AI answering service for contractors

The estimate you should never have driven to

Every builder has made this trip: forty minutes each way to a kitchen that turns out to be a homeowner collecting three numbers for a project with no drawings, no permit and no budget behind it. The call that produced that trip lasted ninety seconds and asked nothing at all.

handlo asks the things that separate a real build from a browse — what stage the project has reached, whether drawings exist, whether anyone has already been out to look, and what range the caller has in mind. None of it sounds rude from an assistant asking on your behalf, and all of it is attached to the lead before you decide whether Saturday is worth spending.

What builders say when they first hear about it

• “Homeowners will not give a budget over the phone.” Many will not, and that refusal is itself information — recorded as declined rather than as zero. The ones who do name a range are usually the ones already committed.
• “My best work comes from referrals, not the phone.” Referrals still call. They call once, usually while you are on site with a saw running, and they rarely call twice.
• “I need photos before I can judge anything.” So it asks for them, gives the caller somewhere to send them, and attaches that to the lead instead of leaving it to a follow-up call you have to remember.
• “Change orders have to be in writing anyway.” They do — which is why a phoned change request becomes a timestamped written record naming the build, the change and who asked for it, rather than a hallway conversation nobody logged.

Where it stops

• It does not estimate. No square-foot number, no sense of what a remodel “usually” runs to.
• It does not commit a start date or a crew. It records the date the caller wants and leaves scheduling to you.
• It does not approve a change order. It captures the request; an approval has money attached and stays a human decision.

Working with the way jobs already run

Builders rarely want another system to log into. handlo answers the phone and puts the result where you already look.

• Leads arrive with stage, drawings status and budget as separate fields, ready to paste into whatever you bid from.
• Live-build calls can route to a different recipient than new inquiries, so the project manager sees change requests while you see bids.
• Supplier and subcontractor messages come through in the same seconds-after-the-call window, so a slipped delivery reaches you before a crew turns up to wait.