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Implementation and Update of Budgets

Concepts for Budgets

The concept of a budget exists in two forms in HomeBuilder. Neither is mandatory, both or either one may be used. When and why, you use them, is in the opinion of the financial controller and/or owner.

  • Estimates. These are typically an initial stab at a budget and are entered at the Cost Detail level e.g., Framing cost 30k.
  • Budgets are one level more detailed than estimates and typically built up from the Vendor Contracts e.g., Framing Lumber cost 10k, Framing Labor cost 20k.

How to Enter Estimates and Budgets

Estimates

  • Enter these on each Model in the “Estimated Amount” field in the Model Budget Page.
  • These initial estimates are pushed to the Lot when the Model is added (Model does not need to be sited) on the Lot and are viewed by clicking on the “Budgets” button on the righ hand side cues (the Infopane).
  • These estimates can be changed on each Lot in the “Estimated Amount" in the Lot Budget page.
  • Estimates are not available in the Lot Planning Lines (they are commonly more summarized than this level).

Budgets:

  • Budgets show themselves as the “Total Cost” in the Lot Planning Lines and as “Planned Cost Amount” in the Lot Budget page.
  • Note that Lot Planning Lines are most commonly created when the Model is “sited” on the Lot.
  • Enter budgets in one of four places:
    • Vendor Contracts (preferred) and accessed from the Phase.
    • Phase Items - for any item with a cost basis of “Universal”.
    • Model Items - for any item with a case basis of “Model/HA” (HA = House Area).
    • Directly in Planning Lines.
  • If you enter a Vendor Contract, it will automatically and immediately update the Phase and/or Model Planning Lines.
  • You must push any Vendor Contract price changes to any Lots that have already been sited – do this from the Phase – Phase Items Page – action "Push to Lots" or from the Vendor Contract page (feature added March 2022).

Purchase Control

By default, the Purchase Invoice will not allow a purchase invoice to be posted if it exceeds either the estimate or the budget. You have four choices to allow purchases to be posted:

  • Go back to the Lot Budget or Planning Lines, increase the cost, and try again. This is the most common option for a payables clerk
  • Add the “User Permission Set” of “EXCEED BUDGET” to the user. This is the most common option for a controller or a CFO.
  • Go back to the Lot Budget or Planning Lines, add a new line, and split the purchase lines up to match the new budget – note this option is not normally selected as people rarely report on overages after the fact.
  • Turn off the control for overage.
    • You can turn off one or both controls in the HomeBuilder Setup page.
  • If you receive an error that states a Cost Detail code but no Task number, this is the Estimate – turn this off using the “Allow Budget Overage”.
  • If you receive an error that includes a Task number, this is the Planning Budget – turn this off using the “Allow Planning Overage”.
    • To locate any of the two functions mentioned above, search HomeBuilder Setup, then on the budgeting FastTab find toggles “Allow Budget Overage” and “Allow Planning Overage”.
Note

You will need to have the “User Permission Set” of “EXCEED BUDGET” to allow a purchase invoice line to exceed a Planning Line budget or Estimate.

  • To access, search Users, then select the User to adjust and click on it to bring up the User Card. On the User Card, find User Permission Sets FastTab, find User Functional Roles, and add Exceed Budget Role.