Standard Architect's Fee?
Folks, after 3 years of thinking about it, taking notes, working on ideas, etc I’m gearing up to meet with architects to do a fairly thorough renovation on a ~2,300 square foot carriage house. May I ask people’s experiences with fees? I’ve been told that I can work at either an hourly rate or a…
Folks, after 3 years of thinking about it, taking notes, working on ideas, etc I’m gearing up to meet with architects to do a fairly thorough renovation on a ~2,300 square foot carriage house.
May I ask people’s experiences with fees? I’ve been told that I can work at either an hourly rate or a set % of construction costs.
What have you been told? What % and hourly fees have you been quoted? Do you see advantages or disadvantages to either approach?
Thanks in advance for your thoughtful feedback!
Response to Sean in Colorado:
Don’t open your branch office too soon… your overhead and salaries are going to be much higher here than in Colorado… part of the reason fees here are higher than other parts of the country.
Also, in response to:
“Why should the client pay us more if they select more expensive finishes, it takes the same amount of work from us.”
Selecting paint and doorknobs, maybe. But I spend a lot more time detailing custom millwork than I do if I were to select a simple pre-fab system. My clients expect this level of service, including multiple options and quality control, and many “normal” clients (as you call them) do too, so pricing per square foot for a high-end job just isn’t going to pay our bills.
–nyc architect
Wow, we should move our firm to NYC. We’re an architectural firm in Colorado and think that charging a percentage of costs is antiquated. We charge a $/sf rate for residential work. Why should the client pay us more if they select more expensive finishes, it takes the same amount of work from us. Typically about $3/sf for a builders set. For any CA we charge hourly, but that isn’t that bad. The highest end firms here get about 15%, but that includes full CA, full interiors and working with a big name on a unique ground up project. For 20% I could do the project from here and fly out once a week. Maybe we’ll try to start doing that.
BTW, hourly is a horrible way to set up a contract. The architect has no motivation to come in under the maximum and the owner questions every invoice. Just get a fixed fee and a well defined scope.
In any case, there are good architects that work with normal people and still make a very good living. Our business is growing like crazy as a result. I now know where our first branch office will be. 🙂
expect an overall percentage of project cost – between 16 and 20 percent depending upon scope (larger scope of work usually yields redundancies making the architect’s job simpler overall so it can be done for less money). the smaller the job, the higher the percentage. earmark 20% for standard services. anticipate extra funds to be needed for additional services, inevitably you will change things during construction.
having just gone through this process and given that this is a high end renovation i would say you are going to be working on a % basis
we interviewed architects from 10% to 20+%
and actually found one in the teens% (is that a real term?)
at the lower end you are getting competence but not ambition at the highest end you are getting proven results (usually in the editorial world) and a name brand
in between you have to be able to trust your judgement: who understands you and your project?
look at previous work,
talk to references: often, even a glowing review can reveal something that doesn’t work for you
both my husband and i are very creative and have managed small projects ourselves in the past
but i agree
do not under estimate what a really good professional will bring to the situation
and if you are willing to look, you can probably find true talent that is yet “unproven” in the big scheme of things.
you say you have done 3 years of thinking…
talk to a bunch of people
(we did)
review their proposals
i am sure the one who “gets” your vision will emerge
me again.
I suppose one way that won’t really reduce costs much (CA usually has the least number of architect hours of the entire process, though it’s arguably one of the most important phases for an architect to be involved in), but might help a little would be to wait to decide whether to pay the architect hourly or by % for the CA work until you’ve completed the construction documents phase. I caution against this because at that point you’ll probably end up feeling like you’ve spent a lot of money already and you’ve got the drawings, so maybe you don’t need the architect for CA. BUT YOU DO. If the process has gone pretty smoothly so far, and you’ve decided to use a contractor your architect recommended, then you could contract the architect for hourly CA work. If the construction then goes smoothly, you’ll probably save money. However, if the construction does not go smoothly or you didn’t go with one of your architect’s recommended contractors, you might find it is more expensive to do it hourly than a % fee.
So for example, maybe an architect would take a 17-18% fee that does not include CA and when it comes to construction, you could decide based on your experience so far whether it’ll be better to spend another 2-3% on the CA or pay the architect hourly.
–nyc architect
Responding to Anonymous 11:00am – TOTALLY agree and that’s a very good point.
To elaborate benefits of the architect’s non-design responsibilities… be aware that your 20% fee should cover ALL phases of the project and that includes something incredibly important which is the phase of Construction Administration (otherwise known as CA). In CA, the architect monitors the work of the GC (general contractor, who is contracted to the owner, NOT the architect) to ensure that their work properly reflects the drawings as well as the quality intended.
(A side note here: for those who haven’t worked with an architect before, when you contract with an architect you are contracting them for the design and drawings, but NOT for the actual physical outcome. You contract with the GC for the physical outcome, completion date, etc. For example, you could hire the best, highest quality architect but then not take their recommendation on contractors and end up with a pretty poor product or something that takes a year longer than you expected. That’s not the architect’s fault. Most architects at your level of quality have multiple GC’s they like, who understand their attention to detail. You’ll be best off hiring someone they’ve worked with before. Especially if you want to reduce the number of change-orders (what the changes during construction are called) you have to pay for during construction.)
If your architect is providing CA services then, during construction, when the GC has a question they call the architect not you (for example, they find a pipe or structure they weren’t expecting in the wall, which necessitates a need for a design revision), and the architect will provide it. The architect will also act as the owner’s representative in sorting out the responsibility for the many changes that inevitably arise. That is, who is legally responsible for the costs associated with the changes? Were the architect’s drawings not clear (in which case it’s the architect’s responsibility), did the GC not follow the drawings (GC’s responsibility), or is it a preexisting condition issue that neither the architect nor the GC could have known about (client’s responsibility).
If you don’t use your architect for CA work (some clients think that this is a good place to eliminate fees and hours – I STRONGLY CAUTION YOU AGAINST THIS) you’ll find that the GC will usually throw all responsibility for the cost of changes to the client. And if you’re not experienced in construction, you’ll find it difficult to argue with them even though often the contractor is actually at fault.
So in sum, if you just hire an architect for design and drawings, and don’t hire them for CA work, you run the very high risks of 1) not getting the design (and/or the quality of design) you paid the architect for in the first place, 2) shouldering the responsibility for the changes that ALWAYS present themselves. And when possible use a contractor the architect has worked with and likes – they might be more expensive but trust me, that’s probably because they already understand the architect’s attention to quality and detail meaning you’ll probably save money in the end because there will be fewer mistakes and change-orders.
Another side note: GC’s can make a lot of money in their change-orders. Especially if they know you are inexperienced, they will often bid low initially, knowing that they can just make what it really costs later through change-orders. Your architect will curb this tendency…
Although I have never HIRED an architect because my husband is one, something I think the posters above are leaving out of the equation is that many clients don’t understand an architect doesn’t just design. Part of the architect’s process is to provide legal framework to deal with contractors and vendors.
The contract portion of your relationship with a builder will be directed by the architect. This in itself is worth a large percentage of your contract fee. An example – a family member decided they didn’t need an architect (my husband recommended someone registered in Virginia ) and went ahead working directly with the GC. It ended up costing them $125,000 over budget (in 1989 dollars). Every time they requested a change, it became an “extra” and the contractor had zero incentive to urge them to rethink uneccessary changes. They also had the builder do the drawings, which probably intentionally left out MANY details, which had to be negotiated separately later.
Design and building oversight and proper contract supervision could have eliminated a lot of this added expense.
When you use an architect, you might bypass the lawyer’s part of the project where you end up suing the contractor.
continuing that last post and agreeing with anonynon 3:38:
The staggered % is a place where you could probably negotiate a little. for example, i’m working on a gut renovation of an historic townhouse right now that is 20% of construction up to a construction cost of $3 million, 15% of $3-5 million and 10% of anything over that. The project will probably end up somewhere around $5M. I know that kind of budget isn’t the “brownstoner” mentality… I’m on this site because I’m in the midst of a personal apt renovation… but you get the idea.
–nyc architect (and “architect in nyc”)
That approaches the quality of work at my firm (I work at a VERY high-end firm in the city). We’ll usually charge 25% of construction. I’d say if it your fav comes in at 25% you could say that you’d like to use them but that 20% is all you can do. My guess is that no firm will come in at less than 20% for good quality work. Anyone who will do it for significantly less than that is cutting corners somewhere (though they might be young and eager, which is something different, just be sure to actually visit some of their other projects and call their references). If you do get something less be sure to request that the principal of the firm attend all critical design meetings, otherwise you might find you don’t have the attention of the person whose design experience you hired them for.
In your case, I’d expect all bids to be % of construction. That’s because of the complexity of high end projects like this. It doesn’t make sense for either party to do hourly.
While 20% might seem really high if you haven’t used an architect before, it will be WORTH it. Again, most important is whether you click with not only the principal of the firm but the people who will be working 100% on your project.
–nyc architect