Good Contractor/Bad Contractor
The majority of contractors I have worked with have been great. There are however more than a few bad apples out there, and they can give the whole industry a bad name. Some contractors are just incompetent, and a few are borderline criminal. It’s definitely a tough job, but it’s also tough for my clients to find a good builder they can trust.
A number of years ago, I was working on a residential project. The owner hired a contractor, and the project was not going well; It was way behind schedule, communication was poor, neighbours were complaining about excessive noise, and the site looked like a Worksafe BC nightmare, with garbage, materials, and tools strewn everywhere.
The owner asked me to set up a meeting on site to discuss it all. The arranged meeting time came and went with no sign of the contractor; we were about to leave when he finally pulled up. As I walked over to the truck, he rolled down the window and clouds of pot smoke wafted out. Let’s just say the meeting did not go well: He was fired and a new guy was hired who successfully saw the project through to completion. This is so bad that it is almost funny, but the homeowner certainly did not see any humour in the situation.
Here are some questions to consider when hiring a contractor (I’m going to use the ‘he’ pronoun, as the majority of contractors are male although the whole construction industry could really use more women):
· Does he have a good reputation? Ask around, you’d be surprised how much you can find out talking to other builders, subtrades, building inspectors, architects, and property owners. Spend some time on due diligence—it will pay its way.
· Is he a member of industry organizations and keep up to date on changing codes, materials, and methods of construction? Things change constantly, and what worked 10 years ago may be hopelessly outdated now.
· Does he have a long term outlook? Shady builders tend to be short term oriented, lurching from one project to the next, often with desperate cash flow. And sometimes it is your cash that is used to finish off the last project (or purchase that new boat).
· Is he a good communicator? Getting buildings done is very much a team sport and communication is very, very important. A good contractor manages the communication to ensure that everything keeps moving along efficiently. He will keep the team updated and in the loop. And any good contractor will drop everything to speak with the person paying for the project.
· Does he give you realistic advice and recommendations from the get-go? Absurd promises on schedule or budget are red flags. Aggressive requests for upfront deposits are another red flag. Yet another is working with no written agreement in place.
· Would you feel comfortable inviting him over for dinner? If not, maybe you don’t want to spend the coming months or years dealing with him. Construction never, ever goes exactly according to plan, and you need to be comfortable working through all kinds of challenges and conflicts as it progresses.
For property owners: good luck in your search for the right contractor!
To all the good contractors out there: thank you and keep up the good work!
Costs
Cost has become the burning topic in the world of design and construction. Buildings have always been expensive to build, and now more so than ever. There are all kinds of reasons for this, including: a shortage of skilled labour as people age out of the workforce; an increasingly complicated regulatory environment—for example, there are all kinds of new requirements for building envelope, energy efficiency, and accessibility that add to costs; a more litigious environment with consultants and contractors increasingly skittery about being held accountable for problems; and then of course unpredictable factors such as Covid or tariffs.
Experienced developers usually know fairly accurately what they are in for with costs, but most people setting out to build one-off custom buildings have an unrealistic idea of costs coupled with high expectations. These cost ideas may be based on outdated information—prices from 5 or 10 years ago have very little bearing on what happens today. And building costs can vary widely in different parts of the country, different parts of BC, and even in different parts of Vancouver.
Cost is one part of the three-legged construction stool, with quality and quantity the other two legs. All three factors interact: An increase in quality (ie higher end finishes) or quantity (ie more floor area) will affect budget. The challenge is to balance the three, with constant give and take. Generally I aim for better quality, and less quantity—ie sacrifice a bit of floor area but build really well.
For custom houses most people look for inspiration in design magazines/online resources. There are plenty of great ideas to be found, but many of the projects are ‘cream of the crop’ and not affordable to most people. There is still value in looking at these precedents, but the design challenge becomes to design a building that captures some of the look and feel of these places, without breaking the bank. Architects and contractors would love to have clients with endless budgets, but that is a tiny sliver of the population. A good architect will happily find opportunities working within budget constraints, in the same way they can find design opportunities even on a very constrained lot. If fact, I would say that having constraints produces some of the best design results.
My recommendation is to have a reasonably realistic budget at the outset, based on current market conditions. Contractors and (I hate to say it) architects will often willfully ignore budget realities and tell the client what they want to hear in order to land the project. It also really helps to have some slack in the budget to allow for inflation or unexpected situations (ie tariffs, port strikes, Covid, whatever).
There is a lot of talk about prefabrication as a way of reducing costs. This is a topic in itself and I will speak to it in a subsequent post.
As a starting point, cost guides are available from a number of Canadian sources:
https://www.bty.com/market-intelligence/
https://www.altusgroup.com/featured-insights/canadian-cost-guide/
And for cost information in specific markets (ie Whistler, or the Gulf Islands), the best resource will be contractors and architects, as they will have experience from recent projects.
Prefabrication/Modular--better, faster, cheaper, greener?
I have done a whack of research into prefabricated and modular buildings over the last few decade, for residential and commercial construction. This has been driven by cost concerns, client enquiries, a desire to find a solution to the challenges of finding available skilled labour, as well as the challenge of building in a challenging climate for a good portion of the year. Prefab/modular are often presented as a magic bullet that will solve many construction challenges.
First, some definitions: Prefabricated construction is defined as the building of components of buildings in a controlled factory setting and then delivering and installing them on site. Parts of all buildings are already prefabricated off-site—ie doors/windows, equipment, roof trusses, timbers, millwork, etc, but discussions about prefab generally mean more prefabricated components. Modular construction can be defined as delivering nearly complete ‘pods’, often complete with windows, siding, drywall, insulation, wiring/plumbing, with only final touches completed on site to stitch it all together.
The idea of prefab and modular buildings is very appealing. Buildings can be put together in a process more akin to an automobile assembly line, in a very precise, controlled setting, with greater quality control. Prefab/modular can take advantage of the new technologies around advanced 3D computer modelling and CNC cutting. It can make the good old days of a crew of grumpy guys pounding nails in the pouring rain look absurd. There has been plenty of positive press on the subject in recent years, but there are a few myths to debunk right away:
Myth #1:--is it better? Maybe. Built in a factory, climate controlled, more precision, safer work environment--that all sounds good. But the person manning the assembly line probably can get by with less skill and experience than an experienced tradesperson found on any job site, as they can be trained to do one task over and over again. So there may be less craftsmanship with prefab. At the other end of the spectrum, a Hundegger can churn out some rather impressive ‘craftmanship’, albeit done with a robot:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCKVq9yTWrI
Myth #2--faster: buildings go up ‘in just a few days’ according to some promo material. This is completely absurd. There is a huge amount of design work and coordination done in advance—usually much more than a traditional build. There is also a lot of prep work on any site before any prefab shows up, including site clearing, excavation, site services (sewer, water, power) and foundation. The prefab components themselves take plenty of time to put together in the factory, but most of this is hidden from the building owner. And then depending on the process, there will be some time, and perhaps a lot of time, to complete the building on site. But there can be time savings, and even speeding the process up by 10% is very valuable.
Myth #3--cheaper: So far, from what I have seen the savings are surprisingly nominal. There is often another layer of people, process and pre-planning to build into the equation. It can cost as much or sometimes even more than conventional construction. This likely will improve with economies of scale, particularly with highly repetitive building types like multi-family housing. One major advantage though is cost certainty--prefab/modular are almost always done on a fixed fee. And generally the crazy cycle of change orders and cost escalation can be avoided.
Myth #4—greener: there is almost certainly less waste in a factory, and more chance of recycling the waste. Prefab is not inherently greener though. A high performance green building can be done prefab or custom built on site. And a ridiculously over the top trophy house can be done in a factory or on site.
Here are some of the pitfalls:
· Logistics become incredibly important, especially with modular. Rather that delivering construction materials one load at a time to the site, large assembled units arrive all at once.
Because the elements are so much larger, a crane is often required on site, and crane time is very expensive, especially on remote sites. Coordinating the crane availability with the trucking schedule and erection crew timing can be very tricky. Also, if the site is difficult to access—because of a winding road, or steep grades, or overhanging trees/power lines, getting large loads to the site may not even be possible. Also, the sizes allowed to be transported by road (or ferry) dictate the largest size that can be fabricated. This can put some serious limits on what can and can’t be done. All of this tends to tie contractors up into knots.
· Modification on the fly is discouraged and can be awkward and in some cases nearly impossible. With conventional wood framing it is fairly normal to make modifications as work progresses, since the system is fairly flexible. For example, if you want to move a window rough opening, it can usually be done without too much effort. Moving a window in a modular building would involve tearing out finishes, insulation, siding, etc. Basically it wouldn’t be done, unless absolutely necessary.
· At the economical end of the spectrum, modular buildings often look very boxy and clunky and unlikely to be winning many design awards. There is still a leftover aesthetic from Atco trailers and work camps that is hard to completely escape from. The rigidity of the fabrication process can sometimes drive the entire design and the outcome, which is not ideal.
· There is quite a bit of hype in the industry, and what looks great on a website may not be what gets built and delivered. I have watched many prefab companies—big and small-- disappear over the years, as it seems to be a very capital intensive and risky undertaking. One of the biggest recent failures was with Katerra. The company was very ambitious about disrupting the construction industry, and had deep pockets with tech investors, but they crashed and burned:
Personally, I think prefab wall and roof panels have the most potential, particularly for high performance buildings like Passive House. Modular will likely become more popular as the industry works out the bugs, particularly in dense urban areas close to the fabricators. One way or another, we will be seeing a lot more prefab and modular in coming years.
The links below show a range of companies working in this realm.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q5X4IwOueHA