Pricing and Making Bid Estimates
For Contracts
We
are finally at the part I know you have been waiting for. When pricing a job,
it’s best to physically stop by and see the job site or building that you are
offering cleaning service to later perform. However, I will show you how to bid
on jobs without seeing them or leaving your office until it is time to go out
and do the building cleaning or a little construction work. In the Construction
Data Company (CDC) newspaper, you will find that, before the project even
starts, the owner or architect has usually posted estimates for the projects
that you are interested in bidding on. The pre-amounts they plan to spend on
each of these projects are listed there to help things get started even before
you do your own research or review blue prints and specifications. This is a
big help for you. For example, as I take a quick glance at just one of these
semiweekly construction newspapers full of information, I see about five
hundred different projects that are coming up for bid very soon, are already
accepting bids, or will be accepting bids in the near future. A sample entry
might read, Project: “Penn Valley Office Building, Location: 1200 North Lincoln
Road, Vacaville, California, Estimated Value: $20,000,000 to $25,000,000, Bid
Type: Owner/Architect Subcontract to General Contractor, Update: All General
Building Subcontractors Bids Due July 2009 to select, Architect: Johnsons
Associates & Architects Inc., Structure Engineer: Allen Engineering LTD,
Size: 90,000 Square Feet, Details: 1 story technical office building. Owner:
Christopher & Brooks Inc., Contact: Bob Davis, Owner Reprehensive for
General information, [with his phone and fax number].” You will also find past
bid results in the CDC publications with up dates of who the successful bidders
are. This information will let you know in detail of who the low bidders are
and, for example, who also is the general contractor for the control of the
construction phase of this above new building project. Also, their names, phone
numbers, fax numbers, and addresses can be a big help to you. Send your bids
and flyers in to this successful bidding general contractor who is the low in
charge bidder, if you want to be a subcontract for your services such as a
building cleaning, painting, electrical, dry wall, roofing, flooring, plumbing,
carpet insulation, windows, doors, carpentry, and lumber, or any other type of
specialty contractor. You should always send in all of your bids as soon as you
can, before or after the first bidding dates (July 2009, in the example above).
The general contractor will be paid most of the money because he has been
contracted to do the job and he will hire or subcontract parts of the job to
other, often smaller, specialty businesses contractors. For example, if the
general contractor wins the bid to build the building for $ 20,000,000 to $
25,000,000, his company will build the new building from the start plans to
finish. As an owner/architect of the building project, the general contractor
will be hired by the architect, who will approve the general contractor’s work
as by plans, and make sure that the project is finished on time and on budget.
The architect will put all the money in escrow accounts for the general contractor
as well as to pay himself and to spend as he see fit each month, dispersing and
controlling the owners millions until the project is finished. Again, most of
the money will go to the general contractor, who will hire subcontractors like
us to do the building cleaning, carpentry, plumbing, and so on, if we are the
low bidders for him or if we present the most attractive trade bid proposal. No
matter what your trade, you should mail or fax your bids to the one successful
construction companies or general
contractors, developers, construction managers, builder, who may use any of
these different titles but they are all still general contractor just the same,
who will soon be putting up this new building. Remember that there are thousands
of these types of bids that are ready for you to work with or look over each
month in CDC publications.
You
can also become the big general contractor, owner, or developer if you decide
to buy some property, contact an architect and let him put a set of plans
together for you, so you can put up a building you are interested in owning.
Get the plans approved by the city planning commission, and then take them to
all different types of financial institutions in your area to find the funding
you need to put up your new building. Often you will hear about people getting
rich in real estate. In this book, you will learn just how some of these real
estate millionaires got so rich and are getting even richer by researching how
to put up, own buildings and providing good service, will make you rich as
well. If you do your homework, stay creative, work hard, and most of all take
action, you can do the same thing. Please note that you will always have to do
a little more research to do this, but that’s why I’m trying to give you some
new ideas about how things work, to make more of the dirty millions you desire,
the clean building contractor’s way. I will talk about many of these ideas in
more detail in my next book.