Collecting Bids & Knowing a Fair Price for a Project
Feels like this should be simple but I’m at a loss.
I’m currently replacing my 10 year old mini split system with multi-zone ducted. The bids I’ve received range from 35k to 80k. I have no idea how to understand what’s “market rate.” Are there any databases or services that collect data on home improvement projects that make this sort market research feasible?
If not seems like a huge need.
rights8877zz
in General Discussion 1 year and 5 months ago
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eg66 | 1 year and 4 months ago
Homeinspector, you make excellent points. My partner and I tend to research, collect personal recommendations, and save up to pay to have things done right by people who will be paid fairly to do it– particularly in areas where we aren’t knowledgeable. I admit I am more comfortable with small companies with solid recommendations than the big companies where the pricing is more opaque (like the 90k HVAC install quote)– but asking about field teams is a good idea, too, and I truly hadn’t thought about it.
justinromeu26 | 1 year and 4 months ago
Both Chris John and i mention regulation. We understand something that many homeowners fail to and that is that without regulation some contractors will do whatever it takes to get a job – including submitting unrealistically low bids. these are often people with less experience and people who are not as invested in whatever it is they are doing (they are not in it for the long all and they are not interested at becoming experts at what they are doing).
Too many homeowners convince themselves that the people submitting higher bid are getting rich and the people with the lower bid are living life where they should be living it. The reality is that both contractors are making about the same amount of money and in some cases the people with the lower bids make more money. How is this possible? the people submitting the lowest bids cheat. whom do they cheat? they cheat all over the place (modus operendi). They cheat the: customer by using inferior product where possible and untrained labor; their insurance company by lying about what they are doing and h ow many employees they have; their employees by misclassifying them as contractors and paying them off the books; by doing electrical work when they are not licensed to do so; the tax authorities, their auto insurance carrier by registering their vehicles in pennsylvania, etc, etc. this is how they survive.
Regulation is good for both the consumer and the contractor. Everyone is protected and contractors compete in a fair market. Good contractors should not have any problem with regulation and the reason is they are already doing their best to deliver the best to the customer while being fair to their employees.
A customer recently asked me “why does it seem that there are only shoddy contractors and top-shelf contractors in this city and no one in the middle?”. My best guess at this is the middling contractors, the ones who cannot make it into the top tier where they could work for the wealthiest homeowners, constantly feel the pressure of having to compete against shoddy contractors in a market where many homeowners might take a chance with the lowest or lower price. in that environment, some of the good people doing this work might become field supervisors for one of the larger companies or they might leave the market altogether (or not commute to the city; work say where they live on LI or in NJ.
lkrshacmzcy | 1 year and 4 months ago
HVAC is unregulated here for the most part, so you will have huge variance in the pricing; fair is not a word to be used in an unregulated market.
Do your due diligence on companies, set up visits, get proposals and compare. I would be living in a Penthouse on Park Avenue if I had a dollar everytime someone asked us to explain why our cost was double another company but had no information on the company besides an email address…not even a website sometimes!
lkrshacmzcy | 1 year and 4 months ago
HVAC is unregulated here for the most part, so you will have huge variance in the pricing; fair is not a word to be used in an unregulated market.
Do your due diligence on companies, set up visits, get proposals and compare. I would be living in a Penthouse on Park Avenue if I had a dollar everytime someone asked us to explain why our cost was double another company but had no information on the company besides an email address…not even a website sometimes!
justinromeu26 | 1 year and 5 months ago
GreenwoodGoblin & others: my neighbor did his own install so it’s obvious that some of us can do these things without specific training. over the years i have seen a lot of work, some good, some bad, done by homeowners or even people who consider themselves professional (albeit untrained). Here is the key to doing something like this without training and without the benefit of a city government that believes that the installers of these systems must be regulated: the people doing the work must follow the manufacturer’s directions to the letter.
Sometimes situations arise in old houses where we must deviate from the directions. When we do this, we MUST call the manufacturer’s tech support team (not customer service but the team staffed by people from engineering and product development) and tell them and tell them why we MUST deviate and ask them what the workaround is and what the risks are; at that point it is up to us to convey to the property owner that we must deviate and why and what the approved solution is.
Most of the time, contractors and insta llers deviate from approved standards and manufacturer’s directions to benefit themselves to save money (it costs 30 mins of time to make a call to a tech support team on a complicated issue) or out of sheer laziness (they do not want to read the directions; language is no longer a barrier; the directions are someplace in another language and many tech teams have people who can speak other languages and know this; all manufacturer’s directions for these sorts of products have a phone number on them inviting people to call) or because they do not want to run to the supply house for an approved part (so they go to the corner hardware store, say for a fitting or hose). Know that in some states failure to follow manufacturer’s directions is considered consumer fraud.
I just checked. Mitsubishi offers training classes in the installation of these systems. This is what we learn when we take these classes (in the past year and a half, i have taken over a dozen classes to advance my home consulting business): we learn what goes wrong when somebody takes a shortcut. and know that every one of us who works with our hands knows dozens of shortcuts for every job we have ever done.
How can all of you protect yourselves? wait, how can WE protect ourselves (yes, WE; i know nothing about these systems; i might take a Mitsubishi class and i only thought of that now, thank you GreenGoblin). this is how: we read the installation instructions for these systems and research some challenges and problems people encounter installing these and ask a few questions of the person you are interviewing to see if they have ready answers (do not ask untrained people or other homeowners what might be good questions because they might give you nonsense that the contractor might not understand; pull your questions from approved sources). If they have the answers it means they have read the directions and overcome past issues. (assuming you are dealing with a smaller company and the installer is the owner/salesperson; i will explain how to deal with a larger company in a moment):
As forgiving and understanding of others as this Brooklyn community might be, do not assume that language is the reason someone is having trouble responding to questions you might put to them; if someone is here doing this work correctly at this level (this is technical work) it means they have been here for at least 10 years and have done a lot of other work (and learned a lot by making a lot of mistakes; if people do not realize when they make a mistake, they are not learning) and they have spoken to a lot of people along the way to the point that language will not be an issue. if you (remotely) think language is the issue, it would be safer for your wallet if you would assume that they only started doing this last month or last year and have not spent a lot of time doing much else in related fields to learn even the basics that men like me learned while we were still in our formative years (high school).
if you are talking to a larger company that relies on salespeople with no field experience and has multiple crews working without the owner on each job, and they charge MORE money, I think i would inquire about the training the field supervisors have and would ask if they have attended manufacturer’s training programs. If i am going to hire a big company and spend more money, i would expect their field supervisors have attended those programs and might even be certified if the manufacturers offer such. That is the trade off, go with a smaller, cheaper company where the owner has been trained and cares and is on each job or go with a larger, more expensive company where the installation team is professionally trained.
I am not consulting on these kinds of installs but am available for consultation on other systems such as roofs, parapet walls and related water intrusion issues (including on EIFS) and smaller construction and renovation projects. i am available to coach DIY and have recently told two people from this board how to maintain their roofs.
Steve
Brownstone Home Inspection LLC
eg66 | 1 year and 5 months ago
We are pricing non-ducted minisplits with hyperheat and are getting quotes ranging 40k-90k — exact same materials and scope and plan. In this case I actually think HVAC installs are wildly inflated due to incentives that previously covered a great deal of the cost (allowing them to do seemingly random pricing) and I am paying the overheat of slick marketing for some larger companies — I actually think higher cost will be lower quality in this case. We may forego the incentives, buy materials ourselves, and have a trusted friend of our former landlord do the install. As for comparison, I would ask for a breakdown of materials and labor. HVAC seems to be a special case of screwy comparisons; our bathroom remodel quotes have been consistent within 4k.
justinromeu26 | 1 year and 5 months ago
Just know that what Cate suggests- lots of experience – generally translates to a higher price.
cate | 1 year and 5 months ago
Also if it’s ducted are you working with an architect to maximize the clever and streamlined placement of everything? They may also know some good HVAC people they have worked with before.
cate | 1 year and 5 months ago
Try to figure out how long the work will take and with how many people and roughly estimate the cost of labor and materials. Personally, I would tend to go with someone with lots of experience who has well trained people who have been with the firm for many years and who is recommended by people I know. You will likely need someone reliable for service every year after as well.
justinromeu26 | 1 year and 5 months ago
First, there are people on here who have been through this recently who can comment on cost. one commentator, Randolph, has gone through this and even though he did this for a home located outside of the city, I would bet he can say something to cost. My neighbor was talking to me about what they charge the other day because he is thinking of going into this as a job.
There is published data on the ‘net regarding every possible home project but you have to be careful about your sources. there are a lot of kids with no experience in anything but bs writing articles and some of them will try to make data gathered in East Bunny Hole, Iowa work here in NYC – and it won’t be realistic. No matter how you cut it, NYC is more expensive for everyone – including contractors.
I must ask, how many bids have you gotten? two? not enough. you need three. at minimum. if you have a spread of 35-80 and have three with one in the middle, get a fourth. at that point, if you get a fourth and that 35k one is a lot lower than the other three, you would be wise to discard it. you can try to keep it, but what you have to do is study the materials and processes and then look at reviews and put that contractor under the microscope. You will find it will be better to discard the lowest bid.
you must be aware of something with this industry; with the exception of the electrical work, anyone can install these. anyone with a license to handle whatever refrigerant it is that they are now specifying. having that license does not mean anyone is competent to perform this work. it only means they are supposed to know not to vent these gases to the atmosphere and most of them don’t care about that either.
a lot has been said on here about equipment that should last 15-20 years only lasting 7 because someone who did not know what they were doing or could not follow manufacturer’s directions did the install. I blame the city for that for not regulating this industry. Be careful.