Start a new job

Three walkthroughs: a build from day one, a build you inherit mid-flight, and getting your people onto it.

A job that hasn’t broken ground is the easy case, because BLT watches the whole thing from the first load of fill.

1. Start it An empty portfolio offers Start one, which opens a screen asking what you need to get done. Choose Set up my build.
2. Name it Type it the way you’d say it out loud. Whatever you type becomes both the job name and the address, so use the version you’d text someone.
3. Load the budget A CSV — phase names down one column, dollars down another. It’s parsed in your browser and shown back to you before anything saves. Anything it couldn’t read, you type in, then confirm. This sets phase-level totals only; it won’t invent line items you never typed.
4. Read the benchmark The moment the budget lands it’s compared against the cost library and you’re told which phases look light, heavy or normal, and whether you’ve left yourself contingency. Worth thirty seconds — it’s the one moment the software might know something you don’t.
5. Set a target finish Every later slippage number measures against this.
6. Open the job Once there’s a budget and a finish date, the job opens onto its spine.

Pick up a job in progress

Most jobs arrive already running — walls up, subs engaged, money spent. The temptation is to back-fill everything so the record looks complete. Don’t. It’s hours of typing and it tells you nothing.

The goal is a truthful starting line, fast, and then let it run forward properly.

1. Create it the same way Name, budget CSV, target finish — but use the budget you’re working to today, not the original.
2. Tell the spine where you are Open the Build panel. For every phase genuinely finished, press Mark this phase done. For anything partly done, Set a % and add a one-line note. Ten minutes, not an afternoon. Your number always beats the software’s guess — that’s by design.
3. Don’t back-fill photos or hours Start the photo record from today. The page will happily show a job that begins at drywall. What matters is whether the next six weeks get captured well.
4. Log what’s already committed In Subs, add the subs you’ve engaged and what you awarded them. In Materials, add anything on order that hasn’t landed. This is the part that pays off immediately — it’s what makes the money real.
5. Then work it forward From here it behaves like any other job. The only difference is where the line starts.

A job that’s honest about starting at drywall is far more useful than one faked back to day one.

Get your crew on

Everyone on a job needs their own account — hours, photos and receipts are all attributed to a person, and a shared login makes all of it meaningless.

1. They install the app — BLT, from the App Store.
2. They sign in with their own mobile number and get a six-digit code by text.
3. They enter the six-character join code for your job, and they’re on.

Roles run owner, manager, foreman, crew and sub. Owners and managers see everything in the company and can bring people in; everyone else sees the jobs they’ve been added to. Nobody can invite someone at a higher rank than themselves.