I’m setting up quick books for new small custom woodworking business. I’m wanting to build high end furniture and home furinshings of my on designs; later on I hope to have a line of furniture and only produce a limited amount of pices a year. I’m 58 years old and work form a small shop, about 1,200 sf and don’t want to grow to where i have to rent a commerical building and hire 10 empolyees and all the headaches. One or two helper is all I have space for. My quick book’s question should I set up for manufactoring or would contruction be a good choice since each job will be different? I’ve work for 9 years as a finish carpenter for a high end remolding company and have very limited knowledge of there accounting set.
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Replies
Both of my businesses are set up in quickbooks pro under construction. The estimating portion allows you to easily change quotes as designs change without starting over, and invoices can be billed in stages, showing payments, etc..... if you get into larger projects where down payments are involved. All of the accounting sub categories are the same for either, unless you custom enter new ones, (which would be available under either category).
Hope this helps.
Jeff
I also use QB pro. I think I started with the Construction template but then I modified it heavily from there. I actually WAY over complicated it. I also remodel and tried to track spending and profits on various types of work. I never used the data and it just complicated things. I use the QB payroll module for my helpers. It is pretty easy to use.
Some mistakes I made early on......
Relied too much on the Item list. I had an Item for 2x4s and for caulk and for 100s of other things. Now I only have about 20 Items I use. 4 different labor rates, General materials, Cabinetry (as a group Item), Installation, Finnishing, etc....
I had no luck finding any decient advice from the profesionals (CPA, Tax people, accountants) They tend to know only about their part of the equasion.
Putting off entering reciepts/ payments
There are more but that will hopefully help.
Pardon my spelling,
Mike
Make sure that your next project is beyond your skill and requires tools you don't have. You won't regret it.
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