How much is that going to cost?

[dodge man]

Through my work as a land surveyor I worked for a civil engineering firm. We often had people come in with a project in mind with no understanding of the scope or cost. The one that comes to mind was the chief of police who wanted to expand his gun range. He wanted hundreds of feet of berms fifteen feet high. He thought a guy with a bulldozer would come in and do it in a day. I did a rough earthwork calculation and assigned a rough dollar amount per cubic yard of earth, it was a several hundred thousand dollar project. I explained to him the scope of the project and cost. His reaction? Never mind.

Anybody else have good examples of this. I picture Eddie Walker and others who do remodels having some good ones. Same for those that do construction.

 

[orezok]

The last high school I built was $105,000,000. Schedule was a 2 year build. That averages $1,000,000 per WEEK. Most people have no idea how much work that it takes to accomplish that.

 

[5030]

I'm better at demolition myself. More fun.

 

[Jstpssng]

Most people have no idea how much work that it takes to accomplish that.

You're right. I can't comprehend it. It must take a lot of skill to coordinate everything.

 

[scootr]

As a young man I was a tradesman in many trades. When I got older I was a superintendent. There are about 15 trades that need to move through a housing unit to complete it. Most have to go through it twice. It's quite the orchestrated dance of about 200 men marching through hundreds of units.
Not to mention on any given day you will have neighboring streets dug up, Import or export of soils, paving, and a flood in this building, a fire in that building, and somebody's wife looking for her cheating husband. And the big bosses flying in to visit their money at work...

 

[4570Man]

I deal with customers having to adjust their expectations to their budget pretty often. One of the more common occurrences is cable deck railing. The stuff is stupid expensive.

 

[dodge man]

Through construction staking and material testing I got in some decent sized projects. Being a superintendent takes a special kind of person, half tough guy, half mother. I met several that were fair to good. I met one really great one who was over a Pella Window factory. I asked him how he did it and put up with it all. He said it was all an adrenaline rush.

 

[/pine]

I used to do a lot of cost estimating for marine construction jobs...mostly for commercial entities (private marinas etc.) and for municipalities...lots of bridge and underwater pipeline work...
Whenever we would get bogged down with a difficult part of the job (estimating)...our go to tag line was "it ain't no hospital"....

Just imagine (before there was software to do the grunt work) going floor by floor on a big hospital and all the specs trying not to miss anything...especially with the cost of medical equipment etc...

 

[Jstpssng]

ust imagine (before there was software to do the grunt work) going floor by floor on a big hospital and all the specs trying not to miss anything...especially with the cost of medical equipment etc...

UltraRunner is the one most likely to understand that one.

 

[Hay Dude]

I hated doing take offs on plans and estimating-work you never really get paid for. Even when you had a great feeling about getting a project from a customer, it could fall through for any number of reasons.
Drove me so crazy, I left the business pretty much for good, although I’ll still work for certain customers.

 

[buckeyefarmer]

Electrician buddy told me today he had a job to change 5 light fixtures in a nuclear plant. His union boss said make it last a week.

 

[4570Man]

I hated doing take offs on plans and estimating-work you never really get paid for. Even when you had a great feeling about getting a project from a customer, it could fall through for any number of reasons.
Drove me so crazy, I left the business pretty much for good, although I’ll still work for certain customers.

I’d prefer to strictly do spec homes but I only have the cash flow to do 1 at a time. I’ll only do custom builds on a cost plus contract. It takes long enough to do bookkeeping as it is and trying to keep track of all the changes on a fixed price build takes way too long. In today’s volatile material market you’d get burned in a fixed price contract as well.

 

[/pine]

I hated doing take offs on plans and estimating-work you never really get paid for. Even when you had a great feeling about getting a project from a customer, it could fall through for any number of reasons.
Drove me so crazy, I left the business pretty much for good, although I’ll still work for certain customers.

When estimating as a GC you have to know that all the sub contractors are in the ball park...sometimes a lot of extra work especially when pricing custom fixtures etc...used to dread jobs with long spec sheets...

 

[dodge man]

With government agencies, it’s generally against the law to select surveying and engineering based on price alone. It’s called quality based selection. For construction staking price was usually the solely based on price. Same for private work . I’d spend hours putting a cost to a big highway job and rarely get the job. Most of the staking jobs we got it was because we had the skill and they just said come do it.

 

[orezok]

You're right. I can't comprehend it. It must take a lot of skill to coordinate everything.

I got some good training early. About 1970 my first major project out of college was 900 units of Navy housing in San Diego. It was an 18 month project. I was assigned as the “Field Engineer” (AKA glorified Gofer). I had to do such things as find a door supplier who could deliver 19,000 prehung doors in a 6 month period, get 5 million board feet and 5 million SF of plywood delivered in 8 months (we went mill direct in Oregon for that one). Sold the Navy a hundred thousand CY of dirt that they already owned because their topos we off by 20 or more feet. We had estimated we would have a lot of export but we were able to move it onsite much much cheaper.

It was trial by fire but the experience was extremely valuable in my career.

 

[2manyrocks]

Good luck with accurate estimates in the present inflation driven economy and/or unexpected materials unavailability.

 

[/pine]

I got some good training early. About 1970 my first major project out of college was 900 units of Navy housing in San Diego. It was an 18 month project. I was assigned as the “Field Engineer” (AKA glorified Gofer). I had to do such things as find a door supplier who could deliver 19,000 prehung doors in a 6 month period, get 5 million board feet and 5 million SF of plywood delivered in 8 months (we went mill direct in Oregon for that one). Sold the Navy a hundred thousand CY of dirt that they already owned because their topos we off by 20 or more feet. We had estimated we would have a lot of export but we were able to move it onsite much much cheaper.

It was trial by fire but the experience was extremely valuable in my career.

When I was a "field engineer"...I was responsible for all line and grade work...had to check the formula sheets on all concrete etc...on a lot of jobs I had to make inspection dives...if there was no super on the job also responsible for manual labor force...

[more one topic]
A lot of homeowners want to open up rooms for wider spaces...they sometimes choke when they find out removing bearing walls can be costly to rework...

 

[oosik]

I think folks are surprised for at least two reasons. They have no concept of the work involved. They have no previous reference to a project of that scope.

I was somewhat shocked when I saw the bid to construct my driveway in 1982. I had no choice. I had to have access to the property. If it were done today - at least four and perhaps as much as six to eight times as much. The project - construct a mile long gravel driveway to secondary highway standards.

 

[Jstpssng]

I think folks are surprised for at least two reasons. They have no concept of the work involved. They have no previous reference to a project of that scope.

I was somewhat shocked when I saw the bid to construct my driveway in 1982. I had no choice. I had to have access to the property. If it were done today - at least four and perhaps as much as six to eight times as much. The project - construct a mile long gravel driveway to secondary highway standards.

Some people don't understand the concept of "bearing walls"... apparently thinking that the roof is supported by magic.

 

[Hay Dude]

Good luck with accurate estimates in the present inflation driven economy and/or unexpected materials unavailability.

I was just offered a barn restoration project and my mason told me his bid would be different by the time the project started. That’s no big surprise, but when he told me how much because of these crazy times, my Customer started getting less excited about doing the project.
Market volatility is keeping a lot of potential customers on the fence.