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>Can I just throw more money at the problem so that I'm less stressed and offload more decisions to the builders? Yes you can. It requires two things: 1) you

by max51 4y ago

>Can I just throw more money at the problem so that I'm less stressed and offload more decisions to the builders? Yes you can. It requires two things: 1) you need to hire a builder who has experience with commercial and/or industrial construction. Hire the same type of builder that you wanted to build a small dental clinic. Tell them explicitly that you want everything to build built with the same standards as their commercial clients. Even if they are well intentioned, you don't want to be the beta tester for a builder trying to expand in a new type of construction. Most of the work will also be done by subcontractors, so you want to hire someone with a list of contacts filled with companies who typically do high quality work for highly demanding client. 2) Hire a structural engineer and architect to check their work. If you can only hire one, the engineer is more important, a shitty finish material or bad interior lightning is easier to fix than a cracked foundation. The engineer needs to be on site to check the work at the critical moments to make sure it's done right (eg. before pouring concrete). He needs to have the authority to stop work if it's bad and/or force them to redo it. they also need to approve the plans and the product that will be installed. It is common practice in government contracts that the builder has to submit for approval the spec sheet for most of the products that they want to install. Basically, you want to follow the same procedure a large city would use but skip some of the red tape that don't apply to you. The contract is very important, I would recommend copying it from whatever is the most used one in your region for public work. It's probably gonna be a >200 page monster but it will cover every single situation you could possibly imagine and provide a fair way to resolve the situation.

fblp 4y ago
Do you know anyone who has actually done this? I think this advice isn't just throwing money at the problem, your suggestion sinks time into creating a mini-bureaucracy to ensure quality decision making. That mini-bureaucracy may in itself may make it hard to source/retain the various contractors you're suggesting. For example I imagine it would be quite hard to source a small dental clinic builder who does high quality work and is also willing to sign a 200-page city level government procurement contracts without significant negotiation or persuasion.
- max51 4y ago
  >Do you know anyone who has actually done this? I have. >your suggestion sinks time into creating a mini-bureaucracy to ensure quality decision making My main suggestion is to hire an engineer/architect, they will manage all of this crap. They will work FOR you and not for the contractor and money doesn't come out of their pocket when they reject something. >For example I imagine it would be quite hard to source a small dental clinic builder who does high quality work It's not, they don't need to know how to design it, they just need to have done commercial work before and be used to work on a project that has architects/engineers watching them. Dental clinic was just a random example. Government buildings might have been a better one. >and is also willing to sign a 200-page city level government procurement contracts without significant negotiation or persuasion. In every region, there should be one contract that everyone is used to work with and that is fairly balanced. You should not write a new one or try to negotiate clauses. They are long because they have a clause for almost every possible type of conflict that could happen. No one actually reads them cover-to-cover because it's mostly just common sense or things that don't apply but someone has to put it in writing to make it official. If the project goes well, you will never open it. It provides instructions on things like how to approve an extra and payment schedules, how to fire them, how to reject work, how to contest a decisions from the expert, maximum delays for important things, etc. If you want a hands-off approach, it will protect you. The more involved you want to be, the less you need it.

by max51 4y ago

fblp 4y ago

Do you know anyone who has actually done this? I think this advice isn't just throwing money at the problem, your suggestion sinks time into creating a mini-bureaucracy to ensure quality decision making. That mini-bureaucracy may in itself may make it hard to source/retain the various contractors you're suggesting. For example I imagine it would be quite hard to source a small dental clinic builder who does high quality work and is also willing to sign a 200-page city level government procurement contracts without significant negotiation or persuasion.

max51 4y ago
>Do you know anyone who has actually done this? I have. >your suggestion sinks time into creating a mini-bureaucracy to ensure quality decision making My main suggestion is to hire an engineer/architect, they will manage all of this crap. They will work FOR you and not for the contractor and money doesn't come out of their pocket when they reject something. >For example I imagine it would be quite hard to source a small dental clinic builder who does high quality work It's not, they don't need to know how to design it, they just need to have done commercial work before and be used to work on a project that has architects/engineers watching them. Dental clinic was just a random example. Government buildings might have been a better one. >and is also willing to sign a 200-page city level government procurement contracts without significant negotiation or persuasion. In every region, there should be one contract that everyone is used to work with and that is fairly balanced. You should not write a new one or try to negotiate clauses. They are long because they have a clause for almost every possible type of conflict that could happen. No one actually reads them cover-to-cover because it's mostly just common sense or things that don't apply but someone has to put it in writing to make it official. If the project goes well, you will never open it. It provides instructions on things like how to approve an extra and payment schedules, how to fire them, how to reject work, how to contest a decisions from the expert, maximum delays for important things, etc. If you want a hands-off approach, it will protect you. The more involved you want to be, the less you need it.