Residential Builder

A residential builder client may seek to reduce their building budget by investigating alternative costings from an overseas manufacturer.  The building budget savings are purportedly delivered by pre-fabricated cabinets or windows then being installed by local labor.

Cost comparisons are too good to ignore but like everything else – ‘the devil is in the detail’.   The cost comparison on cabinetwork, window joinery or the like, are often not on an equally comparative basis.  The construction details may not have been supplied or even understood by the overseas manufacturer.  If details are drawn and described by the residential builder in english with references to international standards; then there is an enormous amount of trust and faith in the overseas manufacturer ‘s english language skills to ensure that the product that arrives at site can be efficiently and economically installed.

specification substitution

A contract where the client ordered Chinese window frames for a 66% budget saving on aluminium joinery was a lesson learned.  The Chinese manufacturer misinterpreted the window height with width.  This was a costly client lesson for when the pre-assembled window frames did not fit the brickwork openings. Further exasperation resulted in the realization that all the windows were 12mm thickness toughened/tempered glass.  The project site was only designated a category N1 wind classification category not requiring toughened/tempered glass. The residential builder charged twice the labor for window installation across the building stories due to the weight. Other residential builder reports of aluminium windows leaking across multi-residential apartment projects.  Windows also arriving to site unassembled, are real contract events that will effect profitability on any residential builder project.

A residential builder client’s perceived budget savings by sourcing overseas manufacturers rather than engaging local custom cabinetmakers or window joinery fabricators, may be a false economy as they aren’t competing on equal grounds – just as the Optus Stadium playing surface is vastly different to the MCG turf.  Builder’s should take overseas online window joinery or cabinetwork procurement seriously and something that will have significant impact on business.

Online sales are here to stay with the rise of www.alibaba.com and other B2B marketplaces.  Builders should develop risk mitigation when trying to procure Chinese prefabricated products to and the consequences to budget and program. Residential builder feedback is consistent; no  amount of contract, drawings or specification matters if you’re not speaking the same, “…crack-a-lacking language…”