Contractor Bids
My husband and I are purchasing an apartment. We want to complete some minor renovations. We haven’t yet taken ownership of the apartment, and – as per the contract – are entitled to three visits to the property before completing the purchase. We would like to meet with several contractors for estimates of the work we want done. Is it advisable (or acceptable) to schedule visits with different contractors at the same time? Thanks.
birdsandbones
in Construction 12 years ago
6
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6 replies
upwsidemom | 12 years ago
My husband and I were in a similar situation prior to closing on our apartment. We were able to arrange for a 3 hour time window where we met with 3 contractors (we staggered the times). Thus it counted as only one of our pre-close visits and we had enough time to figure out which contractor we felt best about.
pepinohill | 12 years ago
i would do it simultaneously if you don’t own the home yet – you’re just getting ballpark figures and you aren’t hiring on the spot. if you like one or two of the contractors, MAYBE have them come back for a more in-depth visit. by the time you take ownership of the home, you may have different ideas about what needs to get done / by when / by whom. at that time i would have the individual contractors come in. we scheduled walkthroughs at separate times when we were about to put a bid on a house. one of the four contractors suggested that if we ever do it again, we should schedule simultaneously. when we finally purchased the home and were looking to hire someone to execute the plans, we scheduled the contractors at separate times. it helped to see the different approaches and suggestions.
joearchitect | 12 years ago
For a public project it is appropriate and maybe necessary to do a group walkthrough. For private work like an apartment renovation it less uncommon because usually an owner will want to have time to ask the contractor questions and get a feel for how they would be to work with. You can’t do that with several people at once. Contractors also want to get to know you a little bit. If your meeting time is too limited I like Jeanmarine’s idea to let them know of the situation ahead of time and stagger the meetings so at least there is a little one-on-one time. You should write down all the requirements for your project and give that to them so they are all pricing the same work.
elbow | 12 years ago
We do bids with mandatory simultaneuos walk throughs for all of the contractors. I don’t think they particularly like it, but they go along with it. Our rationale is that each potential bidder will see and hear the same thing.
jeanmarine2 | 12 years ago
I read a book on renovations with a contractor that suggested bringing all your possible contractors to the house at the same time for a bid-oriented walk-through (with the idea that all possible bidders on the job should hear the same thing before bidding) and was surprised. I think doing this isn’t necessarily that unusual – in some parts of the country, perhaps, or in markets where there’s more competition for contracting work… in NYC it seems strange and inconsiderate, it only occurred to me to make one on one appointments. So you could try it but I’d suggest letting all contractors know what you are doing ahead of time, or staggering (say) 3 contractor meetings about 30-45 minutes apart and making the meetings part of one “visit”, to maximize your 3 visits.
jigman | 12 years ago
I don’t think I would do this. You may stiffle the each contractor from voicing their opinion since they will feel in competition with the others attending the walk-through. As inconvenient as it may be, I would walk them through separately. With a fair amount of photos and realtor floor plans, and a description of the work you want to do, you should be able to get some initial pricing. At least enough to narrow the field. Then you could take the one or two contractors you are considering to the apartment to finalize their pricing. Just my 2 cents.