About
The South African construction toolkit.
A set-out is the first physical act on site — pegs in the ground, lines transferred from the drawing to the dirt. It’s where a project either starts right or quietly starts wrong. That’s the idea behind Setout: get the numbers and the contract right before the concrete goes down.
Setout is a free toolkit for South African contractors, quantity surveyors and anyone pricing or running building work. It brings together the things you reach for when a tender or a project is in front of you:
- Calculators
Building cost, concrete, brick, paint, roofing, rebar, bond and tender pricing — each with its formula shown.
- Cost data
What it costs to build per m², across twelve cities and eight building types, with the method behind each figure.
- Contract Assistant
Common questions on NEC3, JBCC, GCC and FIDIC, answered plainly.
- Tender tools
A Bill of Quantities pricer and compliance document generators.
How we work
- Every number shows its working
- Each calculator prints its formula and its assumptions. Each cost estimate shows the method and the source. If you can't see how a figure was reached, you can't trust it on a tender — so we show it.
- Sourced, not invented
- Cost rates are calibrated to the AECOM property & construction cost guide and provincial data; transfer duty follows the SARS brackets; rate benchmarks draw on published South African data. Sources are cited on the page.
- Free, no sign-up
- The calculators, cost data, contract answers and tender tools are free to use and need no account. Email capture is opt-in, for updates only.
- Guidance, not advice
- The contract answers are general guidance on how the standard forms work — not legal advice, and no substitute for the contract and its amendments on your project. The estimates are planning-stage figures, not quotes.
Who is behind it
Setout is written and reviewed by Aidan Koetaan MBA PMP, a Bloemfontein quantity surveyor and construction project manager with more than thirteen years in the built environment. That work has covered mining, commercial buildings, rail and capital projects in higher education, on both the estimating side and the contract-administration side. The tools reflect that mix: the cost data and calculators come from estimating practice, and the contract answers and template packs come from administering construction contracts on live projects.
How the figures are kept current
The building-cost model is built on the 2025/26 edition of its source cost guide, and the date of its last update is printed on every cost page. Material rates are checked monthly against live supplier listings, and the result is published as The Rate Sheet, with the workbook available to subscribers. Transfer duty follows the SARS brackets for the current tax year, and the calculator states which year it uses.
If a figure looks wrong for your area or your type of work, say so. Send the number, the source you are comparing it with, and the location through the contact page. Each correction is checked against the source and, where it holds up, made on the page.
What Setout is not
It is not a substitute for a quantity surveyor’s estimate on a specific project, an engineer’s design, or legal advice on a contract dispute. A rate per square metre cannot see your ground conditions or your specification, and a general answer on a contract clause cannot see your amendments. Use the tools to get oriented, to check a number you have been given, or to prepare for a conversation with your professional team, and bring in that team before you commit money.
Beyond the free tools
For teams who want more than the calculators, Setout also offers editable contract administration template packs — drafting and administration starters that work alongside the official NEC3, JBCC, GCC and FIDIC contracts. Setout doesn’t sell the contracts themselves; those come from their publishers.