What Is Included In a Home Remodeling Chicago Bid?

May is National Home Improvement Month and one thing you always hear is that the best investment you can make is to put money back in your home. By investing in your house you not only improve your quality of living in the present, but you recoup your costs (and then some) when it comes time to  put your property on the market. If you are thinking about giving a few areas of your property a facelift, you may be searching for home remodeling Chicago bids. Some homeowners still have confusion about what to ask for – or what’s included – in a bid. Here’s what you need to know:

Understanding the Different Types of Bids You Can Get

To throw a proverbial wrench in any bid confusion you may have is that there is not just one standard bid format. The two main types that contractors in our area deal with are:

    Fixed Price – you’re basically saying here’s all I want done in the project and the types of materials I want to use and the question to the contractor is, “how much can you do it for?” Fixed price bids are for a definite set cost.

    Time and Materials – a fluctuating bid that shows “here’s what your materials will cost (plus markup) and here’s what our labor charges are per hour.” With this type of bid, you get a bill for what you owe after the project is completed and material and hours are figured up.

At first glance it might seem like the fixed price bid is your best route for home remodeling Chicago. That’s not entirely true however because the only work that can be done by the contractor is what’s included in the bid. If you’re getting a new roof for example and find out the plywood sheathing is rotted and needs to be replaced – you’ll need an extra contract if it’s not in the original bid. Fixed price bids can be complex especially in renovations compared to new builds as contractors don’t know what they’re getting into until actually breaking ground on the project.

Many homeowners feel that a time and materials bid is the best way to just ensure that the home remodeling Chicago project gets done how it needs to. Plus, construction projects don’t always run into hardships. If the renovation goes even smoother than the contractor expected you may find that your time and material costs are actually lower than what they would have been at a fixed price.

What’s Actually Included In the Bid?

Once you figure out how you want to go about with the contract for the project, you also need to know what’s going to actually be included in the bid and what to look or ask for. Here are the basics:

    What’s included in the renovation

    When phases of the project will be completed

    Project costs

    How changes will be handled

One of our mottos at MG Bros Construction is to make our bids as detailed as possible so you know exactly what you’re getting. Instead of just giving a quote for ‘electrical’ for example, we tell you where the lights will be installed and the exact type that they are. We’ve found this is the best way to give our valued customers transparency and to ensure there are never any hidden fees incurred in our work.

Now that you know a bit about what’s in a bid, give us a call for a free one today!