Planning Archives

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Sometimes Going Forward Takes Compromise

· June 30, 2016

People have different reasons for wanting to get something built. Usually, there is a disconnect between what they want to build and what they can afford to build.

Recently a friend was working on a project for a non-profit, where the design committee had stated that the project budget was 20 million dollars.

Monopoly houses The project was well into designs and the design team had put together a beautiful looking project. The cost of construction was estimated to be about 18.3 million dollars, all in. The team felt great! They had successfully designed a beautiful looking project well within budget, or so they thought.

Then, literally an hour before the team went to present the project to the city board, the donor told the team the donation would be five million, not the budgeted amount.

They asked me to help figure out how they could get the entire project down to five million, so we spent the weekend crunching numbers and whittling away at the project.

That following Monday, we presented the list of suggested cuts which included reducing the square footage of buildings, reducing ceiling heights, re-positioning buildings, combining spaces, and using different materials. It was all budget driven, but the owner was still not at all happy with all the suggested cuts.

Realistically, the owner can get all of the necessary project functions into a project that will cost five million, but taking any project from 18 million down to 5 million, will drastically change the project size, scope, and quality. In the end, it may have changed everything so much that they don’t build anything resembling what they wanted.

The worst part is that now they have a design that they cannot use, have purchased land they may not use, and have spent upwards of one million dollars on everything to date.

In every project, it is of utmost importance that the people responsible for design and those responsible for funding, are on the same page.

In this case, the design committee never wanted to have the donor involved or informed, and had no other relevant donors. They were setting themselves up for a failure and didn’t even know it.

It didn’t have to happen that way. If the design committee really wanted to build something useful, they needed to compromise on the project size, scope and quality. If they couldn’t, they will have wasted a million dollars on a plan they cannot afford to build on property they cannot use.

Categories : Big Picture, Budget, Construction, Planning, Project Management, Uncategorized

Tags : Building Budget, Construction Cost Estimate, Design Your House within Budget

About tall ceilings

Posted by Richard Cartright

· October 21, 2013

Tall ceilings help make a space, any space, feel larger. Raise the ceiling and instantly you feel like a weight has been lifted off your head.

Buildings and houses built in the late 18th and early 19th century before the advent of air conditioning often had tall ceilings as a natural design element to help keep people cool. This was especially true in warm climates.

Tall ceilings help keep people cool in warm weather because warm air rises. For centuries before the invention of air conditioning, through a process called thermal (or air) stratification. Air stratification is a natural process where air forms bands of different temperatures, with the hottest air rising to form the highest band. Ceiling heights started shrinking in the 1930’s, as air conditioning became more widely available.

Unfortunately today, tall ceilings are often a problem for the same reason—air stratification.

Building codes today commonly call for ceilings with a minimum height of 7′-0″ to 8′-0″ with no specified maximum, this is mostly so tall people won’t smack their heads on everything hanging from the ceiling. New residential construction these days often has ceilings from 10′-0″ to 15′-0″ feet high. In commercial and institutional construction you can easily find ceiling heights that exceed 20′-0″ feet. In these tall spaces air can easily stratify in bands that exceed the height of a person. This means that if the space is not properly engineered, you can have the heat on full-blast in winter and still be cold in the room.

Ceiling fans, when properly sized, do a good job of preventing air stratification by keeping the air moving around the room. In the absence of ceiling fans the mechanical system must be powerful enough to overcome the distance to the floor.

Categories : Big Picture, Planning, Uncategorized

Tags : ceiling fan, ceiling height, home remodeling ideas, Home Remodeling Tips, tall ceiling

Making FF&E, Material and Finish Selections

Posted by Richard Cartright

· October 9, 2013

The term FF&E is an acronym for Furniture, Fixtures, and Equipment.

Furniture is movable items such as tables and chairs. Fixtures are the immovable items such as cabinets. Equipment is a machine such as a water-heater or air conditioner. All are used to make a house or other space suitable for living and/or working.

Materials and Finishes, are generally talked about in one of two ways; products and construction materials. Every product you choose while developing your project plan will be made of a specific material with specific finish options.

People sometimes use the terms Material and Finish, interchangeably, but they are not the same thing. Material is what a raw component is actually made of, while the term Finish describes the sheen, color, and texture.

For example, people often talk about paint as if it is a finish, which it is, but only in the context of being applied to another product, like drywall (sheet rock). However, nowadays the paint itself comes in countless finish combinations when considering available colors, texture additives (like popcorn), and sheen such as gloss, semi-gloss and flat.

Manufacturers differentiate their product lines by generally providing better materials, finishes and options in higher priced products.

The same is true in construction. The qualities of products on the market today generally fit into many different categories: Economy, Basic, Common, Deluxe, Luxury, and Custom – or other similar words. Companies can use different words to describe the same quality level, even among manufacturers of similar products.

There are incalculable combinations of Material, Finish and product combinations. There are so many, there is no way to cover all of them, but don’t let that overwhelm you.

Construction Conductor explains how you can use that to your advantage in Who Selects What.

Categories : Coordination, Planning, Project Management, Residential, Residential Construction

Tags : Bathroom Renovation, Home Remodeling Tips, Kitchen Renovation, Landscaping Renovation, Project Planning, Real Estate Investment

Dear Construction Conductor

Posted by Richard Cartright

· July 12, 2013

Dear Construction Conductor:

What is the cheapest and best way to get several design ideas for my full kitchen remodel? I know I want to remove a wall, so I will have to use an architect.

Sincerely,
On a Budget, Austin, TX

Dear On a Budget,

Thank you for your question. The cheapest and best way to get several design ideas for your full kitchen remodel is to look at several magazines, perform internet searches, buy or borrow a few home design books and even watch the DIY channel. If you’re like most people, you won’t find one project where you like everything presented. Most people find an element here and an element there and end up piecing the ideas together. As you find project elements you like, make a color copy of the source image (if you can), and identify the element you liked on the copy so you can refer back to it.

Make a list of everything you want to change in your kitchen, referring back to the copied element images. Break your project down in to major groups based on your specific needs; Flooring, Wall tile, Cabinets, Counter, Painting, Plumbing, Electrical, and in your case Carpentry because you want to move a wall. Whether you need an architect depends mainly on answering two questions; is the wall structural, and what is the building departments’ requirement in your jurisdiction?

If the wall is structural, meaning that it is required to hold up the floor or roof above and your jurisdiction allows, you could look for a contractor capable of doing the final design and construction. Do you know if the wall is structural? Sometimes it’s hard to tell, without investigating the manner of construction in the attic or through minor demolition. If you have no idea how to tell whether the wall is structural, ask a few contractors and compare their possibly varying opinions. In the end, if you do your homework, clearly define what you want, get the best contractor for the best and most-inclusive starting price and have a system and methodology for maintaining control throughout construction, the project will work out well.

Categories : Planning, Project Manager, Residential

Tags : Design Ideas, Home Renovation, House Remodel, Kitchen Decor, Kitchen Remodeling, Residential Architect

The “Beat This” Strategy

Posted by Richard Cartright

· April 12, 2011

Competitive Bidding

The following is an excerpt from a discussion between a client and me. In his desire to try to get the lowest possible bid, he suggested a strategy and wanted to know what I thought of it.

Client:
I think there is one more bid out there. I think I should call a couple of companies and tell them they can bid on it and the bid to beat is X$. What do you think of that strategy?

Me:
How many bids do you have?

Calling more companies and asking them to bid is no problem, especially if you feel you do not have enough bids, but I am not a fan of that Strategy at all. While it might get you the lowest bid, it will most likely not be the lowest project cost, which is an important distinction. Here is what typically goes wrong in that scenario. At best: The next contractor wants to be lower, so they will start including even cheaper materials and lower allowances. There is a point at which the bid no longer resembles the Scope or Work. If the Scope of Work still reflects what you want, then you should let the Scope drive the price, not the other way around. At Worst: The honest and competitive people will become disinterested and pull out all together.

If there is an imbalance between the Scope and the Bids, then now is the time to modify the Scope. The better way to proceed is to start evaluating the bids we have, and communicating with all the contractors. Acquiring the bids is only the end of the initial stage of the Bidding Process. Now we need to evaluate the bids to make sure they are realistic, inclusive, and appropriate. If you want to stay in control, we are going to have questions about the bids regarding, allowances, material quantities and selection, timing, etc. Answers to those questions can affect the bid.

Contractors will typically hold their bid 30 days, not more. That is because material costs change over time. While seemingly unpredictable, in actuality the cost of the raw material commodity globally, drives the cost of the finished material locally. The more material there is and the closer to the supply chain you are, the more this is true. Libya, an important oil-producing nation is currently in turmoil. It is unclear what is going to happen there, but it looks like Muammar Gaddafi is going to have to flee. While the U.S. does not use that oil for making Asphalt and uses very little of it at all, Europe uses a good percentage of Libyan oil. Following the laws of supply and demand, if Europe starts having to use a greater percentage of oil from American suppliers, the cost to America will go up. Everything then is likely to follow, as is the nature with the global market. We saw this 15 years ago, when China underwent their big construction boom of the 90’s. At the same time America was in a building boom and at one point, the cost of copper was increasing every 15 to 30 days.

If you want to invite additional bidders, I would start by calling all of the current bidders and letting them know that you have unfortunately had to extend the bidding period and ask them if they are able to hold their price another 30 days. No reason should be necessary. Then I would call all new contractors, invite them, but set the timeline upfront so that you do not lose the interest of the people who already got you their bids. When you receive all of the bids, complete the Competitive Bidding Process.

Categories : Planning

A plan for the investment house.

Posted by

· April 12, 2011

There’s a certain panic in the air right now, all the lip service Ive been paying to these game changing house projects I’ve talked up.
Up to now Ive had all kinds of things in my path, like Christmas shopping- the holidays- holiday take-downs and put-aways, and finally the Super bowl. So now I think I need a plan.

Being in the industry my whole adult life, Work is work and generally I move in directions that utilize materials I have or are available to me.
Next the degree of difficulties due to obstructions. Ultimately comforts can also be measured by resetting the grief meter with nearest critics; the wife and neighbors.
So any way to get out of the hole making traction, has potential benefits.

For me this year that project is the house next door.
The house was in bad shape when we bought it, and we bought it mostly to have control over it (bad experiences with previous owners).
To date the work done consists of a new septic and sewer piping to it, and 3 new skylights.
My next project is raising the floor to take a huge dip out of it. After assessing the structural situation. The real problem with the floor leveling is the previous attempts which were done wrong and now create a huge obstacle to undo.

After looking at the problems with trying to level on top of the floor, my newest approach will be to work perpendicular creating a beam directly under a wall and jacking up the beam from 2 new concrete pads, then supporting the beam with 2 mini posts.

If I’m lucky this just may make the leveling above the floor minimal by comparison.

This is my time of year to set up mini projects with in a project, besides the floor leveling, Ive taken advantage of material sales and stock piled drywall and doors to install after the floor leveling.
Besides that, I have my eye out for deals on roofing and paint.
By procuring the material now I’m mentally committing myself plus I’m trying to thoroughly think through the mini projects and once I start up I should be able to roll from one to another.
Well I guess were all arm chair quarterbacks in January, but now that’s done and this is my plan to get on a roll!
Ill keep you posted,

Another view from a loose screw!

Categories : Planning, Residential

Tags : Project Planning