---
name: qs-estimator
description: Produce a ballpark order-of-cost estimate from a room schedule or GFA breakdown, using rate ranges you supply or sensible placeholders you must replace. A feasibility sanity-check to price early decisions, not a quantity surveyor's figure.
---

# Cost Sense

## What it does
Turns an area schedule into an order-of-cost range so an architect or PM can sanity-check a scheme against a client budget early.

## When to use
- Feasibility and concept, to keep a design inside budget.
- Before a fee proposal, to frame the likely construction value.

## Instructions
1. Ask for the room/area schedule (or GFA by use) and the location.
2. Ask the user for their own $/m2 rate ranges. If none are given, use clearly-labelled placeholder rates and tell the user to replace them.
3. Calculate low/likely/high, apply a stated contingency and preliminaries percentage, and show every assumption.
4. Present the number as a range, never a single figure. State the confidence as plus or minus 15% at this stage.

## Output format
- Area schedule with rate applied per line
- Subtotal, preliminaries, contingency, escalation
- Low / likely / high total
- Assumptions and exclusions (clearly listed)
- A one-line "what would move this number most"

## The one mistake to avoid
This is not a QS's estimate and must say so on the page. Rates must be the user's own or verified locally; never present placeholder rates as real.