Milwaukee, WI
SIDING ESTIMATING.

## Siding Estimating in Milwaukee Moves Fast — Your Bids Need to Keep Up Milwaukee's housing stock is aging. The city has tens of thousands of pre-1960 homes in neighborhoods like Bay View, Walker's Point, and the North Side, most of them wrapped in original wood or early vinyl that needs replacement. When a homeowner calls for a quote, they're calling three other siding contractors the same afternoon. If your estimate takes three days to produce, you're already out. Estimate.Pro cuts the time from walkthrough to sendable bid down to 8 minutes. --- ## What Makes Siding Estimating Different in Milwaukee **Freeze-thaw cycles demand a material conversation.** Milwaukee averages around 40 freeze-thaw cycles per year. Fiber cement, insulated vinyl, and engineered wood all perform differently in that environment, and the material choice changes your cost structure significantly. Your estimate needs to reflect that — not just square footage times a flat rate. **Lap siding on historic stock adds complexity.** A significant portion of Milwaukee's older housing stock has multiple layers of existing siding, sometimes including original wood clapboard under aluminum or vinyl. Tear-off labor estimates need to account for that. Estimate.Pro lets you build and save those labor line items in your material cost workspace so you're not recalculating them for every job. **Wisconsin requires a Home Improvement Contractor (HIC) registration** for residential work over $1,000. Siding jobs almost always clear that threshold. Your estimates should include your HIC number on the document — Estimate.Pro's output fields support that. **Permit requirements vary by municipality.** In the City of Milwaukee, siding replacement that alters the building envelope or adds sheathing typically requires a building permit. Budget an average of $150–$300 for a standard residential siding permit with the City of Milwaukee Building Inspection Division. If you're working in suburbs like Wauwatosa, Greenfield, or Oak Creek, confirm their specific requirements — they each administer permits independently. --- ## How Estimate.Pro Works for Siding Contractors You walk the job. You open the app. You measure walls using AR on supported devices — the ONNX-assisted live measurement runs directly on your phone, no cellular connection required. Gables, dormers, bump-outs — you log them in the field, not later at a desk. For rooflines and angles where AR isn't practical, you photograph the facade. Photo measurements are marked as estimates in the output so your client knows what's measured vs. approximated. That transparency builds trust before the job starts. The app generates a scope-of-work automatically: wall area, substrate condition notes, trim linear footage, estimated tear-off, waste factor. You review, adjust, and price against your saved material costs. Labor rates pull from your workspace, not from a national average that doesn't reflect Milwaukee wages. You send the bid. The whole cycle runs in about 8 minutes on a job you've walked before. New construction or complex Victorian profiles take longer, but the structure is already built for you. --- ## Pricing That Fits Crew Size Solo siding contractors running one or two crews can start on the **Free tier** — no credit card, no expiration. If you're processing payments through the platform, the Free tier carries a 3% platform fee via Stripe Connect. Move to **Pro at $39/seat/month** and that fee drops to 0%. You also get invoice exports your accountant can actually use. **Elite at $79/seat/month** adds full Stripe Connect workflows and advanced invoice exports. Running a larger Milwaukee operation with multiple estimators? **Crew at $399/month flat** covers unlimited seats. No per-seat math when you're scaling. --- ## Built for the Trades, Not for Software Teams Estimate.Pro supports 25 trades. Siding is one of them — not a workaround using a generic construction template. The line items, the waste calculations, the trim categories: they're built for how siding contractors actually price work. Milwaukee has real competition in the siding market. Established regional contractors, franchise operations, and newer entrants are all chasing the same aging housing stock. The contractors winning the bids are the ones who show up with a professional, detailed estimate the same day as the walkthrough. That's what Estimate.Pro is built to do.