Contractor Day Price vs Job?
Had a few contractors giving me disparate estimates on jobs and unfortunately I don’t have the experience to know if they were fair. I was wondering if it might not be best to go with someone and simply pay him $25 an hour or so. This way one can evaluate the quality of the work…
Had a few contractors giving me disparate estimates on jobs and unfortunately I don’t have the experience to know if they were fair. I was wondering if it might not be best to go with someone and simply pay him $25 an hour or so. This way one can evaluate the quality of the work day to day. Of course it also means your are constantly looking at your watch and hate it when he has to go to Home Depot and wait in line for supplies I suppose. evaluate the quality of the work day to day. Of course it also means your are constantly looking at your watch and hate it when he has to go to Home Depot and wait in line for supplies I suppose.
Maybe you can try what I did. I worked out a reasonable hourly rate for the first month of my bathroom renovation. After 20 working days, my contractor agreed to drop his rate by half. So he had incentive to finish on time, since he didn’t want to be working for less than his usual rate.
Contractor was a personal friend, so it worked out very amicably for both of us. Not sure if random other contractors would go for that arrangement, but you can always try.
Years ago most homeowner initiated construction jobs were paid on time and materials.
My father who has been in construction for 50+ years (and whose father was also a contractor) always says that the shift to the “bids model” has been great for him because it is standard practice to calculate time & materials + mark-up + “insurance” for things that will go wrong/small changes he doesn’t want to argue over with his clients. Yet if things go REALLY wrong or there are significant changes the clients pay above and beyond the initial bid.
What I take away from that is assuming you have a good, hard-working, trust-worthy contractor you probably pay more, on average, under a bid than time and materials structure. Unfortunately many homeowners don’t know until far along into a project if their contractor is “good, hard-working and trust-worthy.”
On a personal note, I am in the midst of a large project that I am paying my contractor time & materials on. Trade specific subcontractors that I don’t know/source myself (e.g. HVAC, flooring, etc) are on a bid. If you want to chat more about how to manage this, let me know.
Are you going to be on site supervising every day with a day rate? It’s one thing if you’re having 2 days of painting done, another for a multi-week project. How are you going to know if the contractor is really going to pickup supplies as he says he is? Are you going to judge how long that should take? What if he has to re-do something? It would be much less nerve-wracking to bid it as a the project except for discrete or unskilled portions (e.g. demo).
The only way the contractor will do the job in a reasonable amount of time is if you are the only job he is on. You will get consistency. The reason simple jobs take a long time is because the guy is running back and forth on several jobs all at the same time. Its stupid and costs the consumer more money and aggravation.
eman – do you need a permit if you are not moving pre-existing plumbing fixtures? Essentially all I plan on doing is installing a new sink and toilet and tile work. Does something like that really need a permit?
In my house I gutted the bottom floor completely.Most of the work was done by somebody working by the day.The kitchen cabinet people installed the cabinets, the floor company did the floors, but everything else was done by my carpenter/jack of all trades.
For a few thousand dollars you can get somebody good to work for you for a month.The secret is to get somebody decent and treat them decent. You can’t be sweating it if they have to go to Home Depot. My golden rule is we work from 8am to 4pm. If somebody can’t start at 8.00am they are no good.
A good contractor is a great asset if you can afford it.
as long as you are willing to bear the risk of working without a permit ($5000 fine), and having no insurance on the job (unlimited liability)…what if something goes wrong and the job drags out for another 5 weeks?…bad idea
Thanks for the advice but I am not sure exactly why I should avoid a day rate for a big job – say a bathroom or kitchen that otherwise would cost 5-10K. As an example – lets say I want a bathroom renovation and contractors are telling me they can do it for 6-8k on average just for labor. Now if this guy I am paying $200 per day for gets the job done in five weeks then the renovation will total 5k. The question is can he do the job in five weeks. My instinct tells me that someone “who knows his stuff” can probably do a complete renovation of a bathroom in even less time – no?
Plan plan plan! Then be as specific as possible and put the whole scope of work, with as many specifications and details as possible, in writing. Contractors are either booked thru the holidays – or needing work, so now is a good time. Contractors usually figure time plus materials plus mark up. If they know exactly what they’ll be doing they can give you an exact price. If they’re dealing with a nebulous concept, they’ll have to guess on a price that will cover them without arguing with you every day.