RSMeans Data Online Reviews

I like that it has just about everything you would need to price out for all types of construction.

Sometimes as an estimator you use your own template and you use RS-Means as a resource for costs and product descriptions. The software doesn't allow to right click copy and paste text feature so I have to jump through alot of hoops to export the estimate in Means to an Excel report and then copy and paste from there.

I use the interior painting, drywall and finishes items the most. RS Means can streamline my estimate and i am confident in my quotes.

Items are difficult to find...say I need a rust inhibitor for metal painting...try finding that item???

Depth of the cost data is impressive.
Ability to "modify" and customize into "assemblies" is powerful.
Software keeps a "running tab".

Customization seems very proprietary and cumbersome.
Experience is required to learn the language and "assignments" of materials to categories and assemblies.
Pricing adjustments seem to require being in Excel at which point, that specific work is not "saved" to the program.

I used the software for maintenance purposes. It shows repair, replacement, and preventative maintenance frequencies of the items, material cost, and manhour need.

sometimes I couldn't find what I need in the maintenance section. The construction section includes lots of items but I can't say the same thing for the maintenance section. Also, in the software, we can see component details of the items (for example, if it is a door repair item, details show change hinges, replace lockset, etc.). However, there is no option to export this information on an excel file. In addition, the units are imperial. A simple converter can be implemented so that people can switch to the metric unit system.

ease of use on line just wish you could split windows to make sure and looking at estimate easer.

need to fix mixing unit and assembly cost to do a completed preproposal. also would like to see my custom data base of my special items, this way its quick to see my custom date items to make search easer and to mod.

Great data, excellent product database, great Square Foot model, I have the full blown professional version which comes with unit prices, assembly prices and square foot models for all types of buildings for all divisions for all locations throughout the USA. By zip code, you can set the labor type - union or open shop ...

Too costly - I paid $$$$ for the full blown version and it is missing some components. Such as LED light fixtures SF costs. Columns are hard to adjust. The layout of the website is not user friendly. To create a SF Model is not user friendly at first. It needs to be more intuitive, and easier to follow. The first thing you have to do is name the project in order to generate any kind of data out of the SF model - well the Name Cell is way down the bottom of the web page - and not up near the top - so if you select the type of building you want and size etc -- it will not generate a SF model .... I have been using RS Means for over 10 years - I started using it in 2004 and they had CD versions then they came out with one license agreements for a server type version - then it was named Costworks - I truly loved the CD version of RS Means Costworks - The best part of having CD is if you lose internet you are not out of business like I was the other week!!! For over 8 hours I had no power in my house therefore no internet and using a Hot Spot does not do the trick when you are searching a database with over 30,000 items....

The database of materials and labor is second to none in my opinion and I like that the program includes the square foot estimator and life cycle cost tools.

The ease of use when developing estimates and square foot models is lacking, and could use some revisions to allow for more functionality. It would be nice if in the square foot model you could adjust the quantity without having to swap an assembly, and it would be good to also have the ability to delete multiple line items at a time when revising the model to best fit the building application. Additionally, it would be helpful if you could define more of the characteristics of a building (i.e. wall construction vs finish, roof construction, roof material, window type, etc.). Within the estimate area it would be helpful if all of the different sections (CSI format, Uniformat for Commercial New Construction, and Uniformat for Facilities Maintenance and Repair) all exported with the same columns and data. Most of my clients like to have their data in a specific format that is not RSMeans export so creating a template is difficult and can be time consuming.

The software provides a logic means to address common construction practice and pricing to generate preliminary construction cost estimates and a consistent format that can be presented to clients in detail or summary formats

Certain fields appear to be missing logical data, such as industrial piping, or plumbing, that one would expect to be included in the data base. Additionally, the report formats can be difficult. It is often easiest to export directly to excel and then edit everything in Microsoft than to try and customize within RS Means.

updated costs by region - you have quarterly updates

Does not have a substantial SF cost database that would be helpful in ROM estimates
Does not have all the items we encounter on federal construction jobs

The almost limitless options for features of work and different tasks

Some of the profit margins seem a bit low.

It makes my estimating easier and faster. It would be impossible to estimate a project without RS Means. Its also gives me an advantage to check subcontractors quotes. In addition, I can bid projects in different areas around the country, which has open vast business opportunities in the construction industry that I would not be able to accomplish before I had the program.

I wish program had virtual "Cortana" like Microsoft. Sometimes I need to find an item and I don't know how to ask RS Means what the item is and all I get for a response is that there is no line item. Also, I wish they had more items to chose from and good example is ceramic tile such as: 12" x 24", 18" x 18", 24" x 24". These items are becoming more prevelent. RSMeans needs to keep up with HGTV as items are changing with the times.

Overall, its interface is user friendly for the most part.

Its several lag on load time when scrolling. That the database lacks almost anything that is specialty or modern technology. Pricing is a joke at best and forces me to struggle with almost every proposal (FYI, I have been using this product since it was just a book). The annual cost increases are always a sticker shock. I understand as a product grows in popularity and comprehensiveness that there is a need for cost increase for the logistics of it alone, but the price increases seem to jump by leaps and bounds. This can be very hard to encumber, especially when used for a contract that is not as lucrative but requires your software.

Organization of the estimating items based on the Masterformat.
Comprehensive list of the estimating items.
Ability to verify estimates using the crew listing and the crew production rates.

Some estimating items should be available in both the commercial and heavy civil products, but it is only available in the commercial offer.

This software is the foundation for my entire business offering. It is a highly regarded cost database in almost every industry. The ability to understand impacts of geographic location and timing are unprecedented in the software industry. The full range of the offering by RS means online is a very important standardization across multiple sectors. I highly recommend the software to any company or person that is responsible for cost management activities in their business.

There are no negatives to the software. It takes a while to truly understand how do you manipulate the data sequence but again it is without any constructive defect.

We use RSMeans a lot for the purpose of completing cost reasonableness reviews for change orders and other construction costs. The software works very well for this purpose and we feel like we get reliable data to base our decision making process on.

Sometimes when estimating RSMeans software can be difficult to used simply because materials or assemblies aren't defined in the same way they are commonly referred to in the industry. For instance there should be an assembly for a NFPA 13R fire sprinkler system.

Frequent database updates and ease of use.

The biggest issue is the lack of ability to modify user accounts in bulk. It takes me 5 minutes to delete a single user license. I need to add and delete up to 60 users every 6 months. It takes me days to add and delete these users to our organization account. This is a major issue for us. We also hope that RS Means will recognize the value of customers like Roger Williams University’s Construction Management Program as an academic/educational user. We train and graduate 40-50 construction management professionals every year and have been teaching them RS Means in multiple courses. As a leading construction management education provider we receive free educational licenses for almost all of our specialized software packages. That is not the case for RS Means. Thanks to CSR we have been getting a discounted set of licenses over multiple years. However, if it was not for him personally advocating for us, it seems unlikely that the remaining team at RS Means would support such access for us.

The software has different levels of estimating (square foot estimate at early phase of project during feasibility study, assembly estimate during schematic phase and unit price for detailed estimate). Ease to use, and exporting report to MSExcel.

It is all in imperial units (inches, feet, square foot etc..). There is no feature in the software to convert imperial unit to metric unit and the user must have an option to either work in imperial unit or metric unit. All construction drawing in Canada are in metric unit. Second, if someone works in imperial unit and generates a report, there must a feature in software to easily convert the result or report to metric unit. Third,there must be a feature in the software that enable the user to integrate the online cost data to AutoCAD, Revit, MSProject, Primavera Project Planner P6, Primavera Risk Management and other construction management software etc...

1) I like that we can tweak the individual components within the SF model.

2) I like being able to take an existing model I've created in past years and update it with current (or whatever year is relevant) costs to create an estimate for a different year version.

1) Historically, the cost of this tool has skyrocketed much faster than inflation every year.

2) Sometimes we make square foot models and the output doesn’t include costs for what I would assume are key parts of the building. We’ve had issues in the past with roof structure not being a part of the model but recently I generated a model that didn’t have costs for interior partitions, even though it most definitely should have. Is there a way for them to tell us which models exclude certain costs? Sometimes these are difficult to catch in our reviews.

Its accuracy across the US, both current and historic data.

Wish it was easier to search for specific data. Occassionally requires rewording topic multiple times.

The access to all the trades and the ability to match items to specifications has been a great help. also being able to retrieve old proposals and have them update quickly

I also have the JOC software from RS Means which no one at RS Means seams to understand and they have tied my passwords to the same account but if I am locked out of one I can not get in the other one.
Then all the tech know how to fix this is delete all your cookies. these are place markers for other programs and be cause of the failed IT side of this it makes it hard to accept it as a leader.

the scope of the cost items is very extensive. The wage rates are very good and the crews are excellent

they should have versions for Power Plants, Refineries, Mining and Metals and other large types of projects. They should also design it so that there would be a industry standard type of estimate report.

Means used to have a Spanish language version. They should continue with this version.

Wide selection of items ... recognizing that it is impossible to have every item included, the software developer tries to have a broad range of common sense construction items covered

Not much to dislike. For some of my needs for taking data from the software and putting it into the client required format, the cut-and-paste attempts are blocked or do not function.

The ease of using and the quaterly updates.

Obvously everthing is not in the data base. So I may have to estimate and get close to use a line item.

Ability to line item choose from all RS Means disciplines we subscribe to. Ability to customize our output reports. RS Means have the majority of the systems that we need to provide accurate budgetary estimates.

I administer our RS Means account, but I very, very seldom use it myself. As the account admin, I am forced to be one of the user accounts; therefore, I have to allow staff to log on with my e-mail and password to use the online cost estimating. We have determined that we do not need more than two simultaneous accounts and our preference would be to assign the licenses to who needs them, when they need them. I can do that with the non-admin license, but not with the one assigned to me. I’d prefer not to have staff logging on as me (administrator).

I liked the ease of picking up the software functionality for gathering reasonable quotes for new and renovations to buildings, streets and treatment plants.

At times I found that the software was lacking in overall speed when loading requested search items. I was able to minimize this issue by refining my search request as best I could but for new users attempting to compare all items of a requested search it will slow down RS Means, and you would have to wait until the system loads the various items. This was mainly an issue when I had over 700 results for a single search.