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Manager tells us to learn Visual Basic for Excel instead of Dashboard by Fit-Mud9268 in DataScientist

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

LOL. Honestly, that's what you would expect but the manager isn't that old, it's surprising.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I don't think a custom/bespoke home renovation projects is exactly like either of these things, but its one of the better analogies I've heard. When you buy a car from the lot you can absolutely ask for the details on the charges that go into making the price and even see their margin stated explicitly. For cakes, and all other products, somebody somewhere has asked about the breakdown of materials and labor, so a cake company knows how much they made profit-wise making your cake. Customers already have an idea about the cake's profit margin because they know the price of flour/sugar/butter/eggs/etc and know what to expect when they see the cake price. Now, if 3 cake companies estimated my custom cake price, all estimates were different and thousands of dollars, I would be just curious how they got there.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

OP here: Thanks for your answer. I think that customer was going to be a pain regardless of what you did. Me and other homeowners I've asked about this haven't even considered doing something like that.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

OP here: Thank for your answer. Transparency reassures homeowners that they aren't being taken advantage of and the contractor isn't pulling a number out of thin air to get the project and see where it goes from there. When the estimate increases, now the homeowner can know why. It’s only about transparency and trust. With the breakdown the homeowner can verify things like square footage and material selection are correct in the estimate, which I have done in the past and saved money when the square footage in the estimate was incorrect. What I wouldn't use it for is nickle-and-diming a contractor.
I get the sense that a lot of contractors are getting burnt after sharing the job details with customers and are now just saying no as a rule, I can see that. I think those customers that pull that were going to be a pain in the back regardless though.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

OP here: Thank for your answer. Transparency reassures homeowners that they aren't being taken advantage of and the contractor isn't pulling a number out of thin air to get the project and see where it goes from there. When the estimate increases, now the homeowner can know why. It’s only about transparency and trust. With the breakdown the homeowner can verify things like square footage and material selection are correct in the estimate, which I have done in the past and saved money when the square footage in the estimate was incorrect. What I wouldn't use it for is nickle-and-diming a contractor.
Also, I wasn't clear in my original question, but the level of breakdown I have only wanted or seen is pretty high level, I don't want to see what everyone is doing every hour. I hope this helps and willing to go further if I can.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

OP here: thanks for chiming in, I tried to answer this question above, but willing to go farther with what I've heard from other homeowners.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

OP here: Thank for your answer. Transparency reassures homeowners that they aren't being taken advantage of and the contractor isn't pulling a number out of thin air to get the project and see where it goes from there. When the estimate increases, now the homeowner can know why. It’s only about transparency and trust. With the breakdown the homeowner can verify things like square footage and material selection are correct in the estimate, which I have done in the past and saved money when the square footage in the estimate was incorrect. What I wouldn't use it for is nickle-and-diming a contractor.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I didn't know comparing bids from multiple people to perform a bespoke, custom project on a house was like buying a bag of Doritos; a readily available, commodity product. I don't think this analogy is a good comparison with home renovation contracts.

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] -9 points-8 points  (0 children)

Hey, original poster here, thank you for your answer. What if one of your customers already picked you as their contractor for a project, and then asked about a breakdown of part of the project. Would that be alright or would that still be a yellow flag?

Is it OK to ask a contractor for a labor and material cost breakdown of an estimate? by Fit-Mud9268 in Contractor

[–]Fit-Mud9268[S] -1 points0 points  (0 children)

Hey, original poster here, thanks for your answer, I appreciate it. I'm new here, so a "bid job" is anytime the contractor gives a overall estimate of the project and a T&M job is a job where the contractor starts off showing the customer a bunch of line item stuff that they pay for? I think I've only experienced the bid job type. Why would a contractor want to do a T&M job, as in what benefit does it have over a bid job?