Facility Dynamics Engineering has created a database application for purposes of accurately estimating the costs of DDC systems. The application consists of multiple vendors list price information and third party providers of ancillary devices, sensors, actuators and valves. Systems and subsystems are built and control devices and components are assigned to the system. Detailed cost information associated with the various components is then provided. Additional information including wire length, the time needed to do individual tasks such as start-up, calibration and installation of each DDC component and device, and overall system operating software set-up is also included. Graphic page creation, trending set-up, report set-up, and configuration of the various system components are incorporated into these tasks. When combined, this level of detail allows us to sit down with a prospective DDC vendor with as much, and often more information than he/she typically prepares. We recently applied our cost estimating tool to a large project where the preliminary estimate provided by the sole source vendor was over $4 million. After preparing our detailed cost estimate, the final price was below $3 million.