How to Accurately Create Your Construction Budget
In order to accurately create a budget for your construction project, you are going to want to get some help from a professional. You want to remember when you get help from a professional that what they say is not the law, but it is certainly a great place to start on creating your budget.
Bids From Contractors
So, the professionals you should get help from for creating your budget are three general contractors, and some experienced subs. What you want to do is ask them to get you a bid on your specific project, you want a line by line estimate, and an indication of who will be doing the work at that price. So, to get accurate bids from these people you want to give them as specific of plans, blueprints, specs, etc as you can. The more specific your plans are, the more accurate the budget they create for you will be. You will be able to ask for these bids, and use them to help you create a budget just for you. So, give the general contractors, and subs your plans and specs, and set a date that you want bids back by. Once you get your bids back from the general contractors and subs that you selected, lay them out line by line on a spreadsheet.
Develop a Budget Spreadsheet
This is the first step to saving your self a whole lot of money on your project. How does a spreadsheet help you save money? What laying the different bids out side by side does for you is this...it gives you a relatively good idea of what your house, your specific plans and specifications are going to cost. Because this is based on your specific plans, and prepared by someone that is familiar with the local market, and the different prices and options available to you, it will be fairly accurate.
So, use a computer, or pen and paper and take at least 3 bids, lay them side by side, and average out the prices quoted. The average these numbers will give you is going to be a great place to start when creating your budget. This should give you the best idea of what your budget should be. For example, if one contractor says insulation will be $4000, another says $5,500, and the third says $3,200, you can plan on around $4,250 for that portion of your project. Then you can shop around with that price in mind.
By creating a budget from a budget created by others, you can now feel comfortable that you won't go over budget on anything because you know you can get insulation for $3,200 if need be, or ask a sub to match that. Also, it works as a savings tool because if a sub comes to you and tells you they can do it for $2,700, you know have a good deal.
Get Prices from Subs
You can go to the subs the general contractor recommended and ask for a better bid then what the general contractor listed, or you can use a better bid from a different sub (supplied by a different contractor) to get a bid that works for you. For example, you can say "I appreciate your bid of $3,500, but I have another bid here for $2,900, I think my budget can handle $3,100, can you do it for that?" So you get your bids and put together an accurate budget for your project!
You can use others budgets created for your project to know what to shoot for when you get bids, then get yourself some bids in that price range, and make an accurate budget for the house of your dreams.
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Tags: home-construction-budget budget-spreadsheet home-building
