13-week construction cash flow forecasting

Construction cash flow forecasting projects the timing of cash in and out of a contractor’s business using real pay-application, retainage, and payables data. It shows when receivables should convert to cash and when payables come due, so a contractor sees funding gaps before they happen. In construction it is uniquely hard because of retention, progress billing, and 60 to 90 day payment cycles.

A 13-week forecast is a rolling, week-by-week projection of your cash position for the next quarter. Thirteen weeks is the construction-finance standard because it is far enough out to act on a shortfall, chase a receivable, or move money, and short enough that the numbers stay accurate. Buildalytic rebuilds it automatically as billings and payments post.

It learns from history. Each general contractor and owner has a real payment pattern that rarely matches the contract terms, and Buildalytic times each open receivable by how that specific payer has actually paid you before. A GC drifting from 45 days to 60 surfaces with a name, so the forecast reflects when cash will really land.

A stated forecast assumes every receivable pays on its terms. A risk-weighted forecast adjusts each one by its collection probability and the payer’s actual history, so a slow or disputed receivable is discounted. Buildalytic shows both side by side, so you can see the gap between what you are owed and what will realistically clear.

Retainage withholds a percentage of each payment, measured at 7.59 percent on private work in the ASA and Clemson University study (Bausman, 2004), until near the end of the job. Buildalytic tracks retainage held per job and lands each release as an inflow on its trigger date, tied to substantial completion, so held cash is planned for rather than treated as current.

Pay-when-paid is a contract clause tying a GC’s obligation to pay a subcontractor to the GC first being paid by the owner. It pushes owner delay down onto the sub, which is exactly why a sub’s forecast has to model when each GC actually pays rather than the nominal terms. Buildalytic builds that reality into the timing.

No. Cash flow forecasting is a visibility layer, not a bank. It forecasts the timing and tracks the status of each payment in and out, but the money moves through your existing bank and ERP. It tells you how much to move and when, and you move it. Invoice financing is not part of this product.

Many contractors keep operating cash in a money-market fund and sweep it into the operating account before a check run, by hand. Because Buildalytic forecasts the week and amount cash runs tight, it tells you how much to move and when, so payroll clears and checks do not bounce. It advises the move; it does not execute it.

Some vendors offer a discount for early payment, such as two percent for paying in ten days instead of thirty. Buildalytic flags those opportunities in the forecast and shows whether cash allows capturing them, so AP is paid on strategy: using your full terms when cash is tight and taking discounts when it is not.

It connects to the construction ERP you already run, such as Viewpoint Vista, Sage 300 CRE, Foundation, CMiC, Sage Intacct, or Acumatica, and pulls AR, AP, retainage, and project data live. There are no CSV exports or stale snapshots, so the forecast reflects what has actually been billed and paid.

A spreadsheet forecast is a snapshot that is stale the day after it is built, assumes contract-term payment dates, and takes hours to redo. Buildalytic updates continuously from live ERP data, times receivables by real payer behavior, weights them by collection risk, and flags gaps automatically.

No. Your accounting or ERP system stays the ledger and the source of truth. Buildalytic reads from it to build the forecast and track payment status, and layers the forward view and the levers on top, which is the operational cash view a general ledger was never designed to give you.