Need Advice - Have To Hire A GC For Fitout Work

Knyte260

I own a small contracting business, specializing in pavers/walks/patios/etc, but I also run another business as well that I just purchased a building for. The building is 12,600 sq ft, 7600 of which is 35' ceiling warehouse, and 4800 which is offices (split into 2400 sq ft floors). The building is new construction, and it has 10' drop ceiling lights/vents/etc/ outlets already installed. I need to have a GC come in and prepare my ONE floor quickly for my people to move here and start working (I currently lease elsewhere for this business).

The work that needs to be done is a basic floorplan of 7 offices, each with mid range expense doors/windows.

Thirteen cat6 outlets.
Twenty electrical outlets.
A couple of the light fixtures in the drop ceiling moved to fit proper in my office layout.
A few new vents.
A few existing vents moved to fit inside office layout.
All lights reswitched for each office.
Framework that needs to tie in above the drop ceiling to the rafters or something (which looks fairly complex).

Give or take 2000 sq ft of 26oz commercial carpet.
All painted.

I talked to a friend of mine in the business who does this type of general contracting, he quoted me 37k. He is going to get the job done in 4 weeks, with a 250$ penalty per business day past that.

I'm not sure this price is all too good, and if there are any GC's from this forum in the Philadelphia suburb area interested, or anyone that could give me some advice, I'd appreciate it. I almost want to tackle this job myself with my hardscaping crew, but I'm worried that being this is our first serious framing work, we may have delays.



What should I do? By the way, I settle on this building Aug 17th, and would like to start fitout immediately thereafter.

Thanks everyone in advance, I'm sure many of you can give some input.

-Chris

Knyte260

This friend of mine by the way is a guy who I know to be not completely reliable, but I figured would be a good guy to go to in order to get this done quickly, and as cheap as possible. He isn't high quality at all. I know this sounds like a bad thing to say, or bad for me to be thinking about having him do it, but I'm a little tight being the building down payment was in the several hundred k range.

Take this into account when considering he is bidding 37k. He also pushed me to slide him cash for this, which immediately is making me less comfortable. I've done other contracts with him for the 10-15k range, and still had a couple issues arise each time.

Mike Finley

Based on this:

I would say go with plan B and do it yourself. You probably at worst will only F#ck it up as bad as he will, and at least you will have nobody to blame but yourself.

Teetorbilt

I'm with Mike, the cash end sounds really slimey. Good way to lose quite a bit of money.
I still work with a few guys that I have known since grade school, a lOOOOOOOng time ago. We continue to work on a professional basis.

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Knyte260

How do these prices sound?

ConcreteGuy

All you seem to need is a licensed electrician.

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A reasonable expectation becomes an assumption when it goes wrong.

Knyte260

I also need a framer to build the walls and hang doors/windows, a carpet installed throughout, and the full office to be painted.

Maybe higher separate people for each thing? Just handle it all myself?

Shawn

Time for new friends.

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Shawn
www.sdcarpentry.com

Neil_K

I agree with GCMan. However, make sure they are certified to pull CAT6 cable. I've had guys show up saying they can only to pull out a continuity tester. You may pay extra for "certified".

From a cost standpoint, I had 12 CAT5 runs done a few years ago in Pittsburgh area and because they were "unionized" I had bids in the 2200-2400 range for the data pulls, jacks, face plates, patch panel and rack. One of the employees had a friend from church do it for $1800, great job too. However, in the Charlotte, NC area I would have done it for about $1200-$1500. Drop ceiling and hollow walls=easy work.

The framers and painters can bid work, but if its minor I'd agree on an hourly rate. Carpet separate. I bet you've got negiotiating power if there's no furniture in the office when they carpet.

catalfanoc

that sounds like a some what straight forward job i might be able to help ya out or atleast give ya advice. I am from the philly suburbs Flourtown to be exact which is about 15 min outside philly. I do lots of work like that in the city, such as converting houses in to apartments and retail stores and so on. So if you want you can give me a call at 267-767-1839. At the least i could point ya in the right direction or give ya a couple numbers of people who could help.