What is the best construction CRM for contractors?

How these were ranked

Five questions, in the order a contractor usually runs into them:

• When you win the work, does the lead become a job in the same system, or does somebody copy it across?
• Can you see the price before you talk to sales?
• What does it cost for five people — an estimator, a PM, the office and the owners?
• How do leads get in and get chased: web forms, email, follow-up reminders, pipeline reports?
• What does it take to start: contract length, minimum users, setup fees?

The first question carries the most weight. For a contractor with one or two people selling, the cost of a CRM is rarely the subscription. It is the hours spent re-entering a customer, a scope and a number into the estimating and job system after the contract is signed, and the mistakes that come with it.

Seven tools. Buildr and JobNimbus come up often in answers to this question and are not here, because their pricing pages would not open in the browser we verify with on the day this was written, and we do not rank a tool whose price we could not read ourselves. How the job systems on this list compare beyond the CRM is covered in the best construction management software for small contractors.

The ranking at a glance

1. JobTread: leads and jobs in one place

JobTread’s own help documentation describes its CRM as a one-stop shop for customers, contacts, leads and job-related information in JobTread, and it can take leads straight from a public web form on your website. That is the whole case for ranking it first: the lead and the job live in the same system, not in two systems joined by a spreadsheet. JobTread help: CRM

Price: $199 a month including one internal user, plus $20 each for users 2 to 10, then $15, $10 and $5 in higher bands. Five users is $279 a month, or $223 on annual billing. Customer and vendor portal users are unlimited. Implementation, training and support are free, with no contract and no setup fee. JobTread pricing

What it does not do as well: the bill rises with every internal user you add. JobTread pricing

2. Contractor Foreman: the cheapest CRM that is attached to the job

On Contractor Foreman’s own plan comparison, Opportunities start on the Standard plan ($105 a month, up to three users), and the Leads Manager and Bid Management start on Plus ($166 a month, up to eight users), all on annual billing. Estimates are on every plan. Leads, bids and the jobs they turn into sit in the same system. Contractor Foreman plans

Price for five users: Plus, at $166 a month billed annually or $206 quarterly. There is no month-to-month plan. Contractor Foreman plans

What it does not do as well: the Basic plan has no opportunities, leads manager or bid management, so the $49 headline is not the CRM. And a year up front is the price of the lowest rate. Contractor Foreman plans

3. WorkHoist: the deepest pipeline of the all-in-ones

WorkHoist starts at the lead. The CRM and sales pipeline are on every plan, you can run more than one pipeline, and when a lead is won it hands off to a new project that stays linked to the lead. The pipeline reports win rate, average days to close, conversion by stage, which lead sources actually close, and which deals have gone stale. Email syncs with Gmail and Outlook, so correspondence with a customer shows against their contact.

Price: $399 a month for up to 20 users, $999 for 20 to 75. No per-user fees and no setup fee. Month to month, or 15% off paid annually, with a 14-day free trial.

What it does not do: there is no web form to catch leads from your own website, and no email marketing or campaigns, which Buildertrend has. For five people WorkHoist is $399 a month against $279 for JobTread and $166 for Contractor Foreman on annual billing. JobTread pricing Contractor Foreman plans

4. Buildertrend: CRM plus email marketing, price on request

Buildertrend’s CRM covers lead management with four ways to add leads, converting sales to active jobs, and built-in email marketing to automate campaigns to leads. Buildertrend CRM

Price: not published. Its pricing FAQ says pricing is tailored to your business. Users are unlimited, paying annually up front takes 10% off, and its own comparison table lists payment options as annual or quarterly. Buildertrend pricing Buildertrend pricing guide

5. Followup CRM: the specialist for commercial bids

Followup CRM is a sales CRM built for contractors — its own words are “built for the way contractors sell” — aimed at specialty subcontractors tracking bids and following up on them. Followup CRM pricing

Price: Starter is $99 per user a month paid annually or $119 paid monthly, Professional $149 or $179, both with a five-user minimum and an annual commitment. Enterprise is a $4,000 monthly platform fee plus $125 a user. On top of the subscription, a one-time launch fee covers onboarding, data migration and training: $2,500 on Starter, $5,000 on Professional. There is a 30-day money-back guarantee. Followup CRM pricing

So five users on Starter is $495 to $595 a month plus $2,500 to start — more than any all-in-one above for the CRM alone. It is a sales CRM: check what it connects to before you assume your estimates and jobs will follow a won bid across. Followup CRM pricing

6. Pipeline CRM: a cheap sales pipeline

Pipeline CRM is a general sales CRM that sells a construction and contractors solution. Every plan includes pipeline management, contact management and deal and activity reporting. Start is $25 per user a month on annual billing or $29 monthly; Develop $33 or $39; Grow $49 or $59. Enterprise is custom, and the 14-day trial runs on Grow. Pipeline CRM pricing

7. HubSpot: free to start

HubSpot’s free CRM is free with no expiration date for up to two users and 1,000 contacts. It is a general CRM, not a construction one, and more advanced features sit in paid editions. HubSpot

Where WorkHoist helps, and where it does not

WorkHoist is third on this list. It is ahead on pipeline depth: several pipelines, a won lead that becomes a project, conversion and lead-source reporting, and email synced to the customer record, on every plan.

Questions contractors ask

What is the best CRM for a construction company?

For most contractors with a crew of 5 to 50, the best construction CRM is one built into the same system as estimates and jobs, so a won lead becomes a job without being re-entered. As of September 2026, JobTread does this at $199 a month plus a per-user charge (five users is $279 a month), Contractor Foreman includes a leads manager and bid management from its $166-a-month Plus plan on annual billing, and WorkHoist includes a full sales pipeline on every plan at $399 a month for up to 20 users. Commercial subcontractors with a dedicated sales team may prefer a specialist sales CRM such as Followup CRM.

How much does a construction CRM cost?

For five users, published prices in September 2026 run from free (HubSpot, but only up to two users) and $125 a month (Pipeline CRM Start, annual billing) to $595 a month plus a $2,500 launch fee (Followup CRM Starter, paid monthly). Construction job systems with a CRM included cost $166 a month (Contractor Foreman Plus, annual), $279 (JobTread, monthly) and $399 (WorkHoist, monthly). Buildertrend does not publish a price.

Is there a free CRM for contractors?

HubSpot’s free CRM is free with no expiration date for up to two users and 1,000 contacts. It is a general CRM rather than a construction one. For more than two users or construction features, the lowest published price for a construction system with a leads manager is Contractor Foreman Plus at $166 a month on annual billing.

Do I need a separate CRM if I already have construction management software?

Usually not. JobTread, Contractor Foreman, Buildertrend and WorkHoist all include lead and sales tools in the same system as the jobs. A separate sales CRM such as Followup CRM or Pipeline CRM makes sense mainly for a commercial subcontractor with a dedicated sales team, where bid tracking and follow-up reporting matter more than the handoff to the job.

What should a construction CRM do?

At minimum: capture leads from your website and phone, track each lead through the stages of your sales process, remind you to follow up, report on which lead sources and stages win work, and turn a won lead into a job in your estimating and job system without re-typing it. Email that syncs to the customer record and a record of every bid you lost, and why, are the next most useful.

Where does WorkHoist rank, and why not first?

WorkHoist ranks third of seven in this comparison. It has the deepest sales pipeline of the construction all-in-ones compared — several pipelines, won leads that become projects, conversion and lead-source reporting, and Gmail and Outlook email sync on every plan. It ranks behind JobTread and Contractor Foreman because both cost less for a five-person office, and JobTread can capture leads from a web form on your site, which WorkHoist cannot. WorkHoist also has no email marketing or campaigns.