This calculator vs. PaintScout
Two different shapes: PaintScout is an account-based platform for running a painting company's whole sales pipeline. This page is a free, private, no-account worksheet for one number — whether the price for one interior repaint, estimated by production rate per surface, actually clears your cost and margin.
What each tool is for
PaintScout is a cloud-based sales and estimating platform built specifically for painting contractors — it is not a generic construction or field-service tool. It is built around producing an on-site estimate in minutes from built-in production rates, turning that estimate into a proposal a customer can review and approve, and running the leads, quotes, change orders, and invoicing tied to those jobs through one account, used across every job a painting company sells, on an ongoing subscription. PaintScout's own site is not reachable from this session to confirm today's specific feature list, plan names, or pricing, so only its well-documented identity and category are stated here: nothing about it is invented, and no dollar figure for it appears on this page.
This calculator does none of that. It does not track a lead, send a proposal for a customer to approve online, or hold a record across jobs. It takes one interior repaint — each surface's quantity and your own timed production rate, an extra-coat factor, prep and setup hours, paint quantity from coverage and waste, payroll burden, overhead, and the margin you intend to keep — and turns that into the job price, the price per floor square foot, the effective hourly rate, and the walk-away number below which the job loses money, plus a printable customer proposal with a scope, deposit split, and price-held date. It runs free in any browser, keeps no account, and uploads nothing you type.
| Question | Where to answer it |
|---|---|
| I need to track leads, send customer-facing proposals for online approval, and run job costing across every repaint my company sells. | PaintScout, or a comparable painting business platform — running the whole pipeline is not something this calculator does. |
| Does the price for this one interior job actually clear my cost and target margin, once trim, doors, coats, prep, and overhead are counted correctly? | This calculator — free, instant, private, no account. |
| Why does a low, round per-floor-square-foot bid on this house lose money once trim and doors are counted? | This calculator's own per-square-foot walkthrough. |
| I need my whole sales team estimating and quoting from one shared account. | PaintScout — built as an ongoing, account-based platform for exactly that job. |
| Do I need to create an account or sign up to use the tool? | This calculator: no. PaintScout's tools are used through a paid account. |
Most painting contractors get different value from each: PaintScout (or a comparable platform) for running the company's whole sales-to-proposal pipeline as an ongoing account, and a private calculator like this one for an instant, no-login check on whether one interior repaint's price actually clears cost and margin before the bid goes out. This page's own figures are a pricing model, not a project record, a customer proposal sent through an account, or a coverage or substrate determination.
This tool needs no account and no sign-in: it is a static page, the arithmetic runs in your browser, and once it has loaded it keeps working with the connection off.
Common questions
Should I use this calculator or PaintScout?
They do different jobs. PaintScout is a painting-only sales and estimating platform used by painting contractors to build on-site estimates, send proposals a customer can approve, and run leads and jobs through one account as a business, on an ongoing subscription. This calculator does none of that. It takes one interior repaint's surfaces — walls, ceilings, trim, doors, windows — each divided by its own production rate, adds prep, setup, paint, payroll burden, overhead, and the margin you intend to keep, and turns that into the job price, the price per floor square foot, the effective hourly rate, and the walk-away price below which the job loses money, plus a printable customer proposal, instantly, in the browser, with no account and nothing uploaded. A painting company running leads, a sales team, and job records across every project it sells is better served by PaintScout or a comparable platform; a painter who wants an instant, private, correctly-estimated price for one job before a bid goes out is in the right place here.
Is this page affiliated with PaintScout?
No. This site is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by PaintScout. PaintScout is a trademark of its owner, named here only to describe what this calculator is and is not.
Open the Painting Bid Calculator to price your own interior repaint.