A car through a garage wall, a tree through a gable, fire spalling on the block face. Enter the damaged section and this tool builds the Xactimate line items a block wall repair actually needs. Not just 'replace 40 SF of block,' but the grouted cells, the tie beam, the lintels, the footing dowels, the shoring, and the finish work that the one-line estimate leaves out.
A concrete block wall looks like stacked block. It is not. In Florida, an exterior CBS (concrete block structure) wall is an engineered assembly that holds the roof up and resists hurricane wind. When you replace a damaged section, you are rebuilding that engineering, not just laying block back.
Miss the reinforcement and you have written an estimate for a garden wall, not a structural wall. That is the gap this tool closes: it starts from the block SF and adds every companion the code and the structure require, each one a real Xactimate item that prices at import.
What is a filled cell? Block has hollow cells (the holes). In a reinforced CBS wall, some of those cells are filled: a vertical steel bar (rebar) is dropped in and the cell is pumped full of grout. That vertical steel is what keeps the wall standing in a windstorm and ties it to the foundation. Filled cells are not everywhere. The standard pattern is one every 4 feet along the wall, one on each side of every window and door opening, and one at every corner. So a repair that includes an opening picks up extra filled cells on both sides of that opening. In Xactimate the grout is one line (per lineal foot of cell) and the rebar is another. Leaving the steel out and pricing plain block is the most common way a CBS estimate comes in short.
What is a tie beam? The tie beam (also called a bond beam) is the continuous reinforced course that runs around the top of the wall and over the openings. It is made of U-shaped block filled with grout and horizontal steel. It ties the whole wall together and it is what the roof trusses strap down to. If the damage reaches the top of the wall or spans an opening, the tie beam comes out and goes back over the affected run. An impact that "only broke some block" often broke the tie beam too, and that is a load-path repair, not a cosmetic one.
What is a lintel? A lintel is the beam over a door or window that carries the wall load across the opening so the opening does not collapse. In CBS construction it is usually a precast concrete lintel. Every opening in the damaged run needs its lintel sized to the span plus bearing on each end. Wider openings, like a garage door, need a deeper lintel, and those are frequently engineered rather than a catalog pick.
A car through a garage corner is the textbook CBS claim, and it is where the "just replace the block" estimate fails hardest. Here is the real chain the tool builds:
Not every masonry claim is a rebuild, and the tool holds back when it should. A shallow fire spall on a non-bearing block face is surface repair: no shoring, no engineer, no tie beam. Settlement and subsidence cracks are a movement problem, and they are often excluded by the policy. The tool surfaces that coverage note, prices only the crack repair it can defend, and flags that stabilization (underpinning, piers, an engineered pin plan) is a separate engineered scope.
Load-bearing status you cannot see is treated as bearing, and the tool says so. That is the safe, defensible default for a hidden load path. The tool builds a defensible quantity scope from real Xactimate items and lets Xactimate price them at import. It does not publish prices, it does not engineer the wall, and it does not decide coverage.
AI Estimate Assistant, from Antero Trail, turns field notes, photos, and floor plans into carrier-ready Xactimate estimates. The calculator on this page is one piece of that engine, pulled out and made free. In the app, the CBS wall scope writes itself from the loss notes. The filled cells, tie beam, lintels, shoring, and the weight-based haul land in the estimate with their Xactimate codes attached.
The masonry haul feeds the debris and dumpster calculator, temporary support ties to the scaffold and shoring calculator, and the interior finish side runs through the drywall repair calculator.
These calculators produce planning estimates from published public rate schedules. They are not a formal quote. Confirm equipment, access, and pricing with a licensed operator or rental yard before you rely on any number for an estimate.