Basement Question!

[Tommjr]

I have the opportunity to bid a development of a 100+ Single Family Homes.

The question is, Does anyone out there give a significant discount for mass excavation?

The average basement here W/ tracking pad is about $5500.00

How much of a discount? If any?

How much are basements in other areas?

What are other formulas for estimating? (need some advice)


Thanks for all the help!

[tylermckee]

Whats the foot print of the average house, and how deep do you have to dig? How long does it take?

[90plow]

You can figure in cost of trucking saved by having the machine on one site and workign by the basement not the day. Your machine can be used 8-10 hours a day instead of tow to job dig basement leave machine on job not working or tow home. Things to think about.
Eric

[Tommjr]

The average footprint is a 1350 sq ft walkout w/ poured walls. (9 Ft depth).

It normally takes 6-9 hours to dig. (pending soil boring results)

What formulas do you guys normally use to bid? (Total yds removed x $)

[Ford LT-9000]

You have to go all by the hour if you bid it and you run into problems you will lose big time. You can't rush on digging a basement everything has to be even and square so you should have your laser level set up to check depths.

Most places where I live don't have below grade basements unless you want to spend 10 grand on blasting.

If you are going to spend say a week digging basements its not so bad but if your only doing one at a time once a week then you may want to walk away from that deal.

It all depends I guess if the project manager wants the risk of having swimming pools on the jobsite when it rains.

[hillrancher]

Tommjr: here in my part of the earth I give a bid so much an cu. yd. spoil stacked on site. Extra hauled away. Give the hp of machine to be used if this machine will not dig it it goes to cost plus, this is to cover if we hit rock and also we charge for excess tooth wear, Backhoe gets one set per day, Ex. get 1/2 set per day. When we go to cost plus we add 20%. Last year we did 25 basement in one development. They ran about $275.00 less by working close this way. We used a dozer and excavator together to do them, there was no spoil hauled away. Most of our deep sides are 6 to 7 feet for a 9 ft wall and day-lit out on bottom.

[dayexco]

we don't deal with rock out here. i would never dig a basement by the hour. all by the yard. we can make quite a bit more money here by the yard typically than we could at the average going hourly rate here

[Squizzy246B]

One thing to note is the job site coordination and the project manager. Some of these jobs are great when you have a good project manager that plans on keeping the machines working (result of hourly hire deals). You quote on having unfettered access and availability, all lined up ready to go and make a killing. The reality is that sometimes that doesn't happen and you can't get a good run at the work and make some real money.

The soil type will be your biggest factor to take into consideration.

[Dwan Hall]

Here I dig by the hour. There is no way to loose money that way. The customer gets what he pays for and I get paid for what I do. Sure I could make more on some jobs but I could also loose my a$$ on others if bid by the job. By the hour the equipment makes its replacement money, overhead is covered I make a good wage, and the company makes a good profit.
One day I may be diging in muskeg, the next day it may be rock, or on the beach. today it is on a hill side around a bunch of utilities and very slow going.
As far as a discount for more then 1 job in the same area, the coustomer saves the delivery charge for each site, plus the job can over lap saving the customer time and money. I beleave that is enough of a discount. I will offer a discount though for payment recieved within 10 days of billing. Seems I uasualy always get paid in full within that 10 days.

Dwan