Construction Reports: Project Profitability

Project profitability continually shifts as budgets get revised, costs accumulate, and billing catches up. The Project Profitability (PM658100) generic inquiry form helps you analyze revenue and costs as of any date, and evaluate financial performance with precision.

Viewing Date-Specific Project Profitability

On the Project Profitability (PM658100) generic inquiry form, you can view date-specific project profitability. By default, it lists all projects with the Active or Completed status, but you can select a specific project to see only its data.

To get started:

  1. Before using the form for the first time, recalculate project balances to ensure that the budget and related amounts are up to date.
  2. Select the date in the Through Date box.
  3. Optional: Specify the project in the Project box; you’ll see a single row with its details. (If you leave the box empty, you’ll see one row for each project.)

Understanding a Project's Health as of a Date

Suppose that your company is a self-performing contractor building a hotel. The project started in February 2025, and now it's early May. As the new project manager, you want to assess the project's financial health as of the end of April. Several factors may have affected profitability since the project went live—such as a revised budget, changes in actual costs or billing, and overbilling or underbilling.

Suppose that you’ve already recalculated project balances. On the Project Profitability (PM658100) form, you select the project and a date of 4/30/2025, and the table shows a row with its details. You can quickly review the project’s description, owner, start and end dates as well as original, revised, and to-date key financial metrics. All amounts (except the original ones) adjust dynamically based on your selected date.

Profitability snapshot as of April 30, 2025:

  • The revised margin (25.53%) is slightly lower than the original one (25.65%).
  • The actual costs to date ($1,195,194) far exceed the profit to date ($156,305).
  • The margin to date (11.57%) significantly trails the revised one (25.53%).

You open the project on the Projects (PM301000) form and find $830,000 in costs recorded in March. Reviewing the pro forma invoices reveals an underbilling of $207,500 in March’s pro forma invoice. You correct the pro forma invoice and return to the Project Profitability form. Now the current project's profitability has improved—no other issues to tackle at this time.