralized database for backup
Why you must also consider paid solutions
Free and open source estimating software is a great stepping stone for many small construction firms—especially those using software for the first time. But as job volume increases, paid software often becomes the better choice.
Why? Higher job volume and company growth means more people, processes, and training are necessary to estimate and complete projects. Paid software offers more “out-of-the-box” functionality than free software, as well as training, support, and integration with other critical applications, such as accounting and construction management software.
Fortunately, there are affordable estimating and takeoff products that also offer free trials. With a free trial, you can try before you buy and avoid purchasing a product your team won’t like.
You’ll get more functionality
When you opt for free and open source platforms, you get what you pay for a lot of the time. There are a lot of special features that can really take your business to the next level—like customized reports and detailed time tracking—that you may not get with a free option. So while you may save a few bucks on software, you’re spending a lot more in lost savings and opportunities.
The software will be more usable
Free and open source platforms can also be a lot more challenging for an organization to use. You’ll have to do your own troubleshooting and maintenance, and you may have a hard time just learning the software with no help.
To help ensure your software search is sufficiently thorough, download this list of top-rated paid software systems and their offerings:
3 Best Construction Estimating and Takeoff Systems Backed by User Reviews
Download this guide to see top construction estimating and takeoff systems based on real user reviews.
How we chose featured products
For the purposes of this article, we classified a product as free if it offers a free, stand-alone version of the software, and it is not just a trial version of the software that requires you to purchase it after a period of time.
The products that met the above criteria were then evaluated against our construction estimating software definition: Construction estimating software helps estimators calculate material and labor costs for a job and then produce a detailed, professional bid proposal from those estimates. Specialized estimating tools are often used to handle trade-specific requirements, such as electrical, HVAC, plumbing, or earthworks/excavating estimating.
We determined the most popular products to feature by choosing those highest ranked in Google search results for “free construction estimating software” during the week of Aug. 5, 2019.