The Contracting Universe

by Doctor Science

So, how do you pick people to do your home renovations?

Right now we've got:

a) a general contractor, picked by the "has done projects for one of our best friends" method.

b) an electrician and generator-installer, picked by the "recced by another close friend" method.

c) a well-digger and water-system-installer, picked by the "recced by realtor, then returned calls in a competent manner" method.

Now I'm trying to find a kitchen designer. I picked three who are nearby, have kitchen-designer accreditation, have pictures on their websites of things I like. Only one of them has successfully returned my calls & emails and met with me. Should I keep trying to track down a second opinion, or should we just go with her?

I admit, part of my trouble with these decisions is that I want to be able to use my father's method for hiring workers: the handshake. Dad doesn't even believe in getting estimates, he says "the worker is worthy of his hire" and does everything on the basis of trust.

My mom says it drove her nuts at first, but it really works for him. He grew up in a working-class household, union when they could get it (but they often couldn't), and he really can relate to guys in construction. He works alongside them, they call him "the Professor" and take him to the bar for a beer after work.

But then, both my parents have a Sociability Superpower: they can start conversations and make connections with *anyone*, they're fundamentally interested in people of all kinds. While still being introverts in many ways -- like I said, it's a Superpower. I can try to imitate it, but I don't really *have* it -- and I somehow doubt the construction guys will invite me along to the bar after work.

Construction Workers by Steinlen, whom I knew mostly for his pictures of cats. [image source].

Comments

[russell]

Talk to *at least* one other designer. For interior design work, a good fit between you and the designer is actually really important.

With all respect to your dad, who sounds like my kind of guy, get estimates. It's not just a matter of keeping your contractor honest, you need that information for your own budgeting and decision making.

Once the wood is cut, you own it.

Best of luck!

[Laura V]

Ask your GC who they've worked with and would recommend, is what I'd say -- they should not only be able to find you someone, but the designer will be more likely to talk to you if you have a GC they know already on board.

[Disclosure: FIL & MIL run a design/build operation; she's the design, he's the build. We don't live near them but we've had her do our design work & a local company build it, and that worked fine -- but probably next time we'll go the all-local route.]

[wj]

I'd definitely second the suggestion to ask your general contractor for references to interior decorators that he has worked with. You still have to see if their vision fits yours. But at least you will know that they won't design something that is un-buildable. Or not buildable on budget.

[Doctor Science]

Thanks for the advice, guys, I'll definitely talk to the GC tomorrow morning.

[paulo]

talk to one other at least and decide for yourself who you want. Especially if the one that returned your call acts as if it is his job (or he really wants this job)

Do not go by "testimonials" like bank prefered lists. Maybe other friends are ok.

Do no give points for living within your community unless you know the person.

[bobbyp]

work with your designer to define the scope of work clearly.
don't trust a handshake? have a written contract with the GC. Don't go for 50% down (common tactic for undercapitalized remodelers) demands absent a substantial price break.
gain some rudimentary understanding of your state's lien laws. Know if and who your GC is subcontracting to and who are his major suppliers. Otherwise, you might wind up paying twice.

#1 cost directive: once you start the physical work, do everything possible to NOT START CHANGING THINGS. That road leads to budget disaster.

good luck!

[dr ngo]

Rule #1: Don't ask me.

Reason: We contracted last April to have our swimming pool re-painted. I trusted the guy, shook hands, etc. Folksy, kept saying he'd been doing this for 30 years, and I believe it. He screwed up (mixing the epoxy) big time, then stopped returning phone calls. Not only are we out the money we paid him -- after the pool was painted, but before the paint started peeling off -- but it may take us five times (5x) as much again to fix it. That is, IF we can find someone (first guy we approached tried for three days, gave up; to his credit he accepted no pay, saying he only gets paid for work done and this work was not do-able). Lawyer says "Yes, you can sue, but if original painter is as broke as he claims, you may not collect as much as the attorney and court fees will cost."

Rule #2: see rule #1

[ABW]

OK, here's my horror story:
This morning I woke up to the sound of heavy machinery across the street and went over to chat with the neighbor. She was having her cement driveway redone (and it DID need to be redone) by a contractor recommended by a friend. I asked her if the contractor had done the blue-stake, where the utilities come out for free and mark where their lines are. No, he didn't deem it necessary.
Well, you guessed it, the contractor's backhoe dug up the gas line, and when I chatted with the gas utility person this afternoon, he said it was very fortunate there was no explosion and no one was killed. They were there all afternoon repairing the line, and he said someone would be paying...

[Brett Bellmore]

Wow, you guys are wealthy, aren't you? You can actually afford to pay other people to do work on your homes!

I do it myself, naturally, unless it requires very specialized equipment that's too expensive to buy for one job, and isn't for rent at Home Depot. In which case I think really hard about whether it actually needs doing. Helps that I'm a mechanical engineer who grew up with relatives in the building trades.

The upside of this, is it gets done by somebody who really cares, exactly how I want it. The downside is that there's nobody else to blame the mistakes on.

But it only costs materials, which is why I do it.

[Countme-In]

Keep a marriage counselor in your confidence and a divorce attorney on retainer.

Your General Contractor can probably make referrals.

[Brett Bellmore]

Probably. The one time I did hire contractors was when I built my first house, back in Michigan. Couldn't dig the basement myself in that hard clay in a feasible time, and an earth mover qualified as "too expensive to buy for one job".

Got a special, one time only interest free loan from the contractor, because he didn't want the income from the job to show up until after his divorce.

[cleek]

we just discovered that the builder of our 3 year old house never installed a vent pipe from the clothes dryer to the outside vent. so our dryer was hooked up to a very short pipe that just blew hot damp air and lint into the crawlspace.

because i hate being in the crawlspace, i hired a local handyman to come and do it. and it took him all day - like, 4 hours, counting two trips to the hardware store for parts. well worth the money, IMO.

[Ugh]

Wow, you guys are wealthy, aren't you? You can actually afford to pay other people to do work on your homes!

It's cheaper that way as I don't waste the time and money doing it wrong myself and end up paying someone else to rip out my crappy work and then do it correctly.

Doc - we redid the kitchen on our house 10 years with a design and build shop around the corner from us and while we are very happy with the result the process left a great deal to be desired. Same thing when we redid a couple bathrooms a few years later. There seems to never be a perfect contracting process in my experience.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

Tip#1: go back to that post some months ago about kitchen renovation.

Re: contract or DIY: know what you *can* do, what you have time and energy to do, for a quality that you're willing to accept. Hire someone for the other stuff.

It helps if you've done that stuff before, obviously; tends to dampen the false confidence.

It *always* takes longer. Always.

I've heard the advice: "File for divorce first, it'll save time later on" Perhaps not 100% true, but disturbingly close.

Good luck!

(Hey, can we get a 'home renovation horror stories' post going? It could be very informative, and should be pinned to the front-page like, forever).

[Brett Bellmore]

"we just discovered that the builder of our 3 year old house never installed a vent pipe from the clothes dryer to the outside vent."

Cousin of mine bought a custom house in a very expensive subdivision, one of those "bigfoot" jobs. After a while he started noticing a stink in the house. Turns out the vent from the plumbing stack ended in the attic, instead of going out the roof.

This is the sort of thing that *theoretically* gets caught in the inspections that supposedly result from drawing a permit. I know, when I built my house, I got all those inspections, including filling the entire plumbing stack with water, and going around inspecting all the joints for leaks.

That sort of thing doesn't get by unnoticed without official malfeasance. Your local building inspector is on the take.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Hey, can we get a 'home renovation horror stories' post going?"

When we bought our present house, it had really rotten carpeting, and we had a month before our lease on the apartment expired, and a couple grand in cash left.

I'd put hardwood flooring in my Mom's house; DIY hardwood flooring is roughly the same price per square food as hiring somebody to lay carpeting. So we picked out a nice cherry stained oak flooring from a nearby company that marketed odd lots of the stuff, bought the necessary tools off Craigs List, and had some 3/4" exterior grade plywood delivered from Home Depot. (Needed it because of the slab floor.)

The plywood arrived soaking wet, because they'd stored it outdoors. Dried it for as long as we had time for, and started laying flooring.

Eveything looked good at first, then a hump started rising down the center of the living room. The plywood hadn't dried enough, and when the moisture redistributed, the plywood shrank, and the hardwood swelled.

At one point the center of the room was 3 inches high, and bounced like a trampoline. Took two years to lay back down again.

Should have gotten a moisture probe, and made sure it was dry enough, or just waited another week. That was the room we started in, didn't happen anywhere else because the rest of the house had days more to dry.

[hairshirthedonist]

That sort of thing doesn't get by unnoticed without official malfeasance. Your local building inspector is on the take.

I guess it depends on how you define "official malfeasance" and "on the take." If they include, but are not limited to, respectively, "not really giving a shit and/or knowing anything" and "collecting a salary for doing nothing of particular value," I'd tend to agree.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

to add to HSH's list: "hang out/chat with these dudes every week for the past decade, so whatever"

Small-scale regulatory capture? Probably; but I'd guess that it really is "Joe Homeowner" that needs the extra set of eyes on his work to avoid boneheaded dangerous results. For the pro's, it's more an issue of cutting corners for time/cost, and subs that show up hung-over.

Brett's probably at the high end of the "homeowner DIY competency" spectrum

[wj]

Sometimes, "official malfeasance" seems like a too kind reading. When our town was going through its big growth phase, a developer put in one of the early gated-community subdivisions. They were all million dollar homes (and that's mid-1960s million dollars; say 10-15 million today).

My dad was a carpenter, and spent his career building houses. His take: "That's some of the shoddiest construction I have ever seen." And indeed, everybody who has ever lived there has constant had plumbing problems, etc. And somehow the building inspectors never caught anything.

But hey, Behring got super rich out of it. Got to build a car museum, move to Seattle, and buy a professional football team.

[hairshirthedonist]

The only major home renovation (well, upgrade, really) was having my basement finished. I was lucky enough to have a good friend of nearly 30 years at the time (over 30 years now) who did that kind of work on the side when he wasn't in pool-installation season. He had already finished a few friends' basements, which turned out great, and I knew he was more anal about doing everything right than I would be, even if I knew everything he did, which I don't.

It was about as worry-free a thing as that sort of thing can be.

But it was, again, a matter of luck. You have to know someone that well, and they have to be that good, not to mention available. Not everyone has that.

[Brett Bellmore]

"Brett's probably at the high end of the "homeowner DIY competency" spectrum"

Aside from growing up with relatives in the building trades, and helping put an addition on the family house as a teen, buy this. Seriously, buy it, even if you're going to hire contractors.

[Brett Bellmore]

Or one of the more recent books from Popular Mechanics. Seriously, I can't over-state how good their books on home repair and remodeling are. With the right one, you can build a house from scratch, and avoid making any major mistakes.

[bluefoot]

I am with Brett re the Popular Mechanics books. My parents had a set when I was growing up and they've been sufficient for all but the most major repairs or renovations i.e. things that required a backhoe or changes to supporting walls.

[russell]

Wow, you guys are wealthy, aren't you? You can actually afford to pay other people to do work on your homes!

I dunno, you can't be good at everything. Sometimes hiring out is actually the short money strategy.

Re: building inspectors, my experience has been sort of mixed, but in general positive.

When our guy came out to look at some work that we had hired someone to do, the inspection was somewhat cursory. But I think that gets filed under Snarki's "hang with these dudes" thing. The guy that did our work does a lot of work in our town, he is a really good contractor, and does great work. When you've looked at somebody's work for like the hundredth time, and their stuff is always good, maybe the microscope stays in its case.

When I did some stuff on the house on a DIY basis, the building inspector went out of his way to explain the permitting process, what I would need to submit when and to whom. I needed a zoning variance (for a 16 sf garden shed, don't ask) and he walked me through what to expect in *that* process, including what turned out to be a very accurate account of who was going to be a PITA and who wasn't.

All in, an extremely helpful and approachable guy.

[Brett Bellmore]

I was favorably impressed with our building inspector, who probably was extra thurough because I was a DIYer building a house from scratch.

The only irritating thing was having to pay for a perc test, when I knew darned well I was going to need an engineered field. They should have waived it given that I wasn't even going to try a regular field.

[byomtov]

"Hey, can we get a 'home renovation horror stories' post going?"

What about new construction horror stories?

I've heard of paint washing off the side of a new house in a rainstorm - no primer. I've had the ducting from a range hood be too small, and made out of that pleated stuff, etc.

My, probably mildly unfair, view is that builders cut every corner they can and need to be watched like a hawk.

[russell]

I live very near Salem MA, and lived in Salem for lots of years.

A lot of the city burned in 1914, and that section was all re-built at the same time.

Salem had a number of factories operating at the time, and a lot of the housing built after the fire was built as multi-family units. Three identical apartments, each occupying one full floor of a three-story building.

The class New England triple decker.

I've lived in a couple of those, and they are build for the ages. Built as blue-collar or middle class housing, they have pocket doors that work perfectly today, 100 years later, really well made built-in corner cupboards, nicely executed tongue-in-groove wainscoting, usually some nice detail in the finish work.

Horsehair plaster over lath for all the walls. Framing that would hold up a mountain.

Really, really good craft work.

Different world.

[CharlesWT]

I have some friends who had their kitchen floor resurfaced beginning will grinding off the old surface. The contractor didn't bother with sealing the kitchen off from the rest of the house. They ended up with a fine film of old kitchen floor coating every exposed surface in the rest of the house.

[navarro]

our house was part of a planned neighborhood built between 1978 and 1982. my wife bought it in 94, we got married in 98 and have lived there since. when the ceiling fan/light fixture in the living room died we had a friend who is an electrician install some new fixtures and he discovered that the wires were all random colors. he had to use his meter to check every wire. later when we replaced the fridge we discovered that the line that went to the icemaker came straight from the hot water line under the sink. then when we got a new central heat/air unit the installer mentioned that the air handler was 2 times the size of the outside unit and said we would probably get a lot better electric bills now that both units matched (of course it didn't hurt that we replaced it with an 18 seer system). at our end of the street there are 20 houses and two plans. i assume everyone else has similar problems.

[Older]

Brett's right. If you're gonna own a house, you need a set of such books, because you really need to understand how every part of your house works.

I used to do everything myself; partly to save money and partly because I never really trusted anyone else to do it as right as I would. Not to mention the sheer pleasure of being able to say "I did that!" But now I have a bunch of physical "conditions" and I can't do that. It's a whole different world.

And of course, there will always be something that needs to be done. Years ago, we heard a "comedian" make that joke about why do they call it a "building"? Shouldn't it be a "built"? My son, about 14 at the time, said "Obviously, he's never owned one."

[Snarki, child of Loki]

"there was loud banging and cursing from the basement, then a pause...at last, Snarki stomped up the stairs: sweaty, dirty, disgruntled."

"THERE, I FIXED it"

[Brett Bellmore]

Speaking of "fixed it", when we got home from Michigan, there was a bit of rotted moulding under the roof at the back of the house. When I removed it, I found I could see daylight through the hole in the roof above it.

Hadn't been there the last time I looked.

It's now raining cats and dogs, I'll get to see how good my repair job was. Just a temporary patch with flashing, the roof needs reconstructing. Got to save up for that, the whole roof needs redoing.

I don't know whose idea it was, that the house should be built without eaves, just gutters flush to the walls. Idiot idea... And pulling apart the rotted area, I found the bricks stopped flush with the top of the windows, which is why there's such an extensive wood area under the gutters.

Gonna have to rebuild the edge of the roof to have eaves, reconstruct any damaged spaces, add a 'cricket' where the chimney sticks up, and replace the roofing. Think maybe I'll go metal, so I never have to go up there again.

[agorabum]

Always retain some payment from the contractor (10% or 5% of each invoice) so they have an incentive to finish the job and get that retention released.
If your contractor refuses, it is a sign that they won't want to stick around and finish the job quickly when it comes to the punch list items.
If you have the money, someone licensed and with insurance should be required.
And to second a comment above, have a plan set in stone before work starts - changes = change orders = price increases.

[wj]

Brett, I have to agree that your original builder was an idiot to build a roof without eaves. I suppose it may have been marginally cheaper, but what a horror to inflict on future residents!

I'm wondering if metal is really the best solution for a roof. Unless it is stainless steel, it seems likely to need attention eventually. And be far harder to repair/replace than more conventional approaches. Or do you have something I haven't thought of?

[Brett Bellmore]

Well, the steel roofing around here gets waranteed for 60 years or more. The cheap shingles? Not nearly so long, we get some brutal summers here, the heat is murder on shingles.

If I put one in, I'll probably never have to do anything to it again unless they invent some way to reverse aging.

I'll take that chance...

[wj]

Oh, steel shingles! That makes a lot more sense. (I wonder if it is available here....)

Somehow, the image in my mind was of some slightly upscale corrugated sheet steel roof. Sorry.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

I heard good things about copper (zinc? terne?) standing-seam roofs, like that they last for about 100 years.

Expensive, yes. And noisy in the rain.

And in the case of copper, perhaps a theft target.

But it certainly cuts down on the need for tinfoil hats when you're indoors, so there's that.

[cleek]

there are a lot of ribbed sheet metal roofs here in NC. people paint them bright colors, mostly red, but sometimes green or blue. i love em. Mrs doesn't.

shingles it is.

[Brett Bellmore]

I was talking about the corrogated steel roofs. They've improved dramatically over the decades, they're just short of copper roofing for longevity now. I don't think the term "shingles" applies to it, though.

You can get steel shingles, though. They're nice looking, but a lot more expensive than the corrogated.

A copper roof I might consider if I won the lottery. They're great, and fantastically expensive.

[wj]

Gotta go with Snarki, a copper roof would be just asking for thieves. Sadly, the market for copper seems to be strong enough to bring them out in droves.

[Doctor Science]

The house in question is 100 years old, stone and cedar Arts&Crafts style -- quite unusual for this part of NJ. It was built as a hunting lodge, with a cistern for water -- which means that pretty much all the household systems (plumbing, electric, heat, phone) were added on over the years.

A whole shelf of Popular Mechanics books seems like a lot of storage space. What would be the best one- or two-volume guide, do you-all think?

As for doing it ourselves: we're both pushing 60, and Mr. Dr.'s time is valuable (and spoken for). My time is less so, but I have some kind of hard-wired inability to do *anything* that involves right angles. Nailing, sawing, cutting, adjusting -- you name it, if it involves a right angle I will mess it up.

But I need to know how things *should* be done, even though I personally can't do them.

[Mooseking]

The last 10 years have been pretty bad for home construction, particularly in the west. By 2005, builders in the boom were stealing workers from the next lowest tier of jobsite (so hospitals were scraping for commercial contractors, who made up their difference with people who'd only knew residential, who just passed around hammers).

The housing crash and recession fixed those competence issues, but cities took advantage and changed retirement and compensation for their experienced hands, and slimmed down appropriate to the very slow pace of inspections. Once things began to recover, building officials and senior inspectors left the jurisdictions that had slashed their benefits and increased their hours, for a round of contracting out since the cities hadn't spent on training to develop their inspectors.

Now that building's at a better pace, cities are leery of staffing up (they hated the recession layoffs), but 3rd party inspectors are too expensive. So their limited inspection staff is running around trying to squeeze in 20-30 inspections a day... which is a cursory level at best.

[bobbyp]

you want a long lasting roof? SLATE.

I managed the tower masonry and roof restoration on this building in 2006.

[bobbyp]

We used a helicopter to set the new flag pole.

You should verify that any contractor you use is licensed and bonded.

Standing seam metal roofs are quite expensive compared to std. asphalt shingles, and don't generally pencil out for residential work.

But you will have a great roof!

[wj]

Salte works really well for a roof . . . unless you are in earthquake country. Sigh.

[cleek]

our county courthouse has a copper roof, and the whole place was gutted when someone working on the restoration a couple of years back left his soldering iron on.

it was bright copper for about three days. so bright and shiny it was blinding when the sun hit it. then it patina'd to dull brown. still a nice old building, tho.

[Doctor Science]

Goddammit. So, the GC said, "my friend who works at Home Depot usually does kitchen layout & design for me."

The realtor asked around, came up with: the person I've talked to, someone else who's *really* expensive and who hasn't called me back, and two people who don't have web sites, portfolios, etc.

As this point I suspect I'm going to go for the person I've talked to already, she's winning the "professionalism" contest by a *landslide*.

[Doctor Science]

And then, there are those projects that completely get away from you: Centuries of Italian History Are Unearthed in Quest to Fix Toilet.

[bobbyp]

So, the GC said, "my friend who works at Home Depot usually does kitchen layout & design for me."

You can walk in to Home Depot and get that "service" for free. Free advice is obviously not always the best advice.

And do you really want Home Depot cabinets and countertops?

[Doctor Science]

No, not at all. That's what I was trying to convey.

[dr ngo]

Wow, you guys are wealthy, aren't you? You can actually afford to pay other people to do work on your homes!

Wasn't wealthy when we bought our first house, almost 40 years ago. Not even close. Never had been; my parents didn't even make enough to pay income tax, etc.

Then I lost my job, eventually got a new far-better-paying one overseas, and by the time I retired, we were comfortable enough to pay for work I couldn't do (question of competence) or probably shouldn't do (question of risk, e.g., climbing around on the roof, which I did until my mid-60s).

One of the nice things about ObWi is the range of ages, lifestyles, etc. But if there are those "to the manor born," I am most conspicuously not among them.

[liberal japonicus]

I've had a number of friends here in Japan get involved with building a house to various degrees. Tempting as it is, because not only do you feel you have some control of your destiny in a foreign land, your language skills improves cause it has to: faced with meetings, forms, etc etc etc, it is definitely sink or swim. In addition, the legal work for purchasing land, etc can take a couple more years.

Still, wealth doesn't have as much to do with it, at least here, it is more 'how stingy are you?' I know people who are making more than me who go with the build it yerself route, it's interesting to talk to them, but the amount of time and effort that they put into an enterprise like this makes me think that I'd rather have someone else do it and get to do stuff that I'd like to do.

[Snarki, child of Loki]

Dr.Science: "...I have some kind of hard-wired inability to do *anything* that involves right angles. Nailing, sawing, cutting, adjusting -- you name it, if it involves a right angle I will mess it up."

Okay! So you should work on plumbing and electrical, then. Doesn't matter so much *how* it gets connected, as long as it's securely connected.

Topology, not geometry.

[Brett Bellmore]

Maybe for the water and electric, but geometry matters a lot for the sewer lines. Got to maintain a minimum, consistent slope on those, or else they plug up on a regular basis.

Based on personal experience, though, I'd say one of the most important things with plumbing, is to run separate cold water lines to the toilet and the shower in a bathroom, rather than T'ing the shower cold water off the line to the toilet.

Yup, very important indeed, if there's ever going to be more than one person in the house!

[cleek]

and if you're on a well, add a sediment filter.

why my builder didn't do that.... nobody knows.

[Brett Bellmore]

I get the impression a lot of builders want the house to look nice for a couple of years, but to accomplish this as cheaply as possible. I've visited some friends in expensive neighborhoods, the "Legendary" homes, and after a couple of years mouldings are cracking, things like that. Not built to stand up to the passage of time, just to look good long enough for the builder to cash the check.

That's one of the reasons we went for an older house; Houses weren't necessarily built right in the 70's, but if one was built badly, it's had 40 years to fall apart by now, so the surviving ones are usually sound.

Kind of a dream of mine, actually, to have a chance to build a house from scratch, doing everything right. My first house was frustrating that way. My original plan had been to build a carriage house garage near the road, and then spend years building a very nice stone house, super-insulated, passive heating, all that.

But between building codes and what the bank would finance, I couldn't. Had to build a standard stick built. Think I'll never get to build my dream house.

[McKinneyTexas]

Get references from the GC and check them out. Do a courthouse check and see if he/she has been sued. Look into that. Have a written contract and WARRANTY--at least one year. Consider retaining a lawyer to help with that (I have partners in NJ and NY and could probably make a referral if you don't have a name). Withhold 10% of payment until substantial completion through and including an initial and then a follow-on punch list. Watch the progress everyday. If people aren't showing up to work, give the GC a call. Stay on him/her. It's your money and your house.

[Brett Bellmore]

And, watch out after they've done the work; A lot of contractors put a lien on your house when they get the job, and then don't bother to lift it when they get paid. You won't even know until you've got to do some kind of financing, or want to sell.

[Countme-In]

The universe is contracting.

The universe is contracting?

Well, the universe is everything, and if it contracts, someday it will collapse in on itself and ruin the renovations. I knew we should have gone with the sturdier roof.

What has the universe got to do with it? You're in Massachusetts. Massachusetts is not contracting!

It won't be contracting for billions of years yet, Doc. And we've gotta try and enjoy ourselves while we're here.

[cleek]

a friend of mine built a house from scratch, up in the NC mountains. he did everything himself (or with friends' help). but he's nuts.

[bobbyp]

Good advice, McKinney, but a bit overboard for Doc's project. As a contractor, I have my own axes to grind....and as we say in the business-lawyers and doctors are the WORST clients.

:)

[wj]

one of the most important things with plumbing, is to run separate cold water lines to the toilet and the shower in a bathroom, rather than T'ing the shower cold water off the line to the toilet.

Yup, very important indeed, if there's ever going to be more than one person in the house!

This is just so, so true! And it's amazing how many houses (not to mention apartment buildings) are built otherwise.

I've long since made a mental note that, if I ever do a custom-built home, that is going to be one of the non-negotiable features. I'm just so tired of keeping a sharp ear out for the sounds of flushing from the far end of the house.

[cleek]

also, if you're building a new house, consider doing multiple on-demand hot-water heaters instead of one big tank that will always be far away from at least one frequently-used tap.

on-demand is great from an energy use perspective (and from a long hot shower perspective!). but if your one heater is on the other side of the house from the kitchen you might find yourself having to wait minutes for hot water to make its way from the heater to the tap.

[Brett Bellmore]

Yeah, I'm considering that right now. Slab floor house, water heater at the extreme opposite end of the house from both bathrooms, it can take minutes for the shower to be hot.

Worse, we had an incident last fall where some kind of debris came in through the water line, and lodged in the intake filter of the water heater. It was murder getting it out, and ever since the hot water pressure has been deficient, not enough to permit hot water use in more than one place at a time. I think the line is partially blocked at some point prior to the water heater.

Installing on demand water heaters in both bathrooms would appear to be the easiest way to solve both problems.

[bobbyp]

Installing on demand water heaters in both bathrooms would appear to be the easiest way to solve both problems.

Or a recirc. loop:

https://www.google.com/search?q=hot+water+recirculation+system&biw=1280&bih=566&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=Nd4vVbCXN9W4ogSLm4D4BA&ved=0CEIQsAQ

[McKinneyTexas]

and as we say in the business-lawyers and doctors are the WORST clients.

Having represented both, I agree. It's a tough call. Lay people can't write their own contracts and some members of my profession view clients like the Doc as 1000-1500 billing opportunity.

Doc, your contract should have your local law's version of the following language:

1. Retainage--Owner will retain 10% of the contract amount until final completion by Contractor of the Second Punch List, at which time said retainage will become due and owing.

2. Warranty--Contractor unconditionally warrants and guarantees "the work" to be free of defects in material and workmanship for a period of one year running from the date of the second punch list. An additional six month warranty will attach to any warranty item identified within the one year warranty period.

3. Inspection and Punch List--within one week of contractor giving written notice of substantial completion of "the work", contractor and owner will jointly inspect "the work" and will prepare a "First Punch List" of items to be repaired, replaced, finished or retouched as the case may be. All items on the First Punch List will be completed two weeks from the date of the joint inspection. Owner will present a Second Punch List to Contractor thirty days after the joint inspection raising any matters not identified in the joint inspection. Contractor will repair, replace, finish or retouch the Second Punch List within 10 days of receipt. If Owner does not present a Second Punch List, the retainage is payable on the thirtieth day after the joint inspection.

4. No part of the contract between the parties shall be construed to negate, abridge or modify Items 1-3 above.

Language to this effect, translated into the law of your state, is the kind of protection I think consumers need. I've had mixed experiences with contractors. Better to have things like this in writing.

[bobbyp]

Better to have things like this in writing.

Agree. Your better contractors will have an off the shelf contract form for review and client signature. Their big risk is clients who do not pay (gosh, who would have thought) or dispute the work requirements and then.... don't pay.

A smart buyer (for higher end and/or complex projects) also carries an allowance in the budget for unforeseen site conditions and design errors/omissions (yes, architects and engineers are not gods walking the face of the planet).

[Brett Bellmore]

And get it written in their that they have to lift the lien when they get paid. Some contractors view not doing that as a last minute way to save a few bucks after the job is done.

Yes, got bit by that.

[hairshirthedonist]

and as we say in the business-lawyers and doctors are the WORST clients.

As an engineer, I feel left out. We aren't among the worst clients? I think Brett, Slart, Tony P. and I are going to have to meet to do something about this. (Sorry if I'm forgetting anyone.)

[cleek]

i'm a programmer. sometimes i can call myself an engineer, but people just giggle.

[wj]

Lots of us in IT get called "engineers." It's a language anomaly. (I blame the HR departments....)

But I probably should get in on this meeting. I've actually got engineering degrees -- even if I've never used them.

[bobbyp]

As an engineer, I feel left out.

I'm sure we can find a way to fit you in!

[McKinneyTexas]

As an engineer, I feel left out. We aren't among the worst clients?

If I said, yes, under the "OCD, anal-retentive, black-and-white-no-shades-of-gray" category, would you feel better?

[wj]

A good engineer wouldn't fit the black-and-white-no-shades-of-gray charecteristic. We're all too familiar with the reality of "engineering compromises."

Of course, that's just good engineers....

[hairshirthedonist]

I'd rather be the know-it-all from bobbyp's link than fitting McKinney's description, but I'll take what I can get. Either way, we're in!

I'm actually not like that, though. My job is mostly project management, and I know a little about a lot of different things, but there are always people who know more than I do involved in any of my fairly diverse projects. They're on any given project because it involves whatever it is they do all the time, whereas it's something I do now and then, among a number of other things.

If I tried to be a know-it-all, I'd just end up looking like an ass, over and over and over again.

[wj]

"Know a little about a lot of things." Sounds like my ideal -- as long as I remain clear on which things I don't know, and am willing to learn more, things work out pretty well.

[McKinneyTexas]

I'd rather be the know-it-all from bobbyp's link than fitting McKinney's description

I left out the smiley face. My bad. I hope you knew and know that I was kidding.

[hairshirthedonist]

Of course! That's too fitting with the stereotype of engineers not to be in jest, even if you left out "socially inept" and "fashion-challenged."

[russell]

You're in Massachusetts. Massachusetts is not contracting!

If you look at a map of the US, you will see that MA has already contracted. We are one of the pre-shrunk states.

As an engineer, I feel left out.

A buddy of mine has a business as a home-builder in southern NH. Seacoast area, around Great Bay.

Many of his clients are tech guys who made a big pile and now want big luxury houses on the water.

His biggest PITA clients are people who are engineers, but not in any field related to building trades. People who know a lot - are experts, really - about technical stuff, but in areas which are irrelevant to building a house.

Electrical engineers, apparently, are the worst of the worst.

One guy would basically follow him around the job site asking questions and taking notes, then spend the evening Googling everything so he could be ready to argue with him about the next day.

Big fun.

[hairshirthedonist]

Electrical engineers, apparently, are the worst of the worst.

We (I'm an EE) have among the highest IQs, on average, of any profession. Let's not get into emotional intelligence or empathy. As kettles of fish go, that's an altogether different one.

[wj]

HSH, let's just agree that, among engineers, civil engineers are on the low end and leave it at that. ;-)

[bobbyp]

In my experience, when it comes to public works plan & spec building construction (nic a lot of risky civil work)it is the electrical sub who typically garners the most change orders above and beyond their initial bid.

I leave the implications for the electrical engineers among us to ponder.

[Brett Bellmore]

Hunting through my books, while the Popular Mechanics books really are good, (And that set I linked to is a steal.) the actual book I used as reference material while building my house back back in Michigan was the Reader's Digest Complete Do-it-yourself Manual, 1973 edition. (Got it from my dad, given the date, he probably picked it up just before we moved out to the country.

Very comprehensive.

I've heard civil engineers described as, "Engineers who design things that don't move, and everybody thanks God they don't move."

[hairshirthedonist]

I leave the implications for the electrical engineers among us to ponder.

That's an easy one - no need to ponder. Your building construction designs are run by civil/structural engineers who don't want to blow their design budgets on expensive electrical engineers, who are doing a bunch of stuff the civil/stuctural PM doesn't understand, anyway. So the electrical engineer (or team) doesn't have enough hours to fully investigate the details of the job and is forced to make assumptions, some of which turn out not to be correct.

So, in construction, the electrical sub says, "What about this?" The answer is "change order."

[Brett Bellmore]

That certainly looks like our recent plant expansion, where extending the company network into the new end of the building got simply forgotten, causing massive cost overruns when it had to be done anyway. (Because all our presses require network drops, and the new design office, which can't function without access to the company servers, is located at the very far end of the building.)

It's not IT's fault the cost overruns happened. They weren't consulted in the first place.

[McKinneyTexas]

even if you left out "socially inept" and "fashion-challenged."

No need to belabor the obvious.

One guy would basically follow him around the job site asking questions and taking notes, then spend the evening Googling everything so he could be ready to argue with him about the next day.

Way back when, we had an electrician come out to our hunting camp to fix something and one of our know-it-all's asked his hourly rate in the midst of dropping some slang to let the guy know how savvy our guy was . The electrician looked at him and said "30/hr normally--40 if you watch and 50 if you make suggestions."

[hairshirthedonist]

That certainly looks like our recent plant expansion, where extending the company network into the new end of the building got simply forgotten, causing massive cost overruns when it had to be done anyway.

Depending on the details, this sort of thing might not entail true cost overruns, relative to what the job would have been expected to cost had the network extension been considered from the beginning. It could simply be a cost that should have been included, but wasn't, so poor plannning/design/budgeting, rather than an unnecessary "extra" expenditure.

Now, if the construction got to a point where the network infrastructure became a retrofit, despite the expansion being brand new, and ended up being more costly that it would have been had it been in the original design, then at least part of it would be a real "extra."

Therein lies a distinction (not the only one) between an error and an omission. No one likes omissions, but they're still way better than errors.

[Brett Bellmore]

No, you're right, the true cost overruns were due to some idiot not getting a fixed cost contract on the excavation, when anybody who'd walked around the building could have told you there was a granite ledge in the area they were going to excavate. They were blasting for months, with the cost of the excavation just going up and up. What's the point of being in the 21st century, if you can't be bothered to use ground penetrating radar, or even your eyeballs?

I'm surprised nobody lost their job over that snafu, half the expansion plan had to be shelved for a few years.

On the bright side, I've got an unlimited supply of granite, ranging from baseball sized stones to slabs the size of compact cars, available to me for landscaping. Already put in a nice raised flowerbed in the front yard.

[hairshirthedonist]

When life gives you lemons...

[bobbyp]

...suck them. ;)

On my last project the electrical engineer screwed up the service design so bad it would not fly past the municipality's reviewer (he left the new elevator loads off the calcs). New upsized service now required. Then the architect specified security card reader door hardware but no "smarts" were in the electrical specs/drawings.

Alas, this was after the bid and award.

Two big change orders....and we hadn't even put the construction fence up.

[Sneddons]

Word of mouth! The best reference you can get when hiring any contractor :)