Comparison
Wave vs Rebuild: The AI Restoration Estimating Comparison
Rebuild asks for your historical estimates to train their AI. Wave ships ready to work. An operator's honest look at pricing, contracts, and training data.
Rebuild wants your price list. Wave brings its own.
Rebuild is an AI estimating startup that onboards customers by asking for their historical estimates, scope preferences, and pricing logic so their AI can learn how you write estimates. Wave is a restoration estimating tool built by a restoration operator, with a proprietary price database that works the moment you sign up. No training library required. No contract minimums. No demo gate.
If you have ever been asked to hand over your company's pricing data to a software startup before you could even try their product, this comparison is written for you.
Note from the author: Written in April 2026. This comparison is based on information publicly available online and firsthand experiences from Wave customers who evaluated Rebuild before choosing Wave. Everything stated about Rebuild's product, pricing, or workflow is either directly sourced from their public materials, their founder's public statements, or operator reports we have collected and framed as such. Rebuild may change their product, pricing, or onboarding process over time.
The core claim
Both Wave and Rebuild are AI estimating tools. Both promise to cut cycle time. Both say "write an estimate in minutes." The real comparison is not whose AI is smarter. It is who built the product, what they need from you to make it work, and what you get out the other end.
Rebuild's founder came out of a New York venture studio that incubates AI startups across multiple industries. His dad owns a restoration company, which is how Rebuild got its first customer and its initial training data. That is the origin story by the founder's own public telling. The founder has not worked in the field as a restoration operator. His restoration exposure is a family connection.
Wave was built by Albert Aguilera, a licensed general contractor with thousands of hours on job sites, including catastrophe storm deployments. Wave is the product of years of writing restoration estimates in the field, across water, fire, mold, and CAT-level losses. Every design decision reflects what actually happens on a job, because the person building it has been on the job.
If you want a restoration tool built by someone whose family is in restoration, Rebuild is the option. If you want a restoration tool built by someone who has stood in flooded buildings writing estimates himself, Wave is the option.
The training data question
This is the part of the Rebuild model most operators do not see until they are in the onboarding call.
According to public statements from Rebuild's founder in a 2026 interview, Rebuild's onboarding process asks each customer to provide a library of their historical estimates and scope preferences. Rebuild's team then customizes their AI for that account based on how the customer likes to estimate, what they like to see in every room, and their pricing preferences.
Read that again. Their AI does not arrive knowing how restoration estimates should look. It learns how YOU think restoration estimates should look, based on the estimate library you upload during onboarding. The founder has also publicly stated that Rebuild's original model was trained on data from a single restoration company run by a family member. The product has always learned from operator data, because that is how it was built from day one.
What this means in practice: your pricing logic, your line-item preferences, your scope patterns, and the accumulated knowledge of how your senior estimator writes estimates become inputs to a product that other operators also use. You pay them. You give them your data. They use it to build a product they sell to other people.
Wave does not work that way. Wave ships with a proprietary curated restoration price database maintained by our team, updated regularly, with regional adjustments built in. You do not bring your own pricing library to make the product work. You do not upload your historical estimates. You do not train Wave on how you like to estimate. Wave was already trained on IICRC drying science, industry-standard restoration scope patterns, and regional pricing before you ever signed up. You get the full benefit of the AI on your first estimate.
One of these approaches takes your competitive advantage and uses it as training data. The other arrives ready to work.
At a glance
| Wave | Rebuild | |
|---|---|---|
| Built by | A licensed general contractor with CAT storm and thousands of hours of job site experience | A software founder out of a NYC venture studio, family connection to restoration |
| Try before you buy | Free trial, 3 estimates, no credit card, no call required | Demo required, no self-serve trial available |
| Pricing transparency | Public on the pricing page | Not disclosed publicly |
| Pricing per location | $495 per month on Ultra, $4,950 per year on annual billing, no contract minimum | Based on operator reports, approximately $10,000 per location per year with annual contract commitments |
| AI onboarding | Works out of the box. No data upload required | Onboarding asks for your historical estimates and scope preferences |
| Price database | Proprietary, curated, regional, updated regularly | Customized per account, based on customer-provided inputs |
| Workflow | Complete priced estimate, on site, in 10 to 15 minutes | Documentation upload, AI draft generation, estimator review, then delivery |
| Ideal customer | Operators who want the estimate done on site and ready to send | Operations built around long multi-step estimate cycles |
How Wave actually works
Open Wave. One chat box. Short greeting.
You type or speak what you see on site. Customer name, address, loss category, cause of loss, which rooms are affected. Wave pulls the scope out of natural language and asks short follow-up questions to fill in what's missing. Most of those questions are multiple choice. Tap A, B, C, or D and keep moving.
When Wave has enough information, it generates the complete estimate. Line items grouped by room, with subtotals. Equipment sized from the room dimensions you provided, using IICRC drying science. PPE kit auto-added and scaled to the loss category. Containment barriers, antimicrobial application, HEPA vacuuming on exposed framing, and every line item a senior estimator would know to add.
Every line item self-documents. Edit inline. Talk to Wave to revise. When the estimate is ready, it is ready to send.
Total time from scope to done: 10 to 15 minutes. On the job site. From any phone. Your technician wrote the estimate. No handoff. No estimator in the middle. No office review queue.
How Rebuild works
Rebuild's workflow assumes an estimator behind a desk. That is the actual shape of the product.
The technician documents the job using voice notes, photos, tic sheets, and optionally a 3D scan from a third-party tool. That documentation gets uploaded to Rebuild. The AI processes the uploaded documentation and generates what Rebuild's founder publicly describes as an 85 to 90 percent complete draft estimate. The estimator then reviews that draft, customizes for the carrier program, and fills in what the AI missed.
The product is built around the estimator, not the technician. Rebuild's founder has publicly stated that commission-paid estimators are their biggest fans. That makes sense, because the product was designed for the estimator role. If you are trying to get your whole team estimating, you are not the target customer.
Wave is built in the opposite direction. The field technician is the estimator. The person walking the loss is the person producing the complete priced estimate, on site, in 15 minutes. No estimator review queue in between the job site and the adjuster.
The pricing and contract question
Rebuild does not publish pricing. Their website CTA is "Book a Demo." Pricing is disclosed during the demo conversation.
Based on pricing conversations that restoration operators have reported to us, Rebuild pricing is reportedly around $10,000 per location per year, with annual contract commitments. One operator we spoke with received a quote requiring a contract commitment before they were given access to evaluate the product on an actual job. These are reported figures only and Rebuild has not confirmed them. Your actual quote will depend on your account and negotiation.
For context, Wave Ultra is $495 per month per location, which comes out to $4,950 per year on annual billing. One flat price, unlimited users, unlimited estimates, no contract minimum, cancel anytime. Wave also has a free trial you can start without a credit card, a sales call, or a contract conversation.
Apples to apples: roughly half the price, no contract, and you can try it before you pay.
The structural difference: Wave's pricing is public because Wave is built to be tried. Rebuild's pricing is not public because the product is sold through an enterprise sales motion that starts with a demo and a quote, and reportedly asks operators to commit to a contract before they can use the product. Different models, different expectations of the customer. If your buying process includes "we need to see pricing and use the product before we sign a contract," Wave is one of the two options that lets you do that.
Why Wave wins
No data required to get started
Sign up for Wave. Write your first estimate. That is the entire onboarding. You do not upload your historical estimates. You do not share your pricing preferences. You do not hand over your scope library to train the AI. Wave already knows how restoration estimates should look because it was built on IICRC standards, industry-standard restoration line items, and a curated proprietary price database maintained by our team.
Rebuild's onboarding, per their founder's own public explanation, starts with you providing historical estimates and scope preferences so their AI can learn how you work. Your pricing logic. Your line-item preferences. Your scope patterns. If that sounds fine to you, it is their stated approach. If it feels like you are being asked to hand over the accumulated knowledge of your senior estimator to a third-party startup that other operators also use, that is also a reasonable reading.
Try it on tomorrow's job, no demo required
Wave has a free trial. Three estimates, no credit card, no sales call, no contract conversation. You can sign up right now and run Wave against a real job before you ever talk to anyone on the Wave team.
Rebuild does not offer this path. The only way to evaluate the product is to book a demo, get a quote, and negotiate a contract. Operators we have spoken with report being asked to commit to annual contracts before they could even run Rebuild on a real job. That is a high bar to clear for an unproven product.
The field technician is the estimator
Wave's entire design puts the estimate in the technician's hands. A technician on their first day can walk a loss, describe it to Wave, and produce a complete priced estimate in 15 minutes from their phone. That is not marketing copy. That is the product.
Rebuild's workflow assumes a different structure. Tech documents the job. Documentation gets uploaded. AI generates a draft. Estimator reviews the draft and fills in the gaps. The field person and the estimator are different people doing different parts of the workflow. If your technician and your estimator are often the same person, or you want to break the senior estimator bottleneck, Rebuild's workflow does not match yours.
One flat price, no procurement cycle
Wave Ultra is $495 per month per location. $199 on Pro, $299 on Growth. All published on the pricing page. Sign up in 60 seconds. Cancel anytime. Save two months when you pay annually.
Rebuild's pricing is quote-based, tied to a demo-first enterprise sales motion, with contract commitments. If your buying process includes a procurement team and a quarterly budget review, that structure may fit you. For the operator who just wants to know what the tool costs before they sign up and run it on a real job, Wave is the one that tells you.
Where Rebuild wins
Your operation is built around long estimate cycles, documentation handoffs between multiple roles, and review queues. You want documentation uploads, AI drafts, estimator review, and carrier customization cycles as distinct steps in a multi-day workflow. Rebuild was designed for exactly that kind of process.
Wave was built to skip it.
Who should switch
Restoration contractors who want their whole team estimating, not just the senior estimator.
Operators who want to evaluate the product on a real job before committing budget or signing a contract.
Multi-location shops who looked at a quote reportedly in the range of $10,000 per location per year and realized Wave Ultra at $4,950 per year per location is roughly half the cost with no contract minimum.
Any operator who was asked to hand over their historical estimates during onboarding and wondered why the software needed their pricing library to work.
Any operator who was asked to sign an annual contract before they could try the product.
Restoration operators who prefer to keep their pricing data and scope patterns as their own competitive advantage, not as a training input for someone else's product.
Anyone who opened Wave on their phone and had a complete estimate ready for the adjuster in 15 minutes and wondered why every other tool costs more to do less.
Try Wave free. 3 estimates included. No credit card required. →
Frequently Asked Questions
How does Wave's pricing compare to Rebuild's?
Wave Pro is $199 per month. Growth is $299. Ultra is $495 per month per location. All public on our pricing page, flat monthly, unlimited users, no contract minimum. Rebuild does not publish pricing. Based on quotes that restoration operators have reported to us, Rebuild is reportedly around $10,000 per location per year with annual contracts. Apples to apples per location, Wave Ultra on annual billing is $4,950 per year, roughly half the cost, with no contract minimum and a free trial. The only way to confirm exact Rebuild numbers is to go through their demo process.
Can I try Wave without talking to sales?
Yes. Wave has a free trial, three estimates included, no credit card required. You can sign up right now and use it on a real job. Rebuild requires a demo and, per operators we have spoken with, a contract commitment before you can run the product on a real job.
Does Rebuild's AI use my historical estimates to train?
Per public statements from Rebuild's founder, their onboarding process asks customers for historical estimates and scope preferences so their AI can customize to each account. This is Rebuild's stated approach, not our characterization. Wave does not require historical data from you. Wave's AI ships already trained on IICRC standards, industry-standard restoration line items, and a proprietary curated price database.
Why is Wave cheaper than Rebuild if both are AI estimating tools?
Different go-to-market. Wave is built for self-serve operators and publishes flat pricing. Rebuild is sold through a demo and contract process to enterprise customers. Same product category, very different customer. If you want AI estimating without a procurement cycle, Wave is the option.
Both Wave and Rebuild use AI. What is the actual difference?
Wave is built for the field technician to write the complete priced estimate on site in 15 minutes. Rebuild is built for the dedicated estimator to review an AI-generated draft back at the office. Different workflows for different team structures. Wave makes every technician an estimator. Rebuild makes estimators faster at producing drafts that still need review.
Is Wave built by someone who actually does restoration?
Yes. Wave was built by Albert Aguilera, a licensed general contractor with thousands of hours on restoration job sites, including catastrophe storm deployments. Wave is the product of years of writing restoration estimates in the field. Rebuild is built by a software founder whose dad owns a restoration company. His restoration exposure is a family connection. Only one of these founders has been in the field himself.
Wave was built by a restoration operator for restoration operators. If you've ever been asked to hand over your historical estimates to a software startup before you could even try their product, you already know why Wave exists.
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