JAC Homes • Jan 23, 2018

What to look out for when you ask for a quote.

Why is it that most builders ask for more money during the building process? The reason is that it is an extremely technical and time-consuming process to accurately calculate the cost of building, a skill held by only the most professional contractors. As a result, most quotes are based on the highly inaccurate “square metre rate”.

Unfortunately, this common method of establishing building costs and hence quotes, is seriously flawed for many reasons and can result in either the builder or the home owner losing money as the following simple analogy demonstrates:

A Toyota and a Ferrari are exactly the same size in m2, and have the same features: they both have four wheels, a windscreen, steering   wheel, headlights etc. Should they both be the same price?

Seriously though, just the shape of a house alone can affect the price drastically i.e.:

House ‘A’ measures 10×10m (square), and ‘B’ 25×4m (rectangle), both are exactly 100m2.

But, the walls of ‘A’ are 40m long and the walls of ‘B’ are 58m long. This is an extra 18m of walling, almost 50% difference. This inaccuracy alone would cost an extra $20,000.00.

There are many other factors that need to be considered apart from the length of walls in order to accurately quote on the cost of building, such as roof type, wall height, the number of bathrooms etc. all of which mean that the m2 method of costing should not be relied upon at all and hence going ahead with building based on one of these quotes is a recipe for financial disaster.

The reality is you will only get an accurate idea of the price for your project when all drawings and schedules of work have been completed. These outline your requirements, the type of house construction and any other factors specific to your project.

However, remember it is difficult to accurately cost a building at an early stage. This is because details of what is being included and what is not is usually quite vague at the initial stages. So, although rough estimates may be useful, we recommend you are careful of ball park figures that may be thrown at you early on as these can vary significantly.