Spring, Early Easter, Early Daylights Savings.. - Contractor Talk - Professional Construction and Remodeling Forum

**denick** · 03-22-2008, 01:41 PM

Early profits?

It seems awful quiet around here. Everyone must be out working? An awful lot of new names registered under Site Work headings recently but not much activity here.

???????

tgeb · 03-22-2008, 02:05 PM

I for one , have been pretty busy.

Started a new project this week, a one car garage demo and then footings for a new 2 car. Poured concrete on Thursday, (ahead of schedule).

Lots of leftover loose ends from last year to get taken care of, grading and seeding work that has been too wet or too frozen to get to.

Still have more at the Temple to finish, and I have been running numbers on a few new projects. It looks like this could be a good year in spite of all the negativity in the air.

How about you Nick, back on "The Hill" yet?

I too have noticed some of the new member names are indicative of site work contractors. Jump in when ever you feel like it guys, it smells a little like grease and diesel fuel in this part of the forum.....but we don't bite.

TMatt142 · 03-22-2008, 02:27 PM

I've been around...just laying low before this next week. I'll start going to all my classes for my employers, take my driving part of my CDL...Just little things to start out the year. I'll be busy the first half just taking care of loose ends on a few of my jobs from last year. An 80ft section of sidewalk settled so I have to go back and redo all of that. I'm sure there will be some warranty work on my erosion control project since I finished it with about a foot of frost already in the ground! I know i have to get the seeders back in once the frost breaks so they can pin the rest of the blanket down to the topsoil. Just little things here and there...

Blas · 03-22-2008, 09:18 PM

Just bought a new house and moved in yesterday. I haven't had Internet for a few weeks. Things are starting to get fired up here just opened up a giant silt pit for a contractor. He didn't want to wait. I will take some pics of his lull buried to the top of the cab latter this week.

Duff · 03-23-2008, 07:51 AM

I joined this site a couple years ago in anticipation of retiring from the Navy and starting my own business. I've learned a lot from this message board and I'm grateful for that. I need to make a committment to try and give back more.

It's been a year since I started and business has been good but have had little time for much else. Working on site during the day, doing everything else at night, putting bids together, Quickbooks, maintenance and repair, etc., etc. etc. ... I've got great respect for someone who has built a business from the bottom up. Don't recommend doing at age 53!

Best advice received ... stay out of the trucking business. I registered and insured my CAT 416C for the road and have plenty of haulers to sub out that work to (no CDL, no truck costs, etc). Works well for me, thanks Denick. Another good move was renting a 20X60 high bay garage. Built a nice shop over the winter and have a warm well lighted space for doing maintenance and repair work on equipment. Getting my construction supervisors license and playing with the new grandson filled up the rest of the offseason.

I am a little worried about the economy ... that's just me. Hopefully we'll get through this mortgage mess and see things start to rebound.

ElIngeniero · 03-23-2008, 07:12 PM

Happy Easter to everyone.

Things are moving here--not very busy but that will hopefully change soon. I'm seeing a lot more work come to life (unfortunately it is not work we won the bid on!) but little to no subdivision work. We're slowly selling off all of our trucks to get out of the trucking business as it's nothing but a headache for us. We get the same rate today as we did 15+ years ago.

The one big church project we're on is on hold because we found out the permits haven't actually been received by the GC

. We began the job with a land disturbance permit and cleared the site, installed erosion control, etc. The GC told us to continue working as the plans were approved, etc. so we did so. Now 40,000 CY's of dirt later, we're ready to put in storm and can't because the city won't inspect it since there is no permit. The GC's response is simply "oops--well don't demobilize, we'll have it within a week". It's been 3 weeks and we've heard nothing so we're likely going to move onto another project this coming week and tell them to give us a call when they're ready.

rino1494 · 03-24-2008, 05:49 AM

Not much going on here. We are still in the shop, should have the dump truck all back together today. So far, we still have no work. One GC we do about 15 houses a year for, only has 2 so far. I have 1 garage and landscaping job so far. I bid a small commercial job and I am working on a bid right now for a building pad for a big pole barn. Who knows, maybe i'll have to go work for Nick.

Noodle · 03-24-2008, 07:06 PM

Hey everybody, new to the site, I work for an electrical company but, I wouldn't call myself an electrician because I do all of the underground installations and the pole base installations. Our equipment consists of a Bobcat Mini-X 334, a Cat Mini-X 306.5 I believe, two Bobcat skidsteers a S175 and a 763, and a few Ditch Witch trenchers. I hope I can comment on some of the topics as I am not involved with the "big stuff". Some days I wish I was.

Brandon

**denick** · 03-24-2008, 08:13 PM

Hi Noodle,

You are most welcome to join in where ever you would like. It's great to have you aboard.

Duff, I've been wondering how you were and if you ever made the real jump in with both feet. Great to have you around.