Homeowners who want a turnkey job to build their home will hire a general contractor. That means that once plans are printed, the home owner has little to do with the building of their home. You may pick out a few items that can range from the paint colors to appliances, but little else. When you hire a general contractor, you hire no one else. That’s where you may run into problems, including money problems.
The general contractor will hire all the sub-contractors, commonly known as subs, including but not limited to:
• electrician
• plumber
• mechanical
• framer/carpenter
• drywall
• painter
• trim carpenter
• flooring installer
It is the general contractor’s job to see that all aspects of your turnkey job will be done in a timely manner. If you are the type of person that you have no free time and want to pay someone to do things for you, then maybe a general contractor is the way to go for you. But if you have some free time and want to save money building your new home, then you as a homeowner can become the general contractor and hire the subs out yourself.
Recently, a friend asked me to bide on the electrical installation for a commercial building. I took the time to get the latest quotes on wiring and the specific fixtures that this sandwich chain required. I have since found out that this chain goes around the country getting locals to bid on projects. Then they take those bids to their subs and require them to meet or beat that price. It is holding this bid over their subs to get them to lower their price. That means the general contractor will come out ahead and make more money on the job.
There should be an overseer on these jobs to make sure the contractor is not using only their subs. In other words, the contractors take their time biding these jobs, including the electrical like me, and they don’t get the job. They also don’t know where their bid came in, whether it was low, high, or in range. But either way, they don’t get the job. And these subs will travel around the country with the generals to keep that little bit of money coming in, whatever it is, be it very low or very high. The electrical contractors need to stop this kind of practice by joining together to require general contractors to change subs with each job and should hire local contractors within that county or parish like they do in Florida.
The general contractor seems to go with the lowest bid. Does the lowest bid mean he will do the best work? No. But some general contractors use the same guys over and over because they are familiar with the job. I agree with that but it doesn’t hire any local contractors to work any jobs. In Louisiana, the right to work allows anybody from anywhere to come in Louisiana and do their work no matter where they come from, from Texan to New York, and put the local contractors right out of work.
I’ve actually seen this for residential general contractors as well as commercial general contractors. Instead of using the local subs, they continue to use their existing subs. They are trying to get them to low ball the job so the generals can make more money. Over the years, I have bid on several projects, only to find out later that they used subs from out of state. I disagree with this practice. Whether you build a home or a restaurant, the general contractor should use local sub-contractors whose business resides within that county or parish.
Do you think the general contractors should use the same subs around the country instead of hiring local sub-contractors? Please type your comments in below. I want to know what you think.
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