Archive for June, 2007
Run, Run, Run…
Tuesday, June 26th, 2007=Phew!= It’s been a busy couple of weeks. So busy, in fact, I’ve been too tired to be able to put my thoughts down here. So if you’ve been following along, my apologies.
I think I’ve lost track of some of the more incidental problems I’ve taken care of for folks. But the bulk of my time the last couple of weeks has been consumed with building hotel like covers for "in window" style air conditioners, along with doing other little maintenance chores for a very nice disabled lady. The air conditioners were to be installed on the South East face of the building. You know what the winter storms are like around here. They always come from the south — along with driving rain etc. etc. So allowing the air conditioners to breath while keeping them protected — and making sure the covers were sealed into the window frames — was all critically important.
And on other fronts, I’ve got some half a dozen larger jobs stewing along on the stove in various states of approval. One is really cool and I hope it works out: A lovely hot tub on a specially built deck overlooking Trinidad Bay!
Sounds cool doesn’t it?
Last week and this I’ve also been helping a college student get her mobile home ready to sell. The poor lady has been unable to finish her masters degree because of funding cuts for research projects. I gather several other students in her major have left for Davis where they can get funding to complete their research.
Anyway, getting her old mobile squared away will probably continue off and on for the rest of the week. She’s actually spending college loan money to do this, so it’s been more along the lines of education than work. I’m trying to keep the costs down (way down) for her, so I’ve been doing the skilled part, then teaching her how to do low skill tasks like taping and finishing and painting.
She’s a worker, so it’s working out so far, and has been rather fun.
Technorati Tags: building maintenance, air conditioning
Your Custom Project
Sunday, June 10th, 2007I’ve been getting so many questions about “how projects go” that it seems an essay on the subject is in order. My hope is that it will help folks who are contemplating either a new custom home or business project or a major renovation of an existing home or business.
I’ve written this in a plain talk question and answer interview format based on the subjects I’ve been repeatedly asked about. By “plain talk” I mean, I’m telling it as it is, like I would if we met on the street. No flowery language, no sales soft talk. So go grab a beer (or whatever turns your Twinkie) and read on!
How does this work? Where do we start?
You start by finding someone who can take your ideas and put them to paper in a way that makes sense to other building professionals and, of course, to the bureaucracy that must bless them. I’ll give you my thoughts on how to go about finding that person below. In the mean time, let me address the “how this works” part.
Building regulations vary from state to state, from municipality to municipality, and quite often from inspector to inspector. In some places a very simple set of plans (blue prints) is acceptable for even very complex projects. In other places they want an insane amount of detail for even simple jobs. Then there are the non-building regulations that may affect your project. Here in California we have the California Coastal Commission to deal with, among other lovely agencies. You might have a few special jewels in your area too.
All that said, the basic track of a new project remains the same in many respects. Your architect or designer will take your ideas and put them into a nice neat form that both of you can see. You can request models — 3D computer models or physical models, or both — make changes and manipulate things until you’re happy with the result. Then the technical work begins as the structural details of the design are worked out. Finally, the final plans are produced. For many projects, a plot plan will have to be produced, and unless the building site is flat, a slope survey will have to be conducted. In rare cases a surveyor may have to be hired. Obviously, “site work” does not have to be done for condo jobs.
Once the final plans are completed, the engineering is done and the surveys are wrapped up, your architect or designer will start the documents through the regulatory process to obtain the building permits. In the mean time, unless the designer is a design/builder, requests for quotes will be put out (RFQs) to start the bidding process by builders.
Finally, once you’ve accepted a bid, the actual construction can start.
Who do I get to do this?
In some states, and in some jurisdictions within states with different rules, only “design professionals” can do architectural drafting and design. A “design professional” is a licensed architect or engineer.
In many other states (including California) the vast majority of residential design work is done by contractors and unlicensed design professionals. They’re usually cheaper than an architect.
I’m on a tight budget. How do I prevent cost over-runs?
As you probably know, construction projects are famous for going over time and budget. And not just residential projects. All construction projects, even government contracts. I’ve seen architects turn in designs that cost two and three times the budgeted amount to build more than once. And getting those projects parred back down to budget size costs in both time and money.
With that under your belt, if you want your project to fit into your budget, don’t ignore this advice (like many clients do, to their detriment):
- Play to the bottom end of your budget bracket. You’ll be glad you did, believe me! In other words, if you have a $200k to $300k budget, keep your designer working in the $200k range. Nobody, and I mean nobody, is going to be able to tell you exactly what its going to cost to build your project until you actually see the numbers on the bid papers. Everybody from your designer to the engineer to the building department will be working with numbers based on experience. They’ll be “in the ball park”; they’ll also be wrong — usually on the low side. Play it safe. Keep it low, it’ll come in about right.
- Keep a tight reign on your enthusiasm. It’s easy to catch design fever. Design is fun, both for you and your designer. It’s fun to dream; it’s fun to see a dream come alive. But in the building business small changes can add up to big bucks real real fast. You are responsible for managing your emotions. Don’t expect your designer to be the parent and tell you no. That’s your job.
- Ask questions and listen to the answers. Keeping in mind number 1 above (nobody can tell you exactly what your project is going to cost), there are expensive ways to do things (and expensive things to do) and inexpensive ways to do things. Anybody whose been in this business awhile knows the difference. Your designer might show you a really pretty castle-rock facade and you might love it. She might also not bring up, or only mention as a side note, that rock facades of any kind are really expensive to install (compared to more normal siding options). So ask questions and make sure to pay attention to the answers. All the answers. If this is “expensive” and that is “expensive” and two weeks ago she described something as “expensive” don’t be surprised if you come in over budget! Which reminds me:
- Don’t expect answers in dollars and cents. Even if you got them, they’d be wrong because prices of building materials are volatile. More useful for your purposes in design are adjectival answers: Expensive, high, average, low. In the same vein: Don’t expect your designer to give you a “line item budget”. You won’t get one, because nobody has one. (See “getting a budget” below.) Even if someone did produce one for you A) the numbers would be wrong by the time you got to bid (see my first sentence above) and B) you wouldn’t understand all the technical lingo in the 100 odd page document anyway.
- Don’t succumb to sticker shock. Despite everybody’s best intentions, projects often come in much higher than the designer thinks. Some of this is due to the ever increasing demand for building materials. Some of it is “the fever”. Whatever. The point is, it happens; it’s normal; it’s nothing to lose sleep over. Does it mean you and your designer and his team may have to rethink a few things? Sure. Will it cost a bit more to do that rethinking? Yes. You know what? It happens on more projects than it doesn’t happen on, both industrial sized large projects valued in the millions and on small ones. It’s the part of nailing down a design everybody hates because it’s disappointing. It’s where you have to par your dreams back into the reality of your budget. Do your poor designer a favor: Hold your nose, buckle down, and help him get ‘er done! Then move on.
How do I get the best person for my job?
The standard government answer is: Ask for references and samples of prior work, and ask for quotes. Then take the lowest bidder with good references. It probably works for some people. I’ve had people give me that grill. In my opinion it’s terrible advice!
Ask yourself this: Would you ever knowingly list someone as a reference on your resume whom you thought would give you a bad reference? Didn’t think so. So if you’re going to follow the “get references” advice you might as well save yourself some trouble and just ask for a company advertising brochure. No company is going to show you work they’re not proud of or give you contact information for a reference that’s going to say something bad.
And as for choosing the lowest bidder: Would you say the quality of work the government gets by using the “lowest qualified bidder” is stellar? My father was a government contractor. He once got into hot water with the government for not using the “lowest qualified bidder” method for selecting subcontractors. So, for the next job he did. The quality was so bad he had to call the subcontractor back twice and the job was still substandard. He never did it again—and was never asked to do it again by the contracting government agency.
A much more sensible approach, at least as far as I’m concerned, is to call around and talk to folks. Then call the one(s) you liked back and talk some more. Pick there mind, get to know them, how they think, what they think about your project. Ask around a bit and see what kind of reputation they’ve got. If you hit it off with one and they’ve got a good rep in the community, that’s the one!
Design/build or design/bid/build?
As is now pretty much common knowledge, design/build has quite a few build in advantages over design/bid/build. That said, I personally don’t like locking clients into a complete design/build with no escape from the contract. So in my design/build contract I state that I will provide a construction budget, and that budget has to be approved by the client. If the client doesn’t like my price, they’re free to go hire someone else with no penalty payment due me.
Sometimes I may not be the right builder for a job, even though both I and the client had every intention of me doing the build after finishing design. Because I’m just that way, I’ll point the customer client to a better option. Sometimes I might even do the leg work for them in getting my replacement.
How long should it take to get a budget after the construction documents are completed and filed?
Producing a construction budget is no small task! It takes a half a dozen people a minimum of forty man hours to produce the initial budget documentation for the prime contractor (the one you’re hiring). Many prime contractors will put in about forty hours of their own at the same time to produce a quality control estimate to compare values too. Then, after getting the outlying budgets, they have to work those number, another 40 hours. So it can take three weeks to a month to get actual numbers that work for your project. And remember nobody is getting paid to do this! Estimating (as it’s called in the trade) is part of every company’s overhead cost.
Se be patient. And don’t expect to see a “line item budget”. You won’t. Those are internal company documents written in constructioneeze. What you’ll get is a price.
Is there anything I can do to minimize delays and get the job done on time?
Short answer: Nope!
Everybody complains about delays—including me. In fact, sometimes I get downright rude at the causer of said delay.
And that gets right to the point: No matter how many laws get passed, no matter how many regulations are promulgated, there are going to be delays. Temper fits or no temper fits; rules and regs or no rules and regs.
Whatever deadline is set, it has about a 30% chance of being met, and I have no idea why! Nobody has any idea why (though politicians will pontificate loudly as though they’re certain they do). There are so many moving pieces in every project that it’s impossible to point at one ahead of time and say “that’s going to hold us up.” I’ve had company estimators disappear on vacation after promising to get me a complex “take off” (a list of materials and prices) “in about a week.” I’ve had engineers over book themselves and then have trouble finding suitable subs to take my job. I’ve seen building departments grind a whole job to a stop half way through because something already approved on the blue prints is suddenly now not okay. So government engineers and the engineer of record get into a fight over what the codes say and whose right and whose wrong. And while they’re fighting, the job is shut down. Storms close roads and shut down building sites. The flu cuts through work crews like wild fire, slowing progress. A truck load of needed materials get stuck in a blizzard in Canada on its way to the job site, causing a work stoppage.
The list of stupid, inane, silly seeming things that can cause delays is nearly endless. And trust me, some of them will probably happen on your job.
So there you have it. A short Q and A about custom building projects.
There’s Water Under the House! Post-3
Tuesday, June 5th, 2007Okay. As promised, here’s the somewhat tardy end to the sump pump project.
Below is a picture of the pump in place. Notice that it’s just sitting in a five gallon bucket. (In plumbing land they call them "basins.") You know, the type that you find in the hardware store? There used to be rather fancy, special, rubberized plastic basins for this sort of job. Now they’re only available for big gray water sump pumps.
The big hole facing you is for water running down to the basin from your point of view. Also note the screw in the outlet pipe. A little feature I added to allow the pump to be changed without having to cut the PVC pipe. It squirts a bit of water, but the pump is so powerful it doesn’t matter. It pumps the five gallon bucket dry in about 10 seconds!
And here’s a picture of the outlet to the street drain. To the right is the core that I drilled out of the stem wall. The green rectangular pipe is the gutter drain.
Notice that the PVC is neither glued nor screwed into the ABS tee. It wasn’t needed. The friction fit is tight, and everything is so secure when assembled it will stay that way until someone decides to physically take it apart.
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Again, thinking ahead to maintenance day reduces the cost of repairs.
At left is a picture of the pump before I installed it in the basin. The funny looking thing attached to it is the float switch that automatically cycles the pump when the basin is full. It’s a nice pump with a 2 year warranty.
Here’s a picture of the main trench running down the center of the house. It gets rather deep in places, as you can see. There’s a hump in the middle of the house, that’s why.
After getting the pump set and plumbed, all that was left was the vapor barrier. There were some problems with that, as you can see in the picture below. (That’s my glove in the foreground. I took it off to take the picture.) The main drain is slightly below grade at this point, and what looks like the mess of insulation is actually insulation wrapped around a central air vent pipe. At the very top edge of the frame, in the middle, you can just see the girder. At this point there’s no way to get the vapor barrier under, over, or even between things in this tight space.
Still, overall it came out satisfactorily. 80% coverage is considered adequate, and we managed to achieve well over 90% coverage with the vapor barrier. In fact, I could feel the difference in temperature beneath the house after it was all down. Much warmer. Much drier.
Technorati Tags: drainage, sump pump, maintenance, repair, vapor barrier
