Structural Consulting Fee's 1

[SWEG]

I am wondering what you all typically charge for structural engineering design fee's for general building design and construction (primarily east coast, mid-Atlantic region)?

When quoting a project for a client do you typically use a percentage of the construction cost for the structural engineering services? Does this fee include all phases of design and CA tasks (reviewing shop drawings, RFI's and site visits)? If not, what extra do you typically charge?

Finally, when you break down time allocation for different tasks within a project, what percentage of man hours do you allocate to different tasks (engineering, drafting, admin/clerical)? I've typically heard 40 man hours per full size sheet, and 1/3 of hours goes to drafting and admin while the other 2/3 is engineering time.

Thanks for any and all input.

 

[XR250]

40 hours for a full sheet sounds high to me. It usually ends up being about $2000 - $3000 for each full size sheet i produce.
I typically do all jobs hourly and charge $160 for design, drafting, site visits and correspondence. I do not charge for admin.
I am located in central NC.

 

[DaveAtkins]

Determining the number of hours required to provide the engineering services is a better way of developing a fee proposal.

Here is why. On a relatively simple, new building project, the structural engineering fee will probably be between 1/2% and 1% of the construction cost. However, on a remodeling project, I have seen a structural engineering fee as high as 20% of the construction cost. A lot depends on the services you offer during the construction phase as well.

And I have found number of sheets of drawings doesn't always correlate to fee either.

DaveAtkins

 

[SLTA]

It also depends on what type of client you're working for. I do most of my work straight for homeowners or small businesses, and where I live, they balk at higher rates. I too charge hourly, though a bit less than ExcelEngineering, and that same rate covers everything (except for forensic work - that's a different rate for investigation and then again for deposition/testimony). I'm in Western NC.

Hey Excel - cheers from the mountains! We lived in Greensboro for a while, about 10 years ago, and have been over here since.

Please remember: we're not all guys!

 

[BUGGAR]

Generally, I find clients ultimately decide based on the total cost you quote them. But they seem to like it when your hourly rate is low, even if your total price is high. Justifying all the hours you will need in engineering terminology will usually glaze their eyes and they just go back to the total cost. But they do like it when you make less per hour than they do.

 

[SteelPE]

I mostly follow the DaveAtkins approach with trying to figure out the amount of time it would take to do the work and then multiplying it by your hourly rate. I usually include CA in my proposals...... but have run into some bad luck lately with this (reviewing show drawings 3-4 times, lingering construction causing more site visits than anticipated) and am considering altering my approach.

FYI, some engineers frown upon providing proposals to clients. However, if you are just starting out I don't know how else get into the business.

 

[MJB315]

Aren't engineers ethically bound to provide written proposals in some states? I think you would need to be very close to a client on a small project to want to do a job without a proposal / agreement first.

"We shape our buildings, thereafter they shape us." -WSC

 

[SteelPE]

MJB I don't know about that, but their are plenty of holier than thou people on this forum who say they would never provide a proposal to a client. If they were requested to provide a proposal they would:

A: be offended
B: refuse to do work with the client

I don't think these people work in our segment of the industry though.

On small emergency projects, I will sometimes not provide a written proposal to the client to expedite the work.

 

[canwesteng]

We do 100 hours per sheet, up to maybe 140 hours. This is in brownfield industrial environments, so the drawings end up being quite full. These threads are interesting but pretty useless since so much differs from project to project.

 

[glass99]

I know for my work there is a crazy variation in $/sheet, so its not possible to use as a benchmark for setting fees. We have completed jobs for between $1,000 and $16,000/sheet. It depends heavily on the ancillary services per sheet.

Why would any engineer not want to do a proposal?

 

[Ingenuity]

Why would any engineer not want to do a proposal?

I am not sure, either. Qualification-based selection, unethical to compete based upon fees, other? No idea.

Interested in the rationale.

 

[EngineeringEric]

We typically calculate how long we anticipate the job will take from Engineering. Upfront time, Gravity time, Lateral Time, Present SD, DD, 90%, Foundation Details, X-details per level, then how long it would take to draft all that per item (usually twice as long as the calc at a minimum but a lower rater), then i typically multiply all of that by 25% as it always takes longer than i think. Then compare to cost per sheet basis and construction fee. As others say the general percent/sheet cost for all new simple building is far less than a remodel.

We recently did a rebuild of a building that the center burnt down... Spent as much time dealing with design as we did with Insurance consulting and even more time measuring in the field. This means the cost was really high per sheet. I think in hindsight our total fee was 13k per sheet.

CA we bill as cost plus with an estimate of time based on engineering fee and construction. Typically if Engr fee was too low for great drawings and coordination time then CA increases.

 

[glass99]

I do my estimates by breaking down the tasks involved and allocating time to each. A typical task list will be meetings, sketches/thinking, analysis, drawings, specifications, site visits, out of town travel, phone discussions, administration, information search and reports. For me, drafting is less than a quarter of the whole. On a renovation job in particular, CA can be half the work.

 

[medeek]

Wow, you guys are throwing around some big numbers. Typically I can't get more than $300-$400 out of residential job in my neck of the woods. Usually one of these jobs will only take me a couple of days to complete (one structural drawing with an accompanying calc. report) so I guess it isn't too bad but higher numbers would be nice.

 

[glass99]

In my previous life as a bridge engineer people talked about 100hrs per sheet, and people were grumpy about it because in the "good old days" it used to be like 150hr/sheet.

Brand name architects in LA I am presently working with seem to spend on a lobby renovation about 150hr/sheet.

 

[canwesteng]

$300-400 a sheet? That's like 3-4 hours max, we spend more time than that checking a drawing.

 

[oldrunner]

Well you can go ahead and provide a detailed proposal and let your possible client shop it around.

 

[jayrod12]

Medeek,

That's generally how residential goes. No contractor wants to pay what the time is actually worse. We do all of our residential work at an hourly rate up to a maximum. The maximum is based on our estimation of how long it will actually take.

 

[Signious]

In my area the typical residential report goes from $350 (something like an eccentric pad footing) to $2500+ for complex tall wall systems, full ICF designs, ext...

For example - that tall wall you posted about a little while back, Medeek, I would have charged something in the order of $700.

The key is dynamic pricing! It is easy to charge $750 for work on a 2M house for the same design you would charge 350 for on a 500k house.

 

[RFreund]

Glass, I'm envious of your work.

EIT

http://www.HowToEngineer.com