> ## Documentation Index
> Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://evoke-f0bfabff.mintlify.site/llms.txt
> Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further.

# Agent 14 — Cost Estimation

> Cloud cost forecast with infrastructure costs, development effort, and ongoing maintenance projections.

<Info>
  **File:** `agents/sdlc/14-cost-estimation.md` · **Model:** Sonnet · **Tools:** Bash, Read, Write
</Info>

## Purpose

The cost estimation agent produces realistic cost forecasts grounded in current published pricing. Every estimate states its assumptions and variance range explicitly.

## Core principle

> An estimate without stated assumptions is fiction. State the assumption, state the range, state what would change the number by more than 50%.

## What it estimates

* **Infrastructure costs** — compute, database, storage, bandwidth, CDN
* **Development effort** — hours/days per pipeline stage
* **Ongoing maintenance** — monthly operational cost projection
* **Scale scenarios** — 10x user growth cost impact

## Outputs

```json theme={null}
// .rstack/runs/<run_id>/specs/cost_estimate.json
{
  "assumptions": {
    "monthly_active_users": 1000,
    "region": "us-east-1",
    "uptime_sla": "99.9%"
  },
  "monthly_infrastructure": {
    "compute": "$45 (2x t3.small)",
    "database": "$30 (db.t3.micro RDS PostgreSQL)",
    "storage": "$5 (100GB S3)",
    "total": "$80/month"
  },
  "variance": "Costs increase 4-6x at 10,000 MAU",
  "warnings": ["If media uploads are enabled, S3 + CDN costs increase significantly"]
}
```