Projects

Track income, expenses and profit for each job, property or client, from the first bid to the last payment.

What projects are for

A project gathers the money for one job, property or client, so you can see what it earned and what it cost over its whole life, not just this month. Choose Projects in the menu (on a phone browser, More, then Sales & jobs).

Projects is on Co-Pilot and Command. On Auto-Pilot the Projects page explains what it does, with See plans to change your plan.

Start a project

On Projects, choose + New Project.
Give it a name, such as 123 Maple Renovation. Two projects that are not closed cannot share a name.
Pick its status: Estimating, Pending or Open.
Add a description, address, start and end dates and a customer if you like. The customer list is the one in Sales.
If you have a budget, enter Est. revenue (what you expect to bill) and Est. expense (what you expect it to cost).
Choose Create project.

Everything but the name is optional, and you can change it later with Edit.

Project statuses

Estimating: Bid or quoted, not won yet.
Pending: Won, but work has not started.
Open: Work in progress.
Closed: Finished. Its totals are frozen.

The tabs above your projects filter by status, with a count on each: Active (everything not closed), Estimating, Pending, Open, Closed and All.

Put transactions on a project

A project counts the transactions you put on it. There are three ways:

On the project, choose Add. Tick the transactions that belong to it, then choose Add to put them on this project.
On Projects, choose Assign transactions. It lists your reviewed transactions that are not on a project yet, newest first, with a search by payee. Tick some (or Select page), choose Assign, and pick the project, or Create new project.
On Activity, open a transaction and pick its Project, or + Create new… to start one. To do several at once, tick them and choose Assign to project.

Personal transactions and transfers between your own accounts are not offered. A closed project takes no new transactions until you reopen it.

Remove a transaction from a project

Open the transaction, from the project’s Transactions list or from Activity, and set Project to None. The transaction stays in your books; it just no longer counts toward the project.

Read a project’s numbers

Income, Expenses and Net: The money on the project over its whole life. They follow the same rules as your Income Statement, so the two agree.
Profit: The margin so far: what is left of the income after expenses, as a share of the income.
Est. Revenue and Est. Cost: Your budget, when you entered one. Profit then also shows the target margin from your estimates.
% Complete: How much of the estimated cost you have spent. Past 100% it turns red and says over budget.

Below the figures you see the status, how many days the project has been active, how many transactions are on it, and the start and close dates.

A transaction counts once it is approved as a business transaction. One still waiting in Review appears in the project’s Transactions list but not in its totals yet. For a loan payment on a project, only the interest counts as an expense.

How Review works →

Invoices on a project

The Invoices box on a project lists the invoices you made for it, with what you have Billed, what has been Paid and what is Still owed. Drafts and void invoices are not counted as billed. Choose + New invoice to start one for this project and its customer.

When a bank deposit pays invoices that are all on this project, the deposit is put on the project for you, so the payment counts in its Income. A deposit that also paid invoices outside this project is left for you to put on a project yourself.

Match deposits to invoices →

Close or reopen a project

When the job is done, choose Close, then Close project. Its totals are frozen, so they stay the same even if you later change the category of a transaction on it. A closed project takes no new transactions or invoices.

Choose Reopen to undo that. The totals count live again, including any late transactions you put on it. If a project that is not closed now has the same name, rename one of them first.

Edit or delete a project

Choose Edit to change the name, status, details, customer or estimates, then Save changes. To finish a project, use Close rather than a status.

Delete removes the project for good. Its transactions stay in your books and are simply taken off it. Invoices made for it stay too, with no project.

Ask Cash

In chat, tell Cash something like "start a new project for the Riverside job" and Cash walks you through the name and customer. Ask "put my Home Depot charges from last week on a project" and Cash finds them and shows your projects to pick from.

During Review with Cash, finish the review first. Cash keeps that session to categorizing.

On the phone app

The phone app shows your projects, each one’s figures, and the transactions on it.