Browse Forums Building A New House Re: Builder Contract Negotiations 2May 08, 2020 8:19 am 3in1 Supadiverta. Rainwater Harvesting Best Practice using syphonic drainage. Cleaner Neater Smarter Cheaper Supa Gutter Pumper. A low cost syphonic eaves gutter overflow solution. Re: Builder Contract Negotiations 8May 08, 2020 10:35 am Norfolk 5. Liquidated damages - according to the HIA this amount is fully negotiable (even more so in the current depressed market), if the builder is confident they can build your home to the agreed quality within the contract time they should have no problem agreeing to a realistic amount here to cover your particular financial costs of delay. Ask them to back themselves. 6. The Australian Institute of Quantity Surveyors estimates a typical $500k house would normally take 23 weeks to construct. Each $100k adds or subtracts 1 week to this estimate. 300 days is very generous. If you agree to 300 days they should have no problems agreeing to realistic liquidated damages if they exceed this. Most building materials and services are sourced locally so COVID19 supply issues should not be a concern. Thnx Norfolk! 6) Does this 23-week benchmark include weekends/holidays/provision for weather-related issues etc? Re: Builder Contract Negotiations 9May 08, 2020 10:59 am Good question! The document I have "The Built Environment Economist" by AIQS does not detail this however I would expect their estimate to include weekends. Public holidays like easter and xmas / new year are known non work periods and can be added by to the base 23 weeks by the builder. Weather related delays are not included as these are added to the agreed contract time as they occur, subject to timely advice and justification of the delay by the builder. They cannot just look at the area's rainfall records and claim rain delay days at the end, although many builders will try this on. Re: Builder Contract Negotiations 10May 08, 2020 7:14 pm One more question guys; What happens when they finish a stage and send you a letter of confirmation. If you inspect( via building specialist of your own) and find issues, does the clock stop until they rectify these faults? They have proposed 7 days for the payment after issuing a notice of a stage completion. Re: Builder Contract Negotiations 11May 09, 2020 6:19 am nfaisal This is a good question for the 3rd party inspector members active on this forum. I understand, however, that based on the HIA contract, the builder is not obliged even to read your inspectors report, respond to their professional opinion or rectify any faults you identify during the various build stages before PCI. They are required to fix 'defects' before final payment though but many ignore, avoid, bluff and delay doing this. Once each stage is deemed complete by the builder you are required to make the progress payment, irrespective of the inspection. The clock does not stop on contract timeframe. If you delay payment you are breaching the contract. If you want to make your progress payments contingent upon faults identified by your inspector being fixed before proceeding then you will need to get a variation included in the contract for this. Its unlikely a typical volume builder will agree to this. Without this type of variation there are ways to dispute that the progress stage is complete and therefore payment is not due but you will need good legal advice and balls to challenge a builder this way as they are very experienced at this. Re: Builder Contract Negotiations 12May 09, 2020 9:26 am Norfolk @nfaisal This is a good question for the 3rd party inspector members active on this forum. I understand, however, that based on the HIA contract, the builder is not obliged even to read your inspectors report, respond to their professional opinion or rectify any faults you identify during the various build stages before PCI. They are required to fix 'defects' before final payment though but many ignore, avoid, bluff and delay doing this. Once each stage is deemed complete by the builder you are required to make the progress payment, irrespective of the inspection. The clock does not stop on contract timeframe. If you delay payment you are breaching the contract. If you want to make your progress payments contingent upon faults identified by your inspector being fixed before proceeding then you will need to get a variation included in the contract for this. Its unlikely a typical volume builder will agree to this. Without this type of variation there are ways to dispute that the progress stage is complete and therefore payment is not due but you will need good legal advice and balls to challenge a builder this way as they are very experienced at this. Absolutely right, Private Inspections are more for your own satisfaction but does not guarantee the builder will follow up on fixing any of the defects reported unless they’re too evident. These days few builder charge you an administration fee when you hire an inspector as a deterrent. If you’re planning on hiring a private inspector use them wisely at particular stages rather than having them inspect at every stage. You talk about deletions, are they variations or PS and PC adjustments? pleas list them 1 17228 Hi All, I just wanted to close this topic out with an update. So we ended up agreeing to a number with the insurance company, and after an extensive amount of hand… 8 24631 Hi Tracey, you have taken too long to react to your builder's wrongdoing and are now left in a vulnerable position. Fighting the builder legally will cost big bucks and if… 4 2478 |