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farmhousegirl_gw

Do builders expect you to negotiate after presenting bid?

farmhousegirl
9 years ago

We are expecting bids to start coming in for our project soon. Just wondering if the builders anticipates the homeowner to try to negotiate the price down. What's the standard process? Thanks!

Comments (6)

  • _sophiewheeler
    9 years ago

    Fixed price has very little wiggle room. You can ask for a few upgrades, but you'll end up paying for it in the end in change order fees that might not otherwise have been charged for.

  • farmhousegirl
    Original Author
    9 years ago

    This is a custom build, not a developer with packages...

  • robin0919
    9 years ago

    Yes, they do even with a fixed bid. Depending on how much the GC's are in demand in your area.

  • ellenandco
    9 years ago

    I wouldn't really call it price negotiation, but after the bids were in and we awarded the contract we made it clear we needed to get the budget down by x amount. We went line by line through our plans and the bid until we got there. Our project is now about 45 days from completion and we are slightly under budget. There were a few items for which we had allowances (lighting and hardware for example) which is how we ended up under budget. Just about all other selections were specified in the plans/contract.

  • renovator8
    9 years ago

    If a contractor submits a responsive bid it should represent the lowest price he is willing to do the work for. If it is not responsive you should assume he doesn't really want the job rather than allowing bid modifications.

    If you select one of the contractors based on his bid and other issues, the process of further reducing the price is called "value engineering" and involves reviewing the cost of each aspect of the work and asking the contractor to suggest how the cost could be reduced without severely reducing quality or performance. Taking the time to do this is something a contractor is usually willing to do if he has reasonable assurance that you are not doing the same thing with the other bidders or intend to modifying the contract and rebid the job.

  • rwiegand
    9 years ago

    Sometimes the value engineering has to go beyond finishes and substitutions and into real scope reductions like fewer square feet, deferring parts of the project, or applying sweat equity. In fairness it's important to choose your builder based on the apples-to-apples comparison of bids on the same scope, then work with your chosen builder to meet your budget.

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