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re: Is there a more shady, legal industry than residential construction?
Posted on 8/18/23 at 8:25 am to StrongOffer
Posted on 8/18/23 at 8:25 am to StrongOffer
quote:
Tow truck companies.
Pour one out for Big Lee.
Then hose it down.
0
Posted on 8/18/23 at 8:28 am to Mariner
quote:
They all have a short term mindset. They go after the most money available to them at the present moment, and take on projects without thinking through scheduling and balance of clients. They don’t think about establishing a reputation first which is when the money will come. In fact I don’t think that many of them care about their reputation.
Well if that’s true they won’t stay in business for long. I love when people make generalizations like this and have no idea what they are talking about.
I graduated college into the recession. We saw a lot of large commercial subs go under during that time. In about the 2010-2011 timeframe, a lot of guys that worked for those big vendors decided to start their own businesses using the contacts they had made. Many did excellent work too. But a whole bunch couldn’t manage cash flow for a lemonade stand. I did a job in 2012 in NOLA where I had to replace all but two of my finish subs. The only guys to finish the job were my HVAC and plumber. The framing and finish contractor literally closed up shop in the middle of the night, turned off phones, emptied his office. Tough to make money when you’re paying other guys to come finish work.
The fact is that this type of behavior won’t sustain a business for long. A lot of these guys can pull volume from natural disasters but eventually that runs out and bad cash flow management catches up with them.
The industry has changed significantly in the last twenty years. There used to be large vendors that had volume to sustain a large workforce. That’s much rarer now. Add to the fact that young people don’t want to go into trades, and now you have this huge shortage of workers too. I talked to a fairly large HVAC vendor the other day and his number one issue right now is finding guys that want to come to work. You can’t stop taking jobs, and you try to manage thru it best you can.
Running a business is hard. The work is easy. Most of the time you just have to build what the picture shows. But it amazes me how many people think subs or gc’s just roll out of bed in the morning and wipe their asses with loose Benjamins.
Posted on 8/18/23 at 8:35 am to Chef Curry
We went through the build out process for a 1750 sq ft retail space that we lease. GCs first sub began work in late July 2022 and last work was completed in June 2023. Now, I personally have a favorable opinion of my GC as a person; however, as a business guy, he was frustrating as hell. He couldn't keep a schedule or proper plan for the appropriate stages of construction. In the end, I acted as the GC for most of the subs. In his defense, he nor I could get the subs to live up to their promises. I would act as my own GC if I had to do it all over again and we would have been done at least four months earlier at much lower cost. For example, the HVAC sub's crew was from Houston (about four hours away) and actually showed up according to schedule but brought flex duct for my project instead of the rigid duct as clearly described on the architect's plans and easily noticed as ceiling is exposed. Easy two week delay. They show up two weeks later and my GC failed to tell them they couldn't access the site due to other issues. They were pissed (rightfully so) after driving four hours for nothing. Bam another two week delay. They should up two weeks later and don't have all of the necessary parts and play dumb saying they didn't know my plans called for ducts in the raised floor when I clearly addressed this specific feature the first time I spoke with them and referenced this feature on a specific page of the plans. Bam increased cost due to a so-called change order and another two week delay.
Overall, the entire industry is effed up and covid didn't help one bit. I know quite a few GCs that retired or left the industry during covid because labor supply along with supply chain, etc got all effed up and they didn't care to deal with people anymore. Industry lost a lot of experience and man power over the past few years.
Overall, the entire industry is effed up and covid didn't help one bit. I know quite a few GCs that retired or left the industry during covid because labor supply along with supply chain, etc got all effed up and they didn't care to deal with people anymore. Industry lost a lot of experience and man power over the past few years.
This post was edited on 8/18/23 at 8:40 am
Posted on 8/18/23 at 9:35 am to elprez00
quote:
A lot of these guys can pull volume from natural disasters but eventually that runs out and bad cash flow management catches up with them.
This is exactly what I am saying. They just chase money and don’t think about the long term and reputation of the business.
I renovated my house a few years ago. Contractor started, then Ida hit. Contractor is now MIA for a few months with subs showing up at the house every couple weeks and doing an hour or two of work just to show that they are present. What was supposed to only take three months (in his confident words) took eight. I would get excuse after excuse and finger pointing for several of those months.
What he did not know was that I eventually want to get in the investment property business, and want a reliable contractor to renovate homes. When things dry up they go down with the ship, when they could have repeat clients who you can use to hedge during tough times.
I won’t use him again, and when anyone asks for a contractor I don’t mention his business.
Posted on 8/18/23 at 9:42 am to dewster
quote:
1. Tech start ups
My #1 is big tech companies of the sort that advertise during golf tournaments. You know, the ads with a young Asian chick pointing confidently at a whiteboard while CGI electricity flows through CGI clouds and whatnot.
Those companies are full of absolute scumbags. They will never admit they can't do something, because their business plan is to have terrible engineers in India throw together whatever you ask for on demand and then act like it was a "solution" they had all along as part of their super-proprietary whiz-bang "platform."
If you want crappy code thrown together at breakneck speed in a mediocre computer language, just skip the golf tournament wackjobs and let your own people write it. They won't do any worse, particularly if they were actually born in the US.
This post was edited on 8/18/23 at 9:43 am
Posted on 8/18/23 at 10:14 am to Beef Supreme
quote:
The hardest check to get is the check at the end of the job when the bank loan for the homeowners has run out and they have to come out of pocket to pay for their balance or changes, overbudgets, additions, etc.
we had to write a $20k check out of pocket for our whole home remodel after the bank floated an extra 10%.
i was there every day for the remodel, so it's not like we got completely F'd but it did sting.
We also gave it to them after 4 days of living back in the completed home because we wanted to make sure they came back for the fixes.
Posted on 8/18/23 at 1:39 pm to SlowFlowPro
No, they simply abuse people & Louisiana law to create wealth
Posted on 8/18/23 at 2:09 pm to Chef Curry
Animal rescue. There are some amazing rescues out there and I support a couple. But there are more frauds and more bad than good. These people live off of those donations and the law does nothing about it when busted. Or kill and bury the carcasses and get away with it. It’s weekly it seems, these days.
Posted on 8/18/23 at 3:57 pm to Chef Curry
Delete
This post was edited on 8/20/23 at 8:23 am
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