Asked Buildertrend for pricing? They said you're not their customer.
Filled out their quote form, picked "$0–$499K annual construction volume," and got back: "Buildertrend may not be the best fit for smaller businesses." That's not a sales objection you can negotiate around. That's their own funnel telling residential GCs and remodelers under $500K in volume to look elsewhere.
TruFeld is built for exactly that contractor. The 1–10 employee residential GC, the remodeler running $200K–$1M in volume, the specialty sub coordinating their own jobs. No subscription. No annual contract. No CPI escalator buried in the terms. Pay only when you generate an invoice.
The Buildertrend complaints small contractors keep raising
"10x more clicking than there needs to be."
Ryan B., co-owner of a 2–10 employee construction shop, wrote in his Capterra review: "The product user experience is absolutely awful. It's a hard product to learn how to use, and there is like 10x more clicking than there needs to be. Very frustrating to use on either desktop or mobile." He's not alone. Verified small-business reviews repeatedly cite UX complexity as the #1 problem — not "I don't understand software," but "this software makes me do too much for too little."
The mobile app was "almost unusable" in the field.
Dave R., manager with 2+ years of use: "The mobile app was almost unusable. It often crashed or refused to load and only offered limited features from the main software, so all our crew only used the app for the time clock feature. If we had to access the software in the field, we all just used the mobile web browser on our phones and loaded the full webpage." If you can't trust the mobile app on the jobsite, the workflow falls apart.
10–13 weeks of onboarding Zoom calls.
Buildertrend's marketing says "a few days." G2's own published averages say three months. Customer testimonials report 10–13 weeks of onboarding sessions, plus $400–$1,500 in onboarding fees. For a small shop where the owner is on the saw weekdays and in the office at night, three months is a lifetime to wait before you can send your first proposal through the new tool.
"My subs won't engage with it."
Douglas White, a small contractor at ~$190K annual volume, wrote on TrustRadius: "In my experience, it's near impossible to get subcontractor participation in the communications and scheduling. Few subcontractors or suppliers embraced the program, severely limiting the effectiveness." Even Buildertrend's own onboarding manager has publicly named the common sub objections: "Oh, we didn't see that" and "It didn't make sense to me."
"A burning tire hung around my neck."
Same Douglas White, after years of paying Buildertrend at small-contractor scale: "For the coming year the fees would have exceeded $17,000, far too much for a program with limited client, employee, and subcontractor appeal with as small a volume as I have. For the last year, I feel they've been a burning tire hung around my neck and I regret not cancelling them in early 2019. I'd have $10,000 more in my pocket and no significant negative impact."
Hidden pricing, auto-renewal, and no way out with your data
You can't see the price without giving them your phone number.
In 2026, Buildertrend removed all published pricing from buildertrend.com/pricing. The page is now a three-step quote form: builder type, annual construction volume, full contact info. Only after submission does pricing surface — and only via a sales rep. The last publicly known range was Essential ~$339/mo, Advanced ~$599/mo, Complete ~$829/mo (annual prepay). All numbers now custom-quoted.
Auto-renewal with up to 10% CPI escalator — in writing.
Pulled directly from Buildertrend's Terms & Conditions: "The then-current fees include a Consumer Price Index (CPI) increase of up to ten percent of the previous fees unless quoted otherwise by Buildertrend in writing." Subscriptions auto-renew. Cancellation requires three steps — email, form, verbal confirmation. No pro-rated refunds. A 2022 round of price hikes hit existing customers with 50–65% renewal increases that contractors still cite in forum threads today.
No bulk export. Your historical project data is hostage.
Buildertrend has publicly confirmed: "Buildertrend does not currently offer a bulk or Export All feature." Contractors report being forced to keep paying just to access years of files, photos, proposals, and customer information. One BBB reviewer wrote: "I've been forced to continue paying for a platform I'm no longer actively using simply because I need access to my historical project data." Cancelling cleanly isn't a feature Buildertrend offers.
TruFeld: built for the contractor Buildertrend doesn't want
Pay-per-use. No subscription. Stop using TruFeld, owe nothing.
TruFeld has no monthly fee, no annual contract, no minimum commitment. You pay a small 0.6% invoicing fee that starts at $5 per invoice and scales with your volume — never more than $50, even on a million-dollar invoice. Your first $33,000 invoiced is free with Pro. A slow quarter costs nothing. Our incentives are aligned with yours: we make money when you generate an invoice, which means we only make money when you're making money.
No CPI escalator. No three-step cancellation gauntlet.
There's no annual contract because there's no subscription. Nothing auto-renews because there's no recurring charge. You don't have to email anyone, fill out a form, or get on a verbal-confirmation call to leave. If TruFeld isn't right for you, stop using it — your account stays accessible, your data stays exportable, and we don't bill you again.
Your data stays yours. Native project export, always available.
Download a portable archive of your account at any time: projects, proposals, clients, vendors, payments, invoices, scope changes, schedule history, templates, catalog items, and settings. No "we don't currently offer that feature." No paying us to keep your own records accessible. Your data was always yours; we just make sure leaving doesn't take it from you.
Set up in under an hour. Send your first proposal tonight.
Sign up, configure your branding (logo, colors, the look your clients will see), connect Stripe for payments, and you're ready to send. Most contractors are up and running within 45 to 60 minutes — no demo call, no credit card to start, no $400–$1,500 onboarding fee, no three-month implementation timeline. Got a Buildertrend proposal you want to bring over? Upload it as a PDF and our AI converts it to an editable TruFeld proposal.
Built for the residential GC who's still on the saw.
Buildertrend's own funnel told you you're too small. TruFeld is built for the contractor who drives his own process — whether that's a solo operator, a remodeler running crews, or a specialty sub coordinating his own work. The interface assumes you're running the project, not feeding a system built for a 20-person office. Right-sized for residential remodel phasing — demo, rough-in, finish, punch list — without task-Gantt overhead you'll never use.
Client-raised punch list with verified/disputed sign-off.
Your client can raise issues themselves — not just through internal-staff tickets. Each issue moves through Open → In Progress → Resolved → Verified, with a full activity timeline (comments, status transitions, attachments). When the client marks an item Verified, that's signed-off sign-off. If they push back, it goes to Disputed with their note. Project completion is gated on outstanding issues being resolved or verified — no surprise punch lists landing after the final payment.
Per-clause client initials on every scope change.
In TruFeld, a scope change isn't just a billing line item. The detailed builder lets you mark specific clauses as required reading — pricing, schedule impact, exclusions — and your client has to initial each one before approving. The signed scope change updates the payment schedule automatically. When the final invoice lands, there's nothing to dispute — the client's initials are on the record.
On Buildertrend now? Bring your active projects with you.
TruFeld's 6-step project import wizard brings an active Buildertrend project into TruFeld without re-asking the client to sign anything. Upload the original signed contract (stays as the immutable record on the Files tab), set the milestones, capture payment history with original dates, optionally enable schedule tracking. Pair this with Buildertrend's no-bulk-export problem and the math is clean: TruFeld is the only way out of Buildertrend that doesn't cost you your historical records.
Buildertrend won't tell you what you'll pay. We will.
Buildertrend no longer publishes its pricing. To find out what you'll pay, you fill out a quote form, take a sales call, and negotiate. The last publicly known tiers were Essential ~$339/mo, Advanced ~$599/mo, Complete ~$829/mo — all on annual prepay. Add onboarding fees ($400–$1,500). Add 10% CPI renewal escalator. Add their own payment processor at 2.95% + $0.30/transaction (ACH capped at $15/transfer).
TruFeld's pricing is on the page. No calls, no demos, no surprises.
| Buildertrend | TruFeld Pro | |
|---|---|---|
| Platform cost (2yr) | $8,136–$19,896 (Essential–Complete, annual prepay) | $299 one-time |
| Onboarding fee | $400–$1,500 | $0 |
| Processing fees (2yr) | ~$5,722 | ~$280 |
| 2-year total | $14,258–$27,118 | $579 |
Frequently asked questions
I'm currently on Buildertrend with active projects. Can I switch without losing them?
Yes. TruFeld has a 6-step project import wizard built for this. Upload the original signed contract (it stays on the project's Files tab as an immutable record), set up the milestones, capture payment history with original dates, and the project is in TruFeld — without re-asking the client to sign anything. Critical context: Buildertrend confirmed publicly they don't offer bulk data export, so contractors leaving Buildertrend would otherwise have to start fresh or keep paying Buildertrend just to access historical records. TruFeld's import path closes that loop.
Buildertrend has scheduling, time tracking, and selections. Does TruFeld?
TruFeld has milestone-level scheduling — dates, hours, delays, actual-hours capture, configurable work days — fits residential remodel phasing (demo, rough-in, finish, punch list) without task-level Gantt overhead. TruFeld does not have GPS-based time tracking with payroll integration, or a Selections module for homeowner finish picks. If those are critical, you'd pair TruFeld with a dedicated tool for that piece. Most small residential GCs we talk to don't actually use Buildertrend's time tracking — they have a separate payroll system already.
Is TruFeld really this much cheaper, or am I missing something?
You're not missing anything. The price gap is real and the explanation is simple: TruFeld has no outside investors, no quarterly ROI targets baked into a subscription, no annual contracts to renew, and no sales team to feed. We make money when you generate an invoice — our incentives are aligned with yours. Buildertrend's pricing reflects their growth-stage business model; TruFeld's reflects ours.
Can my subs use TruFeld too?
Yes. TruFeld has Work Orders and RFQs Pro+ — formal contracting between you (the GC) and your subs. Send a work order with scope, line items, milestones, and payment terms; the sub accepts in their own PIN-gated portal (no account required); track milestone payments as money moves outside TruFeld. Work Orders can be created from scratch or copy-forward from an accepted RFQ. Both products handle sub coordination — TruFeld's is built on the same PIN-portal as the client side, so there's no separate auth or app for the sub to learn. (Starter gets a limited monthly preview.)
What if I want some of what Buildertrend does and TruFeld doesn't?
Most small residential GCs already use specialized tools alongside whatever their main project portal is — QuickBooks for accounting, a separate payroll system, sometimes a CRM. TruFeld is built to be the project portal in that stack — the layer that runs project delivery — not the all-in-one. If you specifically need the Buildertrend feature set (full Gantt scheduling with task dependencies, time tracking with GPS, Selections module, daily logs with weather and attendance, lead pipeline CRM), Buildertrend may genuinely be the better fit for your operation — and we'd rather tell you that than oversell.
Built for the contractor Buildertrend doesn't want.
Start free. Set up in under an hour. A project portal your clients (and your subs) can actually use — no subscription, no annual contract, no CPI escalator at renewal.
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