Handoff
Handoff is an AI teammate for residential contractors. It turns photos, plans, voice notes or a written scope into a localized estimate, then carries the job through proposals, scheduling, change orders, invoicing and payment.
What is Handoff?
Handoff is an AI-native construction platform built for residential contractors: remodelers, home builders, handymen and trade contractors. It is published by 1build, Inc., a Delaware corporation based in Austin, Texas. Its organizing idea is the AI Teammate, an always-on assistant that absorbs the paperwork side of a job rather than a piece of software you sit down and operate.
The work begins with the estimate. You describe a job in writing, dictate it on site, upload photos, or drop in a plan set, and Handoff returns an itemized estimate priced to the project's location. That pricing is the product's real substance. The company reports more than 100,000 completed estimates behind the model, over 60 million supplier SKUs tracked, cost data backed by Home Depot, Lowe's and other suppliers, and rates refreshed daily for every city in the United States, quoted by ZIP code rather than national averages.
Behind the takeoffs sits Handoff-H1, which the vendor describes as the first model purpose-built for autonomous construction takeoffs, combining computer vision trained on hundreds of thousands of blueprint pages with a construction knowledge base and a reconciliation layer. Handoff claims 93.5% material coverage and a full-scope takeoff in about 90 minutes. These are internal benchmarks, not independently published results.
From the estimate the platform carries the whole job: proposals with digital signatures, client and subcontractor portals, AI scheduling, daily logs, change orders, file management, time tracking with geofencing, milestone invoicing, card and ACH payments, and homeowner financing through Acorn Finance. A CRM sits in front of all of it, tracking leads and signalling the moment a client opens a proposal.
Handoff runs in any browser and as iOS and Android apps, both rated 4.8/5 on their stores. Upper tiers add a documented REST API with webhooks and an MCP connection that lets you drive the platform from Claude or ChatGPT. Zapier links it to more than 9,000 apps and QuickBooks Online syncs both ways. The vendor reports over 10,000 contractors on the platform.
What it does
- Build a priced, itemized construction estimate from a written scope, a voice note, job photos or a plan set
- Generate an automated takeoff from residential plans up to 5,000 sqft, with material and labor quantities extracted
- Turn an estimate into a branded proposal or scope of work and collect a digital signature
- Track leads, clients and job stages in a CRM that flags the moment a proposal is opened or approved
- Schedule crews and project phases, log daily site conditions and issue change orders as work shifts
- Invoice by milestone, take card or ACH payment, and offer homeowner financing through Acorn Finance
- Sync projects, estimates, invoices and contacts with an ERP or accounting system through the REST API, Zapier or QuickBooks Online
When to use Handoff / When not to
A quick filter to help you decide if Handoff is the right fit.
When to use Handoff
- Residential remodelers who lose evenings to estimating and want a same-day bid out before a competitor starts writing one
- Custom home builders who need material and labor quantities pulled straight from a plan set instead of measured by hand
- Trade contractors and handymen running without office staff, who need quotes, proposals and invoices to happen on their own
- Small contracting teams of two to five people that want CRM, scheduling, change orders and payments in one system rather than five
- US-based operations that bid across different cities and need pricing set by local labor and material rates rather than national averages
When not to use Handoff
- Commercial construction firms: the vendor states plainly that Handoff is not a Procore or Autodesk alternative
- Contractors outside the United States, since cost data and price localization cover US locations only
- Businesses looking for accounting or ERP software: Handoff syncs with QuickBooks Online but does not replace it
- Large general contractors and enterprise builders, along with subcontractor bid-management workflows, all named as out of scope
- Sole operators testing the water on a small budget, as there is no permanent free plan and entry pricing starts at USD 119 per month
How to use Handoff
A typical end-to-end flow, from setup to results.
- Start the 7-day free trial at app.handoff.ai; no credit card is requested and the first estimate is free
- Enter the project location so the system applies local labor and material rates
- Describe the job the way that suits the moment: type a scope, record a voice note on site, upload photos, or drop in a plan set
- Let the AI Teammate return an itemized estimate, then adjust it against your own presets for rates, services and markup rules
- Save your pricing catalog once so later estimates come out with your numbers already applied
- Convert the estimate in one click into a proposal, a scope of work or a material list
- Send it for digital signature and watch the CRM report when the client opens, views or approves it
- Run the job: schedule phases and crews, keep daily logs, raise change orders and share documents through the client portal
- Invoice by milestone, take card or ACH payment, and offer Acorn Finance to clients who need to spread the cost
- Connect the rest of your stack, with Zapier or QuickBooks during your onboarding call, or with the REST API and MCP if you are on Scale
Pros & Cons
Pros
- One system covers the whole job, from first lead through takeoff, estimate, proposal, schedule, change order and final payment
- Cost data is genuinely localized, priced by ZIP code against 60 million-plus supplier SKUs and refreshed daily
- A construction-specific model rather than a general-purpose assistant with a construction prompt bolted on
- Very permissive inputs: voice, photos, blueprints, PDFs, handwritten notes and spreadsheets all feed the estimate
- Credible on the job site, with iOS and Android apps both rated 4.8/5 and a browser version needing no install
- Human onboarding is included at every tier, with a dedicated Success Coach from Pro upwards and phone, chat and email support
- Card and ACH processing fees are passed to the homeowner rather than absorbed by the contractor
Cons
- Pro and Scale carry a 12-month commitment, and leaving early costs 50% of the remaining subscription fees, due immediately
- All subscription fees are non-refundable and no credit is issued for unused periods
- There is no permanent free plan, only a 7-day trial, and entry pricing of USD 119 per month is steep for a solo operator
- The features that most distinguish the product, AI Takeoffs, API access and the MCP connection, sit behind the Scale plan at USD 719 to 899 per month
- Audio recordings are used to train Handoff's models, with no documented way to opt out of that training
- Legal transparency is thin: no GDPR mention, no DPA, no subprocessor list, no hosting country and no published security certification
- Cost localization and takeoff coverage stop at the US border, and plans above 5,000 sqft are out of scope
Pricing & Plans
There is no permanent free plan. Handoff offers a 7-day free trial requiring no credit card, with the first estimate included at no charge. The lowest price point thereafter is the Flex plan at USD 119 per month billed annually, or USD 149 per month without the annual commitment. Pro is USD 239 per month annually and Scale USD 719 per month annually, both under a 12-month initial term. A Custom API tier is quoted on request. Payment processing fees are charged to the contractor's client rather than to the contractor.
- 50 AI usage credits per month
- 1 custom pricing catalog
- AI-generated proposals
- voice transcription to estimate
- mobile and desktop access
- 2 users included
- standard onboarding
- everything in Flex plus unlimited AI credits
- unlimited pricing catalogs
- client financing
- AI site walkthroughs
- 5 users included
- a dedicated Success Coach
- the AI Project Management suite
- time tracking
- everything in Pro plus AI Takeoffs on residential plans up to 5
- 000 sqft
- material and labor quantities extracted from plans
- proposal customization with branding and up to 5 estimate options
- the AI Subcontractor Portal
- and API and MCP access
- a custom API
- custom integrations
- advanced security
- an uptime SLA and security compliance
- arranged through the enterprise form or api@handoff.ai
Data, GDPR & hosting
A consolidated view of how Handoff handles your data.
GDPR overview
There is no GDPR content on this site at all. The words GDPR and General Data Protection Regulation appear nowhere across the thirteen pages collected, in visible text or in the underlying HTML. No Article 27 representative is named, no data processing agreement is offered or referenced, and no subprocessor list is published. The only privacy regime addressed by name is the California Consumer Privacy Act, which grants access, deletion and disclosure rights through support@handoff.ai. Generic rights of access, correction, deletion, restriction and consent withdrawal are announced without citing any law, and the policy notes they may be limited by local requirements. The policy does use GDPR-shaped language, promising to process personal data only on a lawful basis such as consent, contractual necessity or legitimate interests, but it never names the regulation. European buyers should treat GDPR posture as undocumented and ask directly.
Who owns the data?
The terms never state in general terms who owns customer content, and Handoff says it neither controls nor monitors what you enter. One category is settled explicitly, and not in the user's favour: using the voice-to-text feature grants Handoff the right to process and store your recordings, and the recordings together with any data derived from them are declared the sole property of Handoff. Responsibility for client data flows the other way. Contractors must obtain their homeowners' consent before entering their details, answer their access and deletion requests, and indemnify Handoff against any claim arising from a failure to do so. Handoff states it does not sell or rent personal information.
Reuse rights
Nothing in the terms restricts a contractor from reusing their own material. Estimates, proposals, scopes, material lists and invoices are produced to be sent to homeowners, and sharing them with clients is the intended workflow. Data can be pulled out again through the documented REST API, pushed both ways to QuickBooks Online, or moved through Zapier, and accounts can be deleted at any time from the product. Two limits apply. You may use the Services for your own business and may not resell them to a third party. And audio captured through voice-to-text is treated separately: Handoff keeps the recordings, sends them to Google's Speech to Text API and OpenAI's Whisper API for transcription, and uses them to train AI models it owns outright.
Data retention & training
Hosting summary
Handoff names no hosting country and no hosting region anywhere on its site. The privacy policy's security section commits only to SSL encryption in transit, access restricted to employees who need it, staff trained on privacy practices, and reasonable technical and organizational measures. Encryption at rest is not mentioned. Hosting providers appear as a category of vendor but are never named, and no subprocessor list is published. Targeted searches across the thirteen pages collected found no security certification of any kind, with SOC 2, ISO 27001, HIPAA and PCI DSS all absent; advanced security and security compliance appear only as selling points of the Custom API tier. The public site is served through Amazon CloudFront, but an edge node says nothing about where application data actually rests. What is certain is jurisdictional: the publisher is 1build, Inc., a Delaware corporation operating from Austin, and the terms are governed by Texas law with arbitration in Travis County. Buyers with data residency requirements should ask directly.
Where Handoff works
Country-level availability.
Available in
Things to keep in mind
Risks and trade-offs to weigh before adopting Handoff.
- The 12-month term on Pro and Scale bites hard if the tool does not fit: cancelling, downgrading or terminating early triggers a fee of 50% of the remaining fees, immediately payable, framed as liquidated damages rather than a penalty, with no refunds anywhere
- Using voice-to-text hands over more than a transcript: recordings and everything derived from them are declared Handoff's sole property and are used to train its models, with no documented opt-out and no stated hosting country
- Trusting the number without checking it is the quiet risk of any estimating AI; the vendor itself flags assumptions, missing information and plan clashes in its takeoff summaries, which is a signal to review rather than sign
- An estimator who stops estimating loses the feel for a job over time; the pricing knowledge that used to live in your head starts living in a subscription you may one day have to leave
- You carry the legal weight for your homeowners' data: the terms require you to obtain their consent, answer their access and deletion requests, and indemnify Handoff if you fall short
- Handoff can suspend or terminate access without notice and without liability, for any reason or for no reason, which is worth weighing before every active job runs through it
- Disputes go to individual arbitration in Travis County, Texas, under Texas law, with jury trial and class actions waived
Setup & Integrations
Technical difficulty
Low for everyday use. You sign up online, start estimating immediately and install nothing; the desktop version runs in a browser and mobile apps come from the App Store and Google Play. Expect real configuration time up front on pricing catalogs, rate and service presets, markup rules and team roles, but human onboarding is included at every tier, from standard on Flex to a dedicated Success Coach from Pro upwards, and Zapier setup is walked through on the onboarding call. The API and MCP connection are a different matter and need developers: HMAC-signed webhooks, idempotent writes, cursor pagination and amounts in integer cents.
Deployment
Apps stores
Integrations
Supported languages
Behind Handoff
Fundraising
Social
Resources
All the official URLs gathered for verification and reference.
Alternatives
Tools that compete with or complement Handoff.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a free version of Handoff?
Am I locked into a contract?
Where does the cost data come from and how current is it?
Does Handoff work outside the United States?
What files can the AI actually read?
Is my data used to train Handoff's AI?
How long is my data kept?
Is Handoff GDPR compliant?
Does Handoff offer an API, and what does it connect to?
Should you pick Handoff?
Handoff is a narrow tool, and that is its strength. It is not general construction software with an AI feature; it is a residential estimating engine wrapped in the rest of a contracting business. Much of its value sits in the cost database rather than the model: 60 million-plus supplier SKUs, rates refreshed daily and priced by ZIP code. That is also why the product effectively stops at the US border, where its pricing intelligence has nothing to say.
For a remodeler or small builder replacing four or five disconnected tools, the case is genuinely strong. The mobile apps are rated as highly as the web product, human onboarding is included at every tier, and processing fees land on the homeowner rather than the contractor. The company reports more than 10,000 contractors on the platform, with consistently high public review scores.
The commitment asked in return deserves attention before signing. Pro and Scale run on a 12-month term with a 50% early termination fee and no refunds, and the features that most distinguish Handoff, AI Takeoffs, API access and the MCP connection, sit only on the USD 719 to 899 per month Scale tier. Legal transparency is the weakest area: no GDPR mention anywhere, no data processing agreement, no subprocessor list, no stated hosting country and no published security certification. Voice recordings train models that the terms assign outright to Handoff, with no documented way to opt out.
The headline gains, extra weekly earnings, hours saved and win rates, are vendor claims without published methodology, as are the benchmark scores for the Handoff-H1 model. Take them as marketing. Judge the tool instead on the estimate it produces during the 7-day trial, and read the subscription terms before the trial ends.
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