Do I Need a Dozer or Therapy?

[MarkV]

Sorry to hear it all went wrong. Around here you are not going to get a set price on excavation/earth moving projects unless it is really high. Just too many variables involved to know what you are getting into. The better guys have a pretty good idea, the lesser tend to underestimate. Sounds like you ended up with the latter for this project. I expect to pay about what he was charging and up depending on the size of the equipment. I always ask what size equipment is being used. I will also ask for a reduced price if we go over the estimated hours. Hope you get it sorted out.

MarkV

 

[sdkubota]

Hindsight is always 20/20 but let me add this as I work with contractors and costs alot. Should you have requested a lump sum they would have jacked their price from what they thought it would take and some extra in case they were wrong. You would have gotten a bunch of bids for $20k. The way you did it took away any risk from the contractor and should have gotten you a better price. You should have asked about what equipment he was going to use as $125/hr should get you some fairly serious iron. You might not have gotten shafted as much as you think for the amount of work that was done and time will tell. It is always beneficial to get more then one estimate for hiring out work.

 

[sixdogs]

Having been there and done that I'll say what I would do and that's to get over it right now and forget about what has happened because it's all over. The $$ are gone and the experience has been gained. This lesson will save you multiples of the amount down the road. So start fresh and buy a dozer if you want to or hire it out if you want to but just pretend whatever just happened never happened. It's the Vegas of the tractor world.

Back as a teenager I ruined a brand new sweater the first time I wore it and could not bring myself to replace it. i wore it for a number of years and never got over the trauma. Fast forward to a few years ago I was removing my belly mount mower from my B7800 by lifting it with a much bigger loader tractor and clipped the hood. Ouch, but I had learned over the years.

After surveying the damage I went inside, called the dealer and ordered what I needed to be whole again. New hood, lights, housing, etc for $450. I felt better immediately and the negative images of that day never stayed with me. I feel better. Not to make light of any of this but you probably tossed away a couple thousand $$ but it's OK. it's gone so now so just fix it and don't let it eat at you or the project will have bad vibes for you. I know it's easy for me to say so just my two cents here.

 

[YesDeere]

Having been there and done that I'll say what I would do and that's to get over it right now and forget about what has happened because it's all over. The $$ are gone and the experience has been gained. This lesson will save you multiples of the amount down the road. So start fresh and buy a dozer if you want to or hire it out if you want to but just pretend whatever just happened never happened. It's the Vegas of the tractor world.

Back as a teenager I ruined a brand new sweater the first time I wore it and could not bring myself to replace it. i wore it for a number of years and never got over the trauma. Fast forward to a few years ago I was removing my belly mount mower from my B7800 by lifting it with a much bigger loader tractor and clipped the hood. Ouch, but I had learned over the years.

After surveying the damage I went inside, called the dealer and ordered what I needed to be whole again. New hood, lights, housing, etc for $450. I felt better immediately and the negative images of that day never stayed with me. I feel better. Not to make light of any of this but you probably tossed away a couple thousand $$ but it's OK. it's gone so now so just fix it and don't let it eat at you or the project will have bad vibes for you. I know it's easy for me to say so just my two cents here.

That's some sound advice. As I've gotten older I am able to do this more. Terrible situation but definitely best to put it behind you. Sorry this happened

 

[swick1]

At least you didn't lose too bad. You got the work done that you paid for. I think you did okay even if the job isn't done. Save up some money and try again!

 

[Blackhammer]

Wow!!!!

Is all I can say!

As a contractor I try to deliver what is wanted by my customers. "Shoot" that is why they hired me. I have been asked to price jobs by the hour and lump sum. For me the price is the same. I don't care how they want it priced, in the end the price will be within a couple of points. I have exclusions for unsuitable soils, and other variables in all contracts.

If this guy estimated 50 hrs and only completed 1/3 the work, he should be held to complete the project. There should be a +/- this many hours clause. If after the first 8 hrs only 5% of the work was done, you as the owner should have raised concerns to the contractor.

Sorry for the rant, I am sorry the contractor screwed you, I hope you get it worked out. Expensive lesson learned. With this poor economy, it seems contractors are trying to get more and more out of their customers. Makes me mad.

 

[swick1]

Wow!!!!

Is all I can say!

As a contractor I try to deliver what is wanted by my customers. "Shoot" that is why they hired me. I have been asked to price jobs by the hour and lump sum. For me the price is the same. I don't care how they want it priced, in the end the price will be within a couple of points. I have exclusions for unsuitable soils, and other variables in all contracts.

If this guy estimated 50 hrs and only completed 1/3 the work, he should be held to complete the project. There should be a +/- this many hours clause. If after the first 8 hrs only 5% of the work was done, you as the owner should have raised concerns to the contractor.

Sorry for the rant, I am sorry the contractor screwed you, I hope you get it worked out. Expensive lesson learned. With this poor economy, it seems contractors are trying to get more and more out of their customers. Makes me mad.

Perhaps a lesson for the next contract. As a digger I always get everything in writing and I won't hardly work by the hour because of unrealistic expectations and pressure to work faster than I deem safe. Plus I haven't been able to do that little extra I always like to do for free to make my work stand out. All the dirt work I do gets finished to a "lawn-like" surface. No tracks, smooth, and hand raked. It doesn't take that much longer and I've had a lot of compliments so far.

Good luck on the next bid or equipment purchase!

 

[Ken45101]

I guess I've been lucky. I had a contractor for two different jobs (same guy). One job was widening our driveway with an excavator as it winds up the hillside (800'). He couldn't give me a "job" cost ahead of time since he didn't know how much bedrock he would run into. It took an extra day or so but he did a good job at an acceptable cost. We also had him cut some trails across the hillsides with a dozer. Heck, some of the areas were too steep to walk. In three days he did a tremendous job.

If a contractor "low balled" an estimate and you held him to it and he ran into problems, he could still do a half a** job.

It all comes down to finding a good honest contractor. Being fair works both ways.

Ken

 

[swick1]

Good point Ken! I try not to drive hard bargains because everyone deserves to make a little profit. I'd rather do that and we all win instead of making somebody take a bath on a deal.

I've been dealing with regular construction contractors lately and the high ballers are crazy. I told one of them that just because I'm not doing the job doesn't mean I don't know how and that his company should get their act together. I don't even bother with low ballers because they are always on drugs, playing catchup with their payroll, or ignorant of how to estimate a job.

Since we are having this dialogue I guess I'll share how I and some other people I know estimate a job. First I get all the requirements nailed down then select equipment to do it. If the job will take more than one day I rent equipment for a week usually. Materials also get a 10% markup and labor gets 10-20% depending on the job. I factor in daily travel and material shopping time at cost. If I'm using my equipment I markup my hours by 10%. Service, cleanup, and transport are factored into the equipment's rate. For my 1026r tlb it's $18/hr. That's what I have to make for the equipment to break even. Add taxes and insurance and you can see why it costs so much. I work for $45 to $50 per hour on the backhoe depending on the job plus $12/hr for a laborer.

If I worked more I would have an overhead rate to cover an office, garage, the accountant, insurance, advertising, taxes, lawyer, service, etc. This may be highly variable based on the company size.

I also have a rock clause that has me busting it at a fixed deployment cost plus an hourly rate.

So you can see for a one man show its not worth my time to go to work for less than $45-50/hr and I only operate tiny equipment. The good news is that the equipment is only eating up about half the budget. This is where you save when you diy. As the equipment gets larger though the cost savings get thinner due to maintenance costs , breakdowns, and the higher fuel consumption.