Estimate By Sq Foot

carterarce

When you price out a garage by the square foot are you using the square footage of all wall-space, as in all surfaces to be sided?

I priced out a garage but I don't usually use sq foot to price my jobs. new construction is sort of new to me.

Thanks!

Framer53

For what product? Siding? Framing?

AJAX

Are you talking about building a new building and quoting by the square foot?

carterarce

The entire garage.
Im reading that garage building contractors charge by the sq foot, the permit office in my city has an average price sheet and it it by the sq foot too but i don't know if I am just going off of my four walls, and to include the gables or what.

I am pretty sure i am close and the numbers seem to make sense but I wanted to go to the well to double check :-)

Thanks!

carterarce

Yes I am.

ChrWright

If you've not done it before, square foot pricing will get you in Trouble, with a capital "T".

It is usually only used as a rough guide AT THE END of the bid process. It can tell you if you've forgotten something... or if something is high out of whack. At the end of the day, there is no magic square foot number that works for every builder on every garage... or house... or kitchen... or... etc. etc. etc.

I'd be very very cautious when pricing a project you don't do very often. It's far too easy to leave out a line item and kill your margin.

To answer your question, most square foot references in regards to new construction buildings refer to the footprint of the building.

__________________

Christopher Wright, CR: President @ WrightWorks, LLC/President @ Central Indiana NARI, Named to the 2010 REMODELING Big50
www.WrightWorks.net - Facebook - Twitter - Carmel Remodeling
Indianapolis Kitchen Remodeling Contractor - You Can Get There From Here

carterarce

yeah I priced it all out the way i do remods but it cam out a little lower than what the SF price adds up to. i just don't want to way underbid my competition. In fact, I dont want to underbid them at all. This is a repeat client and he wants me to do the work but I'm not used to bidding new stuff.

Footprint. That's what i was looking for.

Ya gotta learn sometime, right?

Thanks.