Bookkeeping for roofers built around QuickBooks job costing, retainage tracking, and real job-level margins — delivered remotely from India at 60% less than US specialists. Serving roofing and restoration contractors across all 50 states, from $600/mo.
If even three of these hit home, your books are costing you real money on every roof you put up.
Your P&L lumps everything together. The Henderson reroof and the Maple Commons storm job sit in the same bucket — and you have no idea which paid for which.
Generals hold back 10%. Months go by. Nobody is tracking what's owed, who has it, or when to invoice for it. Five figures sit forgotten on someone else's balance sheet.
Your CPA emails in March asking for "the books." You spend three weekends digging through receipts. The bill is bigger than you planned for, every single year.
They categorize Lowe's runs as "office supplies." They don't understand AIA billing, percent complete, or why a $9,000 ridge cap order matters. You spend hours explaining every month.
Materials are up, labor is up, fuel is up. You think your margins are still 25% — but without job costing, "think" is doing all the work. The honest answer is: you don't know.
You're booking $2M in revenue and stressing about payroll. Something is off — but the books are 60 days behind and nobody can tell you what.
No retail. No restaurants. No "we also handle dentists." Just roofing and restoration contractors, using QuickBooks Online, every single day.
Every dollar tagged to a job in QuickBooks Online. Materials, labor, subs, equipment, overhead. You see profit per roof, every month.
A dedicated retainage receivable account, an aging report, and a monthly chase list. Nothing slips through. Nothing is forgotten.
Percent complete, billings, costs, over/under billing, per job. The report your bonding agent and lender have been asking for.
Pay applications prepped, reviewed, and tied back to QuickBooks Online so revenue recognition stays clean across every draw.
A purpose-built COA — direct costs, indirect costs, equipment, COGS — so your reports actually answer the questions you ask them.
Books closed by the 10th. Reconciled, tied, documented. Your CPA logs in, finds what they need, and bills you a fraction of what they used to.
Roofing job costing is the practice of tracking every dollar of revenue and every dollar of expense against a specific roof project, so you know the true profit on each job. Done right inside QuickBooks Online, it captures materials, labor, subcontractors, equipment, permits, and an allocation of overhead at the job level — which is what lets a roofing contractor compare estimated cost to actual cost, identify margin leaks, and price the next bid with confidence.
No long contracts. No lock-in. You can cancel any time.
We hop on a call, look at your current QuickBooks Online file, and tell you — directly — where the profit leaks are. Zero pitch. Zero pressure.
We rebuild your chart of accounts, reconcile every month back to opening balance, back-code jobs, and hand you a job-costed P&L. One flat fee.
Books closed by the 10th. Job P&L, WIP schedule, retainage report, cash flow forecast. Slack & email for questions. Month-end calls on request.
JobCostBooks costs $600–$1,800/month, compared to $3,500–$5,000/month for US-based roofing accounting specialists.
| Feature | JobCostBooks | Bench.co | Local bookkeeper | US specialist |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Monthly price | $600 – $1,800 | $299 | $400 – $800 | $3,500 – $5,000 |
| Roofing specialization | ✓ Roofing only | ✗ | ~ Generalist | ✓ |
| Job-level P&L | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Retainage tracking | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| Monthly WIP schedule | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| AIA billing support | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | ✓ |
| QuickBooks Online native | ✓ | Proprietary | ✓ | ✓ |
| Transparent pricing | ✓ | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ |
| $10K profit-leak guarantee | ✓ | ✗ | ✗ | ✗ |
No setup fees beyond cleanup. No annual contracts. Cancel any time.
Solo operators under $1M revenue.
2–8 crews, $1M–$3M revenue.
8+ crews, $3M–$5M revenue.
If we don't find at least $10,000 in hidden profit leaks in your first 90 days, your first month is free — no questions asked. Applies to all three plans.
"They found $14,200 in unbilled retainage in the first month. That paid for the entire year. Our WIP report is now something I actually look at every Monday."
"We were with Bench for two years and had no idea our commercial jobs were the only thing keeping us alive. JobCostBooks rebuilt our QuickBooks in 9 days and now I can see margin per crew."
"My CPA literally called me to ask who did my books. First time he's said that. I'm paying a third of what the specialist down the street quoted and getting better reporting."
JobCostBooks is a remote bookkeeping firm dedicated entirely to US roofing, restoration, and real estate contractors. We work inside QuickBooks Online (a product of Intuit Inc., with which we are not affiliated) and apply construction-specific conventions — job costing, retainage receivable accounts, AIA billing, and WIP schedules — that generalist bookkeepers rarely touch.
The firm takes on a maximum of five new assessments per week so every contractor gets a senior bookkeeper, not a junior reviewer. Our team is based in India and serves clients across all 50 states, which is how we deliver specialist-grade reporting at 60–70% below US specialist pricing.
Short, direct answers. If yours isn't here, email hello@jobcostbooks.com.
Tactical reading for roofing operators. Job costing, retainage, QuickBooks Online — written by the bookkeepers who do it every day.
A complete walkthrough — chart of accounts, customer:job hierarchy, item lists, and the reports that finally tell you which jobs made money.
Set up a retainage receivable account, age your held-back dollars, and chase what's owed. With a downloadable monthly worksheet.
A construction P&L is not a generic income statement. Here's the line-item layout we use for every roofing client, with samples.
Pick a time that works. We'll review your QuickBooks Online file live, point out the biggest leaks, and leave you with a one-page action list. No pitch.