Quotes!

How many builders should you get to quote for the job? How do you choose who to pick? What should a quote entail?

1. Get as many quotes as you can.

Not all builders will get back to you, some will pull out because their job diary fills up, some you will not like the look of when you meet them and some will just be well over what you can afford.

Out of the 7 builders we approached, five came back with quotes. One was too high and two were from builders who we we had begun to have reservations about. So that left us with two to choose from.

2. There is no simple quote.

Not one of our builders gave us a full breakdown of costs in the first instance. The most we got was 2 A4 sheets of paper with a total at the bottom which gave us very little information to compare one quote with another.

One builder, after some pressing, gave us a full breakdown which allowed us to judge the other quotes.

3. Inclusions, exclusions

All the builders include and exclude different things making it very difficult to do a “like for like” comparison. So one includes insurance, another doesn’t. You have to use your judgement on this – and do some research to check what it actually means in terms of costs.

4. Prime costs and provisional costs

Builders will always have some items that they know are likely to vary during the job, based on what the client wants. So things like tiling and bathroom fittings and tiling. These are called Prime costs. These varied wildly on our quotes. My advice is to do your own research on what you think it is likely to cost – go to bathroom showrooms and get a price for your goods, price tiles that you think you might like – and adjust the builder’s quotes accordingly. For example we were quoted anything from $25 a metre to $50 a metre for tiles. Prime costs are easy for you to take on board so long as you know what you like and what your budget is. But be careful of prime costs that are out of your control – like for concrete for instance.

Provisional costs are where the builder doesn’t know how much something is going to cost at the time of providing a quote. So it could be that a contractor has not got back to them or it is impossible to get a price. These are also dangerous areas as they could blow out a lot. Sometimes you can sit with the builder and ask how he came at the figure he came at and then work out the risk of it going up yourself , or you can simply compare his price with others. One of our builders had a provisional cost of excavation of $7000 and another $15000 – $8000 of difference and who was right?

5. It takes time

From sending our our plans and schedules to getting the final quotes in took about 2 months. Be prepared for the delay.

6. Your plans might have to change

Based on the quotes we realised that moving our car port was going to be a very expensive exercise and not at all worth it. We also realised that the proposed fireplace was an expensive luxury we probably couldn’t afford at this time. So our plans will need to be amended so we can get the budget right.