Build an early estimate before every product has been selected. Use the Preliminary Budget to plan item costs, additional costs, and design fees, then compare those estimates against actual product costs as you begin sourcing and making selections. Budgets are available on the Core Plus plan. They aren't available on Core or on legacy plans (Solo, Studio, Firm, Enterprise, Spec Lite, Spec Pro).
Set Up Your Budget
Create a project using Quick Start or Manual Setup.
If you plan to start with a budget, use Manual Setup. This lets you enter a client budget, markup, shipping percentage, and tax percentage during project creation. These fields are optional, and any values you enter will automatically populate your Budget when you set it up.
In your project, select Budgets, then Set Up Your Budget.
If you entered a client budget during project setup, it will already appear here. To change it, click the amount. If you have not entered one, select Set Total Client Budget. Enter the amount and press Enter to save.
Add Your First Estimate
Open Items in the upper-right dropdown menu to start building your estimate.
2. Select New Row, then Blank row.
3. Enter the item name and assign its Area. Item Code, Schedule, and Type are optional.
4. Enter your estimated designer cost, quantity, and markup, as applicable. If you set a markup when you created the project, it fills in on every new item. Markup is optional. Leave it at zero if you'd rather add one total markup later.
5. Review the extended client price before adding the next item.
Note: If the product already exists on your Product Board, choose New Row, then Import from Product Board. Select the existing item in the import dialog and choose Add Items. In the Preliminary Budget, your estimate stays as you entered it. Changes to the product's name or price on the Product Board don't update the estimate. Once you move to the Working Budget, the item's Working values come from the product.
Review Your Estimate
Use Display Options to review your estimate by Areas, Schedules or Types. Each view shows the item costs allocated to those groups. Entering a group budget target does not add that amount to your Preliminary Total.
Review Additional Costs and Design Fees, including any values carried over from project setup, before comparing the Preliminary Total with your Total Client Budget.
Additional Costs starts with Sales Tax and Freight rows set from your project defaults as a percentage of items, so Gather calculates them from the items you add. You can also add them yourself or change the rate.
In Design Fees, the Product Markup row is view-only. It adds up the markup on your items. To add your own markup, add a new row, choose Product Markup, and enter a lump sum or a percentage of your items. See Add Design Fees to Your Budget.
What Happens Next
Keep refining the Preliminary Budget until you are ready to move into product selection and active pricing. Moving to Working preserves a Preliminary Snapshot and is a one-way step. Review Move from Preliminary to Working Budget before advancing.
Troubleshooting
Problem | What to check |
Budgets is missing | Ask the workspace owner to confirm whether Budgets is enabled for this project. |
You can view but cannot edit | Ask the workspace owner to check your role. |
Remaining is blank | Check whether a target has been set for that group. |
Your estimate looks unexpectedly high | Review quantity, markup, and existing Additional Costs before adding more rows. |
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