Residential renovations suck and are not worth the fees! {PROVE ME WRONG!} 3

[human909]

A deliberately provocative title to get a conversation going. And I fully expect to be proven wrong by some nimble engineers who are more skilled and comfortable in this area that I am.

The instigation this thread is I've just returned from a site visit from a owner who is removing a load bearing wall. No architect and no builder engaged yet. I should have said no at this point, but I'm still in the growth phase of my sole practice and I still say YES to almost anybody who asks. From an engineering perspective it is just a new new roof beam, a couple of supporting studs and two localised footings as the home is on stumps. The visit was local but it is still a couple of hours by the time you communicate, commute, inspect and return. That time is all BEFORE you get into any engineering work. Then given the relatively small task, fees can't be excessively high.... But the building is 80-100years old, the risks and challenges shouldn't be ignored.

My point is that today has further made me question the benefits of bothering taking on such clients unless I am hungry for work. Today's visit just didn't seem worth any potential fees and risks. Especially since I crouched through the roof space and crawled through a floor space for a decent inspection.

Anyway that is my rant. I'm probably just too comfortable in my own area of expertise (industrial and manufacturing facilities). Both in terms of healthy fees and in my own confidence of my engineering knowledge in the industrial field.

Do others here relate to my experience? Do I just need to know when to say 'no'? Or is what I describe just bread and butter for some people?

 

[jerseyshore]

Thanks @jerseyshore those are great tips for getting new clients.

At my old job my boss would pay for leads from a website (cant remember which one it was) when we were slower, with mixed results. Interestingly, it was also his policy for clients to pay up-front for site visits by credit card before being scheduled, which cost us some projects as some people found this suspicious and/or insulting, but I think helped keep out the riff raff, especially for one-off clients.

Do any of you require payment up front or deposits? For a client I don't have a relationship with, I normally require a deposit for drawings and bigger contracts, but wondering if payment up front for the short site visits we're talking about is something you do?

We require deposits for bigger jobs.

But for $950 house-report jobs I am flexible. Most people will write you a check that day. I know some engineers who require the payment ahead of time, but I'll invoice people when the report is done probably 30% of the time. I've had maybe 1 guy not pay in the last 3 years.

If I am releasing S&S drawings to a homeowner or new contractor or something like that, then they get the drawings when I get the money.

 

[phamENG]

pay for leads from a website

I tried this when I first started. What a terrible experience that was. After some introductory period, I had to pay for the leads whether I took the job or not. Even if it turned out they didn't need a structural engineer at all, but clicked the wrong button, the lead was charged to my account. And cutting off the flow of leads (turns out nobody else in my region was doing this, so I got all of them - wonder why...) and canceling that account was its own headache. I think I had to threaten to to press charges for harassment to get them to stop calling me to reactivate.

 

[SE2607]

Thanks @jerseyshore those are great tips for getting new clients.

At my old job my boss would pay for leads from a website (cant remember which one it was) when we were slower, with mixed results. Interestingly, it was also his policy for clients to pay up-front for site visits by credit card before being scheduled, which cost us some projects as some people found this suspicious and/or insulting, but I think helped keep out the riff raff, especially for one-off clients.

Do any of you require payment up front or deposits? For a client I don't have a relationship with, I normally require a deposit for drawings and bigger contracts, but wondering if payment up front for the short site visits we're talking about is something you do?

I usually charge for a site visit for a new client or home owner. I usually don't with my regular clients.
Yes, I always get a deposit (retainer). Getting paid quickly is one of the advantages of small residential remodel projects with contractors and home owners.

 

[Eng16080]

Do any of you require payment up front or deposits? For a client I don't have a relationship with, I normally require a deposit for drawings and bigger contracts, but wondering if payment up front for the short site visits we're talking about is something you do?

For a new client, I typically require a 25% or 33% deposit up front.

I had a policy for awhile where I'd require 100% payment up front if I got a bad feeling about the client/project. I've since changed that though. Now, if I get a bad feeling about the client/project, I simply don't take the project!

 

[Eng16080]

To answer the original question, residential renovation projects are often worth it for me. Sometimes it's even nice after working on a full plan set for a new build, detailing everything, where now I only have a few details where a load bearing wall is being replaced by a beam.

 

[EdStainless]

Many moons ago I was a draftsman for a structural engineer.
He tried to avoid all residential work, but if it was a good client he would do it for them.
At the same time our bread and butter was truss design.
But this work was nearly all for truss companies.
They had to accept that he was going to do what he thought was needed and bill them accordingly.
We did a house that was owned by a corporation.
It was used for executives on temporary assignment and they needed a second floor added for a child's bedroom.
When we saw the hand painted silk wallpaper we raised our rate.

 

[phamENG]

When we saw the hand painted silk wallpaper we raised our rate.

Glorious.

 

[SE2607]

CAD for residential is my nightmare. I have zero blocks and details of my own work. I've leaned heavily on details passed down from a retiree. But with different work flows they aren't as useful for me as they were for him. I've managed to stay away from CAD for most of my work. My clients have a CAD team and I so often I can avoid formal structural drawings. (I cut my teeth with 3D CAD modelling so I'm no stranger, but I try to avoid it when I can now.)

If you don't want to do CAD work, I recommend hiring someone, even if it's a remote hire (consultant). You will have more control over the construction documents and you can put your title block on it showing the customer that the architect isn't the one providing structural engineering services. Two birds, one stone.

 

[JoshPlumSE]

I've thought for a long time that the engineers who do residential work (in general), but remodel work in particular..... They work way harder for lower fees than the rest of us.

There are caveats, of course. If you're working for a mega wealthy client that's not sensitive to cost, that would be better. But, you're usually working for a client that doesn't see value in the engineering, they'd prefer to just have their contractor have at it without an engineer. Then you've got lots of issues with rules about what can be built, how close, how tall. You've got neighbors objecting.

That's just my opinion from someone who's dabbled in for small projects here and there. I've done a couple of patio covers, and pool related structures, deck additions and such. Those weren't so bad. But, it was a lot of work for a relatively low fee.

 

[jerseyshore]

I've thought for a long time that the engineers who do residential work (in general), but remodel work in particular..... They work way harder for lower fees than the rest of us.

Small residential is just like anything else IMO. You can get killed on a $250k commercial project or a $1250 kitchen beam project. But the advantage of the lower fee is that if you spend double the time on a house project, it's not really that much time lost. Maybe you assumed 2 hours and it took 4. But you can make that up easily on the next one.

But, you're usually working for a client that doesn't see value in the engineering, they'd prefer to just have their contractor have at it without an engineer.

Maybe it's the type of jobs we get, but I rarely feel this working for homeowners. Someone calls us because they need us. It's not like I'm ambulance chasing the building inspector for failed stickers and offering my services.

That's just my opinion from someone who's dabbled in for small projects here and there. I've done a couple of patio covers, and pool related structures, deck additions and such. Those weren't so bad. But, it was a lot of work for a relatively low fee.

Efficiency and experience is key in our business regardless of project type. The thread last week about who does what calculations in residential shows how quick you can knock out a house framing plan without grinding on every single member size.

Someone who does steel design is going to look at a plan and say 5x5 tubes aren't going to work for that moment frame. Someone who does wood design knows exactly how far triple 2x12 PT deck girders can span. The more you do a certain type of project or design the less "work" it ends up being.

 

[human909]

Again thanks all for the replies.

These are my bread and butter. For easy ones I charge about $750 USD. Try to combine 2 or 3 in a day and not travel more than 20 miles from my office. The site visits are usually 20 minutes and the engineering and drafting or a letter is about 30 minutes. Honestly, I do the engineering on my calculator while on site so I can communicate the beam size options to the customer. I charge more for more complicated ones.

Good too know. Yeah the engineering involved in the job in my example was pretty minimal. The 'harder stuff' for me was dealing with the footings (the house is on stumps) and dealing with the unknowns. But this is probably only 'hard' due to my lower experience with these jobs.

There's plenty of headaches in dealing with one-off clients and homeowners, but every day is exciting, different, and gives me the opportunity to put my best foot forward in many respects.

I get plenty of excitement from my manufacturing and industrial experience. But I can understand that this sort of residential is more interesting than dry and cookie cutter commercial/industrial/infrastructure projects.

But I've found it sort of needs to be an all or nothing, at least for me.

I'm thinking nothing for me. But it is too early for me to throw in the towel on these. Like I said I am still facing a learning curve here. My other stuff is dialled in well and lucrative.

If you don't want to do CAD work, I recommend hiring someone, even if it's a remote hire (consultant). You will have more control over the construction documents and you can put your title block on it showing the customer that the architect isn't the one providing structural engineering services. Two birds, one stone.

Certainly something I'd consider if I did plenty of residential. Currently, I don't have enough jobs that need suitable CAD support. And in my world architects can't do engineering services so I don't have that issue.

For my bread and butter work, my industrial clients. They are happy with steel wireframe, connection details and a 3d model review and/or fabrication drawing review.

I've thought for a long time that the engineers who do residential work (in general), but remodel work in particular..... They work way harder for lower fees than the rest of us.
......
That's just my opinion from someone who's dabbled in for small projects here and there. I've done a couple of patio covers, and pool related structures, deck additions and such. Those weren't so bad. But, it was a lot of work for a relatively low fee.

That is my feeling. But again I'd put most of that down to my lower experience in this area and many of the comments do support that.

 

[JoshPlumSE]

Jersey Shore: Efficiency and experience is key in our business regardless of project type. The thread last week about who does what calculations in residential shows how quick you can knock out a house framing plan without grinding on every single member size.

I was partly thinking of the complexity of detailing and load paths and such. With a steel project, we tend to use the same details over and over again. It's probably similar with wood. But, the load paths are all over the place and you have to think through a lot of things. How to get load from the diaphragm into the struts (or vice versa)..... The load paths just get messy. For steel (and concrete) they're usually pretty clean and straightforward.

 

[SE2607]

For steel (and concrete) they're usually pretty clean and straightforward.

Steel structures are sooooo easy.

 

[SE2607]

If you're working for a mega wealthy client that's not sensitive to cost, that would be better.

Those are the only ones I'm working with. It's nice when the economy is going well. When it gets tough, I'm flexible enough to go with the "bottom feeders".

But, you're usually working for a client that doesn't see value in the engineering, they'd prefer to just have their contractor have at it without an engineer. Then you've got lots of issues with rules about what can be built, how close, how tall. You've got neighbors objecting.

I try to weed those out. Not always successful, but being picky is the key.

 

[Euler07]

3. Ask your client what he/she thinks the job is worth before you write your proposal

Thanks for this tip. Would you be able to elaborate on methods of doing this? Do you simply ask directly, or do you have a round about way of getting this info? Do you have any other tips on the sales aspect of engineering consulting? I've been trying to learn this recently but it's so completely out of my training...

I have one consultant/mentor on speed dial that I occasionally call advice. He is the only person I know who I'd dare suggest wear a title of 'genius'. He had a national wide business that he owned and ran. But he sold out and went back to work for himself and have his son alongside. He didn't want to run a company, he wanted to continue to be a great engineer.

I also know someone that fits this description exactly, maybe it's the same person . It sounds as though we're in complementary fields, maybe it would benefit both of us to get in touch.

Do any of you require payment up front or deposits? For a client I don't have a relationship with, I normally require a deposit for drawings and bigger contracts, but wondering if payment up front for the short site visits we're talking about is something you do?

For one-off clients I always get them to pay up front before starting any work.

Anyway, for this type of work my tips would be:
- Get photos of the walls and inside the roof space before quoting. This will tell you whether it's steel truss, timber truss, or timber stick. Look at google street view to determine if it's timber or brick walls, timber stump or slab. This will affect the quote.
- Get original drawings if possible, showing exactly which walls are being removed. Sometimes owners will say they need a simple wall removal, but not think it's relevant to say it's on the ground floor of a 3 storey supporting concrete beams.
- In my experience, this type of work is lower pay. Due to being business-to-consumer instead of business-to-business. Also, there is a lot of wasted time because of non-return clients and the constant need to quote and teach the client.

I have a lot of experience with this type of work, so feel free to dm me.

 

[BDE Engineering]

Personally, I despise renovations as well, unless they are simple. Like load bearing wall removal is usually pretty easy and straight forward. There are a ton of the little rectangular 1 story ranch houses w/ a load bearing wall down the middle in my area. They are always looking to remove part of the wall between the kitchen and living room. I've done so many I know what they look like before I even step in the door. I can be in and out in 15-30 mins. We throw in a LVL with a stud pack and blocking to the steel beam below and from the stl beam to a new footing below. I can do a set of drawings that already have the standard details in it in about 1 hr, 2 tops, since I only need to draw the area of the house being worked on. So I can knock one of those super simple inspection & drawings out before lunch for $850. Occasionally they don't want the new posts and footings in the basement, then we have to design the existing steel beam and have them field verify footing sizes and that is more labor intensive and costly, but not bad. Honestly, If you're used to commercial or industrial it feels like it's not worth it, but once you do enough you can knock them out pretty quick. I get a mix of commercial and residential. Thankfully my residential is mostly new-build.

 

[human909]

I also know someone that fits this description exactly, maybe it's the same person . It sounds as though we're in complementary fields, maybe it would benefit both of us to get in touch.

.....


have a lot of experience with this type of work, so feel free to dm me.

DM sent... You can also email me if you wish using my name on this forum at gmail. The 'genius' engineer I described earlier has the initials. AB. If you know him I'd be quite curious how.